METAPHOR (TASK 4)

Metaphor

            A metaphor is described as “a figure of speech that makes a comparison between two things that are basically dissimilar. In other words, it describes one thing in terms of another. It is comparative, and thus goes beyond a mere descriptive adjective. A metaphor describes one object as being or having the characteristics of a second object. Unlike a simile, a metaphor “does not use connective words such as like, as, or resembles in making the comparison. Example of metaphor include life is a dream describing life in terms of a dream, the foundation of knowledge. A metaphor that is extended throughout a poem or story, and may involve further related comparisons, is an extended metaphor. If we use a metaphor so often that we don't realize it, the phrase may become a dead metaphor. Sometimes metaphor is defined in very broad terms, and is used as another term for figurative language or figure of speech. In this sense, metaphorical language incorporates all comparative language, including similes and symbols. However, it is safer to use the more formal phrase figurative language. It can be argued that human communication is intrinsically metaphorical, and that human communication as we know it couldn't exist without metaphor. Some have argued that our most essential mental concepts time and space are inherently suffused with metaphorical descriptions, so that the way we think, what we experience, and what we do every day is very much a matter of metaphor. It does seem that metaphors are part of our everyday discourse.

(San Diego. 1985.)

Conceptual metaphor, some theorists have suggested that metaphors are not merely stylistic, but that they are cognitively important as well. In Metaphors Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, argue that metaphors are pervasive in everyday life, not just in language, but also in thought and action. A common definition of a metaphor can be described as a comparison that shows how two things that are not alike in most ways are similar in another important way. They explain how a metaphor simply understands and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another. The authors call this concept a conduit metaphor. By this they meant that a speaker can put ideas or objects into words or containers, and then send them along a channel, or conduit, to a listener who takes that idea or object out of the container and makes meaning of it. In other words, communication is something that ideas go into. The container is separate from the ideas themselves. Metaphors are widely used in context to describe personal meaning. The authors also suggest that communication can be viewed as a machine: Communication is not what one does with the machine, but is the machine itself.

(Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1985.)

Bibliography

University of Chicago Press (2003), Metaphor. Available at:

http://learn.lexiconic.net/metaphor.htm (Accessed 10.6.2013).

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CORRECTION

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