6.0 PRELIMINARY REMARKS

M etaphorical expressions are so common and widespread that people hardly ever notice the omnipresence in discourse of metaphor and its indispensableness when explaining some abstract concept, especially to children. The examples and stories we tell children, in fact, are essentially metaphorical narratives. These allow us to make abstractions communicable to children in concrete ways. No wonder, then, that interest in metaphor has become so widespread in those disciplines studying the human mind.

Although interest in figurative language is ancient, the experimental study of its relation to cognition and communication is a relatively recent phenomenon. And it has soared. Indeed, since about the mid-1950s the amount of linguistic and psychological research on metaphor has been mind-boggling. A while back, the literary scholar Booth (1979: 23) remarked that if one were to count the number of bibliographical entries on metaphor published in the year 1977 alone, one would be forced to surmise that by the year 2039 there would be “more students of metaphor on Earth than people.” The first effort to provide a bibliographical basis to the burgeoning scientific study of metaphor was Warren Shibbles’ mammoth 1971 volume Metaphor: An Annotated Bibliography and History, which contained some 4,000 entries. In 1985 Noppen compiled an exhaustive bibliography of post-1970 publications, which he updated in 1990 with Hols (Noppen 1985, Noppen and Hols 1990). But despite the enormous amount of interest in metaphor among scholars, by and large people still think of metaphor as a stylistic device of poets and writers for decorating messages or making them more effective. Nothing could be farther from the truth. If the recent scientific work on metaphor is even partially correct, then metaphor can no longer be viewed as verbal ornamentation. On the contrary, it is the sum and substance of abstract thinking. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson (1980: 3) put it as follows:

Metaphor is for most people a device of the poetic imagination and the rhetorical flourish—a matter of extraordinary rather than ordinary language. Moreover, metaphor is typically viewed as characteristic of language alone, a matter of words rather than thought and action. . . We have found, on the contrary, that metaphor is pervasive in everyday life, not just in language but in thought and action.

In this chapter, our trip through the cultural landscape brings us to the site where Homo metaphoricus resides. Semioticians have always known about the unique signifying power of this ancestor of Homo culturalis. But, as mentioned, it is only in the last few decades that the same view of metaphor has been spreading to other scholarly domains. The study of metaphor, sometimes called metaphorology, has always been a major branch of semiotics.

6.1 WHAT IS METAPHOR?

From ancient times to today, the use of figures of speech, or tropes , has been seen primarily as a stylistic strategy employed by orators and writers to strengthen and embellish their orations and compositions. In addition to metaphor—which is defined traditionally as the use of a word or phrase denoting one kind of idea or object in place of another word or phrase for the purpose of suggesting a likeness between the two (e.g. “Love is a rose”)—rhetoricians have identified the following primary tropes:

Since the 1970s, the trend in linguistics and psychology has been to consider metaphor, metonymy, synecdoche, and irony as manifestations of separate cognitive processes, rather than as types of tropes. As will become evident in this chapter, the reason for this is that they are manifestations of how the mind probably produces abstract concepts.

Aristotle was the one who coined the term metaphor—itself a metaphor ( meta “beyond” + pherein “to carry”). The great Greek philosopher saw the power of metaphorical reasoning in how it allowed people to produce knowledge. However, he affirmed that, as knowledge-productive as it was, its primary function was stylistic, a trope used by orators and writers to spruce up their more prosaic and literal ways of communicating. Remarkably, this latter position became the rule by which metaphor came to be judged in Western society. But as a seminal 1977 study by Pollio, Barlow, Fine, and Pollio showed clearly, Aristotle’s former view was in effect the correct one. Those researchers documented the fact that speakers of English uttered, on average, 3,000 novel verbal metaphors and 7,000 idioms per week. Shortly thereafter, it became clear to scientists that metaphor was hardly an optional flourish on literal language. On the contrary, they started to discover that it actually mirrored the cognitive processes that underlie abstract concepts.

Defining metaphor semiotically poses an interesting dilemma. In the metaphor “The professor is a snake,” there are two referents, not one, which are related to each other:

Thus, since each referent is itself a sign (professor = [A₁ ≡ B₁, snake = [A₂ ≡ B₂), metaphor can be defined as a complex sign manifesting the following representational structure:

{[A₁ ≡ B₁] ≡ [A₂ ≡ B₂]}

However, it is not the denotative meaning of the vehicle that is transferred to the topic, but rather its connotations and annotations. So, the [A₂ ≡ B₂] in the above formula does not stand denotatively for snake, but rather for the culture-based characteristics perceived in snakes, namely [B₂ = “slyness,” “danger,” “slipperiness,” . . . ]. It is this complex system of historically-inherited connotations that are mapped onto the topic. So, in effect, in metaphor the connotations of [B₂] replace the denotative meaning of the topic. Metaphor can now be defined formally as the relation:

[A₁ ≡ B₂], where B₂ = connotative meanings associated with A₂

Metaphor reveals a basic tendency of the human mind to think of certain referents in terms of others. The question now becomes: Is there any psychological motivation for this? In the case of “The professor is a snake,” the probable reason for correlating two apparently unrelated referents seems to be the de facto perception that humans and animals are interconnected in the natural scheme of things. Indeed, as we shall see in this chapter, metaphor is the strongest evidence that exists in support of what we have called the interconnectedness principle in this book. It reveals a knack in humans for establishing similarities among dissimilar things, interconnecting them within mind-space. Among the first to point this out was Vico (chapter 2, §2.1). Before Vico, metaphor was viewed as a manifestation of analogy (chapter 3, §3.7). Analogy is an inductive form of reasoning that asserts that if two or more entities are similar in one or more respects, then a probability exists that they will be similar in other respects. For Vico, on the other hand, metaphor was hardly a manifestation of analogical reasoning; it revealed how humans go about creating analogies.

6.2 CONCEPTUAL METAPHOR

The first modern-day researchers to argue on a scientific basis that metaphors are the data that reveal how abstract thinking occurs were the linguist George Lakoff and the philosopher Mark Johnson in their groundbreaking 1980 book, Metaphors We Live By. Lakoff and Johnson documented meticulously the presence of metaphor in everyday thought and discourse, thus disavowing the mainstream view within linguistics that metaphorical utterances were simple figurative alternatives to literal ways of speaking. According to the traditional account of discourse in linguistics, an individual would purportedly try out a literal interpretation first when s/he hears a sentence, choosing a metaphorical one only when a literal interpretation is not possible from the context (Grice 1975). But as it turns out, this is not the case.

First, Lakoff and Johnson assert what Aristotle claimed two millennia before, namely that there are two types of concepts—concrete and abstract (chapter 3, §3.4). But the two scholars add a remarkable twist to the Aristotelian notion—namely that abstract concepts are built up systematically from concrete ones through metaphorical reasoning. They then proceed to rename abstract concepts conceptual metaphors, defining them as generalized metaphorical formulas that characterize specific abstractions. For example, the expression “The professor is a snake” is really a token of something more general, namely, people are animals. This is why we can also say that John or Mary or whoever we want is a snake, gorilla, pig, puppy, and so on. Each specific metaphor (“John is a gorilla,” “Mary is a snake,” etc.) is not an isolated example of poetic fancy. It is really a manifestation of a more general metaphorical idea—people are animals. Such formulas are what Lakoff and Johnson call conceptual metaphors:

Each of the two parts of the conceptual metaphor is called a domain: people is the target domain because it is the abstract topic itself (the “target” of the conceptual metaphor); and animals is the source domain because it represents the class of vehicles, called the lexical field, that delivers the metaphor (the “source” of the metaphorical concept). An abstract concept can now be defined simply as a mapping of one domain onto the other. This model of concept-formation suggests that abstract concepts are formed systematically through such mappings and that specific metaphors are pointers to the source domains. So, when we hear people talking, for instance, of ideas in terms of circles, points, etc., we can easily identify the source domain they are deploying as geometrical figures/relations:

The conceptual metaphor in this case is ideas are geometrical figures/relations. Conceptual metaphors are, as Lakoff and Johnson so aptly call them, “metaphors we live by.” To get a firmer sense of what these are all about, consider the topic of argument. The most commonly used vehicles for conceptualizing arguments in our culture are the connotations associated with war, hence the conceptual metaphor argument is war. This shows up in such common utterances as the following:

What does talking about argument in this way imply? It means, as Lakoff and Johnson suggest, that we actually “win” or “lose” arguments, and that our reactions towards the argument situation unfold as if we were involved in an actual physical battle: we attack a position, lose ground, plan strategy, defend or abandon a line of attack, etc. In a phrase, the argument is war conceptual metaphor structures the actions we perform when we argue and influences the feelings we experience during an argument.

Image Schema Theory

Lakoff and Johnson trace the psychological source of conceptual metaphorizing to image schemas. These are mental snapshots of our sensory experiences of locations, movements, shapes, etc. They are the mental links between sensory experiences and mental concepts. Image schemas are, in effect, “figured-out experiences” that permit us not only to recognize patterns inherent in certain sensations, but also to anticipate certain consequences and to make inferences and deductions from them. Schemas are mental maps that can reduce a large quantity of sensory information into general patterns. Image schema theory suggests, therefore, that the source domains enlisted in delivering an abstract topic were not chosen originally in an arbitrary fashion, but derived, rather, from the experience of events. The formation of a conceptual metaphor, consequently, is the result of an experiential induction. This is why metaphors often produce aesthetic or synesthetic effects, and this would explain why metaphorical utterances are more memorable than others.

The image schema is not a “replica.” It is a Gestalt structure (Johnson 1987), a kind of “mental icon” of an experience. Schemas can be associative, fictitious, or narrative—e.g. the concept of love, for instance, implies an associative image schema (a face, a vignette, etc.); a winged table implies a fictitious schema that is nevertheless easy to imagine; an encounter that occurred in the recent past with someone implies a narrative image schema, i.e. a schematization of the episodes of the encounter in temporal sequence.

Image schemas, moreover, are not only picturable mental icons of experiences. They can be iconic of any sensory modality. Think, for example, of the following:

The image schema associated with (12) has an auditory quality to it, rather than a picturable Gestalt. Similarly, the schema associated with (13) has a tactile quality, the one with (14) an olfactory quality, the one with (15) a gustatory quality, the one with (16) a kinesic quality, and the one with (17) an emotional quality.

Image schemas are so automatic that we are hardly ever aware of their control over conceptualization. But they can always be elicited easily. If someone were to be asked to explain the expression “I’m feeling up today,” s/he would likely not have a conscious image schema involving an upward orientation, which can be abbreviated to [vertically]. However, if that same person were asked the following questions—“How far up do you feel?” “What do you mean by up?” etc.—then s/he would no doubt start to visualize the [verticality] schema. In effect, image schemas are evidence of “abstractive seeing,” as the philosopher Susanne Langer (1948) so aptly put it. As an example, consider the following image schema of an obstacle or impediment:

Several abstract scenarios are now visualizable in terms of this [impediment] schema: one can go around the [impediment], over it, under it, or through it, or one can remove it and continue on towards the object. On the other hand, the [impediment] could successfully impede someone, so that s/he would have to stop at the [impediment] and turn back. All of these actions can be easily seen within mind-space. Now, it is easy to see why this schema has become the source of a host of abstract ideas in our culture:

Lakoff and Johnson identify several basic types of image schemas. The first one involves mental orientation. This type of schema underlies concepts that are derived from our physical experiences of orientation —up vs. down, back vs. front, near vs. far, etc. The [verticality] and [impediment] schemas discussed above are two examples of orientational schemas. The second type involves ontological thinking. This produces conceptual metaphors in which activities, emotions, ideas, etc. are associated with entities and substances: e.g. the mind is a container as in “I’m full of memories.” The third type of schema is an elaboration of the other two. This produces structural metaphors that extend orientational and ontological concepts: e.g. time is a resource is built from time is a resource and time is a quantity, as in “My time is money.” Here is just a sampling of how image schemas underlie various concepts:

happiness is up/sadness is down

health and life are up/sickness and death are down

knowledge is light/ignorance is darkness

ideas are buildings

ideas are plants

ideas are commodities

As Lakoff and Johnson emphasize, we do not detect the presence of image schemas in such common expressions because of repeated usage. For example, we no longer interpret the word see in sentences such as “I don’t see what you mean,” “Do you see what I’m saying?” in image schematic terms, because they have become so familiar to us. But the association between the biological act of seeing outside the body and the imaginary act of seeing within mind-space was the original source of the conceptual metaphor seeing is understanding/believing/thinking, which now permeates common discourse:

Cultural Models

For the present purposes, the last relevant point made by Lakoff and Johnson in their truly fascinating book is that cultural groupthink is built on conceptual metaphors, since these coalesce into a system of abstract thinking that holds together the entire network of associated meanings in the culture. This is accomplished by a kind of “higher-order” metaphorizing—that is, as target domains are associated with many kinds of source domains (orientational, ontological, structural), the concepts they underlie become increasingly more complex, leading to what Lakoff and Johnson call cultural or cognitive models. To see what this means, consider the target domain of ideas again. The following three conceptual metaphors, among many others (as we have seen), deliver the meaning of this concept in three separate ways:

ideas are food

ideas are persons

ideas are fashions

Recall from examples cited above that there are other ways of conceptualizing ideas—e.g. in terms of buildings, plants, commodities, geometry, and seeing. The constant juxtaposition of such conceptual metaphors in common discourse produces, cumulatively, a cultural model of ideas that has a specific Gestalt structure. This can be shown graphically as in Figure 6.1.

Several of the source domains for this model—e.g. food, people, and fashion—are relatively understandable across cultures: i.e. people from non-English-speaking cultures could easily figure out what statements based on these domains mean if they were translated or relayed to them. However, there are some source domains that are more likely to be culture-specific, such as, for instance, the geometrical figures domain, and thus beyond easy comprehension. This suggests that there are different degrees or “orders” of concepts. The ideas are food concept, for example, is a lower-order concept because it connects a universal physical process—eating—to an abstraction—thinking—directly. But the ideas are geometrical figures concept reveals a higher-order form of conceptualization, since geometrical figures and notions are themselves concepts that are learned in a cultural context.

Figure 6.1

The Background to Conceptual Metaphor Theory

Lakoff and Johnson did not devise conceptual metaphor theory, as it is now called, in a vacuum. They developed it from the work conducted in several disciplines and from the deliberations of several key scholars in the twentieth century. The experimental investigation of metaphor was initiated by the linguist Karl Bühler (e.g. 1951 [1908]) and his associates (e.g. Staehlin 1914) at the turn of the century, who collected intriguing data on how subjects paraphrased proverbs. In the 1950s and 1960s an increasing number of psychologists started to look at such issues as the effects of metaphor on concept-formation (e.g. Asch 1950, Osgood and Suci 1957, Brown, Leiter, and Hildum 1957), the neurological processes involved in metaphor processing (e.g. Weinstein 1964), the effects of context on the choice of literal or metaphorical expressions (Koen 1965), and the role of imagery in metaphor (e.g. Asch 1958, Werner and Kaplan 1963). Even the behaviorist psychologist B. F. Skinner, in his highly controversial treatment of language development Verbal Behavior (1957), had the insight to include verbal metaphors in his overall theory of verbal behavior.

But it is the work of the literary critic I. A. Richards (1893-1979) in which conceptual metaphor theory finds its philosophical source. In his widely-read and influential 1936 book, The Philosophy of Rhetoric, Richards argued convincingly that the meaning created by a metaphor was an open-ended one, not simply a sum of the parts. Metaphor produced a unique kind of semantic “interaction” between two domains. Like two chemicals mixed together in a test tube, the result of mixing two domains [A₁] and [B₂] (above, §6.1) creates a dynamic semantic interaction that retains properties of both domains but also has unique ones of its own. Max Black (1962) added, later, that the two domains were to be regarded as “systems” rather than as discrete units.

Richards’ crucial work opened the way for the serious investigation of metaphor within the social sciences. The 1955 study by the Gestalt psychologist Solomon Asch, for instance, showed that metaphors derived from the vocabularies of sensation of several phylogenetically-unrelated languages ( warm, cold, heavy, etc.) used the same sensory modality for different referential domains. For example, he found that hot stood for rage in Hebrew, enthusiasm in Chinese, sexual arousal in Thai, and energy in Hausa. As Brown (1958: 146) aptly commented shortly after the publication of Asch’s study, “there is an undoubted kinship of meanings” in different languages that “seem to involve activity and emotional arousal.” Empirical work on metaphor proliferated in the 1970s and 1980s. As Winner (1982: 253) has stated, if nothing else, the research literature has established that if “people were limited to strictly literal language, communication would be severely curtailed, if not terminated.” By the early 1990s there was little doubt in the minds of many linguists and psychologists that metaphor was a guide to the workings of human abstract thinking.

6.3 OTHER TROPES

Since the early 1970s, the practice in cognitive linguistics (chapter 2, §2.5) has been to use the term metaphor to encompass various kinds of tropes. Within this new analytical framework, personification (“My cat speaks English”), for instance, would be seen as a particular kind of metaphor, namely one in which the target domain [A₁] refers to an animal or inanimate object and the source domain [B₂] refers to traits that are associated with human beings. In a nutshell, any cognitive process that involves a mapping from a source to a target domain is now classified under the category of metaphor; any that does not is viewed separately:

Metaphor can now be defined as the ability of the human brain to convert experience into abstraction via the mapping of some source domain onto a target domain to produce an abstract concept. There are two tropes that are regularly considered separately from metaphor in concept-formation—metonymy and irony—because they do not entail such a mapping process. Metonymy is a cognitive process by which the name of one thing is used in place of that of another associated with or suggested by it (e.g. the White House for the President). In concept-formation terms, it can be defined as the process of using a part of a domain to represent the whole domain:

Here are some examples of this substitutive process (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 35-40):

There is a special subtype of metonymy, known as synecdoche, that is particularly productive in concept-formation. This is defined as the process by which the part is used to represent the whole, and vice versa:

In parallelism with the notion of conceptual metaphor, we suggest the term conceptual metonym to refer to generalized metonymical formulas such as the face is the person that inform both common discourse and the entire meaning system inherent in the signifying order of a culture:

Conceptual metonyms are abstractions, and like conceptual metaphors they are interconnected to other domains of meaning-making in a culture. The distribution of the concept the face is the person throughout the meaning pathways of the signifying order is the reason why portraits, in painting and photography, focus on the face. The face is, in effect, a metonym for personality. Here are some other examples of conceptual metonyms:

the part for the whole

the producer (brand) for the product

the object used for the user

the controller for the controlled

the institution for the people responsible

the place for the institution

Irony also does not entail a mapping process. Rather, it constitutes a highlighting strategy based on the use of words to convey a meaning contrary to their literal sense (“I love being tortured”). It is, more formally, a cognitive strategy by which a concept [A] is highlighted through its opposite [-A]: [A ≡ -A]. This process creates a discrepancy between appearance and reality, thus creating a kind of “meaning tension by contrast.”

There is a second type of irony, which can be defined simply as the use of words or statements to criticize someone in a biting, mocking way. This type constitutes a powerful discourse technique that allows someone to make a powerful comment on a situation. For instance, adolescents in Western culture use it typically as a verbal tactic for critiquing others (Danesi 1994)—hence the coining of words such as megabitch, geekdom, party animal, dude, dog “unattractive person,” wimp dog “male with little personality.” Another function of irony in adolescence is humor—hence expressions like M.L.A. = massive lip action “passionate kissing”, barf" vomit,” blimp boat “obese person.”

6.4 METAPHOR AND GRAMMAR

Is there any connection between conceptual metaphors/metonyms and grammar? The traditional view is that grammatical rules are arbitrary and that meaning is objectively determinable in the syntactic structure of language. The work on metaphor summarized above, however, provides reasons why this view is no longer tenable. And, indeed, some cognitive linguists have started to provide a truly fascinating theoretical framework for relating grammatical categories to concept-formation processes (e.g. Langacker 1990, Taylor 1995).

As a concrete example of how grammar and metaphor might be interrelated, consider the use of the prepositions since and for in sentences such as the following in English:

An analysis of the expressions that follow since reveals that they belong to a source domain based on an image schema of time as a [point on a line]. The specific points in sentences (103)-(105) are “1990,” “September,” “Monday.” The schema can be shown graphically as follows:

The expressions that follow for, on the other hand, belong to a source domain based on an image schema of time as a [quantity]. The specific quantities in sentences (106)-(108) are: “fifteen years,” “nine months,” “five days.” This can be shown graphically as differences in the capacity of containers:

These image schemas are the sources for the two conceptual metaphors time is a point and time is a quantity. These can now be seen to have a specific effect at the level of grammar—expressions introduced by since are reflexes of the conceptual metaphor time is a point, those introduced by for are reflexes of the conceptual metaphor time is a quantity. This is, in fact, the kind of rule of grammar that interconnects conceptual metaphors/metonyms and parts of speech.

Take, as one other example, the selection of certain verbs in particular types of sentences in Italian. The verb fare “to make” is used in reference to a weather situation—fa caldo “it makes hot,” fa freddo “it makes cold.” The physical state of “being hot” or “being cold” is conveyed instead with the verb essere “to be” when referring to objects—è caldo “it is hot,” è freddo “it is cold”—and with avere “to have” when referring to people—ha caldo “s/he is hot,” ha freddo “s/he is cold.” The use of one verb or the other —fare, essere, or avere—is motivated by an underlying image schematic conceptualization of bodies and the environment as containers. So, the [containment] context in which the heat or cold is located determines the verbal category to be employed. If it is in the environment, it is “made” by Nature (fa freddo); if it is in a human being, then the body “has” it (ha freddo); and if it is in an object, then the object “is” its container (è freddo):

It is interesting to note that in Italian “being right,” “being sleepy,” etc. are also conceptualized as “contained” substances. This is why to say “I am right,” “I am sleepy,” etc. in Italian one must say ho ragione (“I have reason”), ho sonno (“I have sleepiness”), etc.

A metaphorical theory of grammar can now be envisaged. This would posit that the “history of derivation” of a specific language category in the organization of some (perhaps most) sentences (1) starts out as an experiential form, that is (2) converted into an image schema (e.g. [verticality], [containment], [impediment], etc.) that is then (3) converted into an appropriate conceptual metaphor/metonym (e.g. happiness is up, the body is a container, etc.) that, (4) finally, is grammaticalized (reflected grammatically) and/or lexicalized (reflected lexically):

As a practical example, take the schema [verticality]. Humans the world over experience the sensation of [verticality] as an up and down view of things. This experience is a consequence of the fact that we stand, climb, look up, look down, and so on. The [verticality] schema is a mental shorthand of the experience, becoming the source of the conceptual metaphor happiness is up. This is then grammaticalized and lexicalized according to the type of sentence organization required—e.g. “I’m feeling up today” (lexicalization), “Great!” (intonation up).

6.5 METAPHOR AND THE SIGNIFYING ORDER

Conceptual metaphors and metonyms are not only the most likely sources of grammaticalization and lexicalization processes in a language, but they are also interconnected with the other codes of the signifying order, providing the “conceptual glue” that keeps the whole system of culture together (chapter 12, §12.2). Paradoxically, while metaphor holds existing cultural systems together, it is also the source of innovation in such systems. This is because, as Vico argued convincingly, the metaphorical capacity is tied to fantasia, the imaginative and creative faculty of mind that predisposes human beings to search out and forge new meanings constantly. Indeed, novel metaphors are being created all the time. If someone were to say “Those ideas are a cup of coffee,” it is unlikely that the reader would have heard this expression before. But its novelty forces us to reflect upon its meaning. The vehicle used, a cup of coffee, is a common object of everyday life and therefore easily perceivable as a source for thinking about ideas. The metaphor now compels us to start thinking of ideas in terms of the kinds of physical, gustatory, social, and other attributes that are associated with a cup of coffee. For this metaphor to gain currency, however, it must capture the fancy of many other people for a period of time. Then and only then will its novelty have become worn out and will it become the basis for a new conceptual metaphor: ideas are drinking substances. After that, expressions such as “Your idea is a cup of tea,” “That theory is a bottle of fine wine,” and the like will become similarly understandable as offering different perspectives on ideas.

In terms of the signifying order, the work of Lakoff and Johnson suggests that the system of conceptual metaphors that is found in a culture constitutes, in effect, a metaphorical code. The study of metaphorical codes across cultures is beginning to show that they possess many features in common, especially with respect to the formation of what we have called “lower-order” concepts (above, §6.2). Indeed, the universal features of such codes invite the question of the relation of metaphor to the emergence of conceptual thinking in the human species. Recall the seeing is believing conceptual metaphor (“I have a different point of view,” “I never see eye to eye with him,” etc.). This has been documented across societies as a fundamental source of cultural models of belief (e.g. Viberg 1983, Danesi 1990). In evolutionary terms, the crystallization of such models in human thought suggests that vision was originally at the root of many of our abstract notions. Indirect evidence for this hypothesis can be discerned in the presence of conceptual formulas such as thoughts are movable objects and thinking is visual scanning in languages across the world (Danesi and Santeramo 1995):

thoughts are movable objects

thinking is visual scanning

These suggest that thoughts, like objects, can be moved, arranged, located, etc., or else seen, looked into, scanned, etc. As Walter Ong (1977: 134) has also pointed out, the presence of such formulas in human thought suggests that “we would be incapacitated for dealing with knowledge and intellection without massive visualist conceptualization, that is, without conceiving of intelligence through models applying initially to vision.”

Metaphorical codes are overarching systems of meaning that constitute “conceptual organizing grids” for the entire signifying order of a culture. Our own courtship rituals, for example, reflect the love is a sweetness metaphor (“She’s my sweetheart,” “I love my honey,” etc.) in nonverbal ways: e.g. sweets are given to a loved one on St. Valentine’s Day; matrimonial love is symbolized at a wedding ceremony by the eating of a cake; we sweeten our breath with candy before kissing our loved ones; etc. The justice is blind metaphorical concept can be discerned in the fact that outside or inside courtrooms statutes of “Justice” have blindfolds. The metaphorical concept the scales of justice, too, is commonly symbolized by corresponding sculptures of scales near or inside justice buildings.

Incidentally, Emantian (1995) has documented cross-cultural similarities in the ways in which sexual desire is metaphorized. In Chagga, a Bantu language of Tanzania, the same love concept found in our culture—love is a sweetness—manifests itself constantly in discourse about sex and romance. In Chagga the man is perceived to be the eater and the woman his sweet food, as can be detected in expressions that mean, in translated form, “Does she taste sweet?” “She tastes sweet as sugar honey” (Emantian 1995:168).

Metaphorical codes are powerful shapers of worldview because they are so understandable. They make thinking easy. They are automatic, effortless, and established by community consensus. More often than not, they are guides to a culture’s past. A common expression like “He has fallen from grace” would have been recognized instantly in a previous era as referring to the Adam and Eve story in the Bible. Today we continue to use it with only a dim awareness (if any) of its Biblical origins. Expressions that portray life as a journey—”I’m still a long way from my goal,” “There is no end in sight,” etc.—are similarly rooted in Biblical narrative. As the literary critic Northrop Frye (1981) aptly pointed out, one cannot penetrate such expressions, or indeed most of Western literature or art, without having been exposed, directly or indirectly, to the original Biblical stories. These are the source domains for many of the conceptual metaphors we use today for judging human actions and offering advice, bestowing upon everyday life a kind of implicit metaphysical meaning and value.

Proverbs too are extended metaphors that people employ to provide sound practical advice when it is required in certain situations:

Every culture has similar proverbs, aphorisms, and sayings. They constitute a remarkable code of ethics and of practical knowledge that anthropologists call “folk wisdom.” Indeed, the very concept of wisdom implies the ability to apply proverbial language insightfully to a situation. Preaching, too, would hardly be persuasive if it were not embedded in the metaphorical code of a culture. An effective preacher is one who knows how to structure h/er oration around a few highly understandable conceptual metaphors: e.g. sex is dirty, sex is punishable by fire, etc. These guide the preacher’s selection of words, illustrations, turns of phrase, practical examples, etc.—”You must cleanse your soul of the filth of sex”; “You will burn in Hell, if you do not clean up your act”; etc.

Scientific reasoning too is intertwined with the metaphorical code. Science often involves things that cannot be seen—atoms, waves, gravitational forces, magnetic fields, etc. So, scientists use their metaphorical know-how to get a look, so to speak, at this hidden matter. That is why waves are said to undulate through empty space, atoms to leap from one quantum state to another, electrons to travel in circles around an atomic nucleus, and so on. Metaphors are evidence of the human ability to see the universe as a coherent structure. As physicist Robert Jones (1982: 4) aptly puts it, for the scientist metaphor serves as “an evocation of the inner connection among things.” When a metaphor is accepted as fact, it enters human life, taking on an independent conceptual existence in the real world, suggesting ways to bring about changes in and to the world. Even the nature of experimentation can be seen in this light. Experimentation is a search for connections, linkages, associations of some sort or other. As Rom Harré (1981: 23) has pointed out, most experiments involve “the attempt to relate the structure of things, discovered in an exploratory study, to the organization this imposes on the processes going on in that structure.”

All this really could not be otherwise. Whereas individual signs entail referential domains for humans to reflect upon, utilize, and store as knowledge, metaphor is the form of thought humans use to interconnect such domains into increasingly layered orders of meaning—layers upon layers of metaphors. One metaphor suggests another, which suggests another, and so on. The central feature of human thinking is the fluid application of existing metaphorical concepts to new situations.