24.2748, Review: Linguistic Theories; Semantics; Syntax: Sullivan (2013)

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Subject: 24.2748, Review: Linguistic Theories; Semantics; Syntax: Sullivan (2013)

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Date: Mon, 08 Jul 2013 10:52:52
From: Alessia Bianchini [alessia.bianchini01 at universitadipavia.it]
Subject: Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric Language

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Book announced at http://linguistlist.org/issues/24/24-777.html

AUTHOR: Karen  Sullivan
TITLE: Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric Language
SERIES TITLE: Constructional Approaches to Language 14
PUBLISHER: John Benjamins
YEAR: 2013

REVIEWER: Alessia Bianchini, Università degli Studi di Pavia

SUMMARY

As the title of the book suggests, “Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric
Language” focuses on the analysis of metaphoric language by integrating
contributions from a variety of cognitive linguistic theories (namely, Frame
Semantics, Construction Grammar, Cognitive Grammar, Conceptual Metaphor Theory
and Metonymy Theory). The reason for bringing together insights from the
aforementioned linguistic fields is to supply a new account of metaphoric
language, as well as, in the author’s words, “to raise awareness of this
fertile new area of research, and provide some of the connections between
fields of study necessary for its exploration” (p. 167). Note that, as clearly
stated in the first chapter (p. 5), the book is not intended as a guide for
metaphor identification, but rather aims to individuate general trends in
metaphor evocation within the English language, and supports its analysis with
corpus-based evidence.

In Chapter One, which works as a preface, the major argument of the book is
introduced: metaphoric language makes use of meaning structures present in
non-metaphoric language, therefore, well-known semantic concepts which have
been identified over the past few decades for the purpose of understanding
non-metaphoric language (e.g. semantic frames, constructions,
autonomy/dependence relation, etc.) should nowadays be applied to the study of
metaphoric language because of their great explanatory power. An overview of
the state of the art about metaphoric language and metaphoric thoughts is then
given, filled with references to seminal publications (Lakoff & Johnson 1980,
Brooke-Rose 1958, Turner 1987, 1991, Deignan 2005, Pragglejaz Group 2007,
Antonopoulou & Nikiforidou 2009, Croft 2003, among others), and relevant
frameworks and terminology are clarified. In the book, the author employs the
basic notions of Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT), whose premise is that
metaphor is a conceptual phenomenon involving structured mappings from a
source domain – usually a quite concrete domain of experience – to a target
domain – usually a more abstract concept (Lakoff & Johnsons 1980); for
instance, conceptualizing LIFE (target domain) as a DAY (source domain) allows
us to understand our BIRTH as the DOWN, OLD AGE as the EVENING and so forth
(p. 1). The author then builds on these CMT observations, pointing out that,
however, words are not enough to convey metaphor; more specifically, taking a
constructional approach to the issue, in the book, it is argued that
constructions select the source and target domains of their actual lexical
items. Finally, the author elaborates on the idea of using Frame Semantics,
Construction Grammar (CxG) and notions from Cognitive Grammar (CG) (namely,
the dichotomy autonomous/dependent element, Langacker 1997, 2002) as tools for
investigating the relationship between metaphoric and non-metaphoric uses of
words and constructions. The insights introduced so far are then thoroughly
detailed in the following chapters.

Chapter Two focuses on how Frame Semantics and CG may be integrated and used
as a means to study metaphoric language. A definition of semantic frame,
according to Fillmore (Fillmore 1980), is given, along with an introduction to
the FrameNet Project (FrameNet 2012), which provides a useful schematization
of cognitive representations of situations, objects and events. Reasons for
investigate the possible application of Frame Semantics to metaphor analysis
are presented as follows: since semantic frames have been documented
throughout both metaphoric and non-metaphoric language, they can be used to
detect links between these two domains (p. 24). As for the CG approach, it is
stated that CG structures can be represented by means of semantic frames. The
author then deals with the mapping of autonomous and dependent elements
(Langacker 1997, 2002) on semantic frames; for instance, in the phrase “tall
man”, “tall” (the dependent element) evokes the MEASURABLE_ATTRIBUTES frame,
which includes the frame element ENTITY, whose actual filler “man” (the
autonomous element) is selected by “tall” itself (pp. 29-33). The chapter
concludes  by arguing that a theory of autonomy/dependence incorporating Frame
Semantics is effective in capturing the generalization that can be made about
metaphoric vs. non-metaphoric constructions.

In Chapter Three, the theoretical notions outlined in Chapter Two are
contextualized by presenting a case study whose data were collected in a
series of searches within the British National Corpus (p. 36). Specifically,
this chapter is dedicated to a corpus-based, frame-integrated analysis of the
metaphors HAPPINESS IS LIGHT, UNDERSTANDING IS SEEING, and its sub-mappings
INTELLIGENCE IS LIGHT EMISSION and COMPREHENSIBILITY IS VISIBILITY, all of
which come from the well-known Master Metaphor List (Lakoff, Espensen &
Schwartz 1991). The author points out that not all adjectives referring to
light (e.g. HAPPINESS IS LIGHT and INTELLIGENCE IS LIGHT EMISSION) or to sight
(e.g. UNDERSTANDING IS SEEING and COMPREHENSIBILITY IS VISIBILITY) trigger
these metaphors (e.g. “sunny mood” vs. ?“brilliant disposition”). It is then
argued that the explanation for this inconsistency lies in the different
structure of the non-metaphoric semantic frames evoked by the respective
adjectives, which supports the hypothesis that a lexical item’s frame
evocation constrains the item’s uses in metaphor (p. 41).
 
Chapter Four focuses on metonymy. More precisely, here, the author extends the
methodology described in Chapter Two to the study of metonymy in order to
demonstrate how Frame Semantics proves to be a useful tool for telling apart
metaphors from other figurative expressions.

The rest of the book brings together findings from Frame Semantics and CxG
with the CMT. In particular, Chapters Five to Nine each analyse a basic
grammatical construction (or a combination of basic grammatical constructions)
which encodes the structure of a metaphor.

Chapter Five focuses on adjective constructions exemplified, for instance, by
the metaphors “spiritual wealth” and “blood-stained wealth”. It is argued that
domain constructions (e.g. “spiritual wealth”) and predicating modifier
constructions (e.g. “blood-stained wealth”) must be treated as distinct
constructions, as opposed to simply constructs involving different kind of
adjectives. In fact, the essential semantic difference between “spiritual
wealth” (which refers to metaphorical wealth) and “blood-stained wealth”
(which refers to literal, monetary wealth) cannot be attributed to the
semantics of the modifier alone, but rather depends on the different
constructions instantiated by the two phrases. In general, it is stated that
in domain constructions, the head of the phrase is the conceptually dependent
element; this element evokes a frame whose frame elements’ fillers are
constrained by the domain adjective. On the contrary, in predicating modifier
constructions, the pattern of autonomy/dependency is reversed and the head of
the phrase is the autonomous element.

Chapter Six focuses on verbal argument structure constructions and explores
how verbal heads and their complements work together to evoke metaphor. In
particular, it is argued that the verb evokes the source domain, while, with
verbs with more than one argument, only one of the arguments expresses the
target domain. Metaphoric examples of a variety of argument structures from
the corpus are then thoroughly illustrated (namely, transitive, intransitive,
resultative, ditransitive and copula constructions), even if, as the author
herself states, the aim of the chapter is not to present a comprehensive list
of English argument structure constructions, but rather provide “a step toward
a comprehensive understanding of metaphor in argument structure constructions”
(p. 89).

Chapter Seven analyses closed-class constructions, focusing on prepositional
phrase (PP) constructions, which are one of the most frequent means for
conveying metaphor in English (Sullivan 2009). The variability in PP
constructions makes it hard to generalize about the autonomy/dependence
relation, or about the target/source domain status. The author deals with this
issue by choosing to focus exclusively on Noun Phrase – Prepositional Phrase
(NP-PP) constructions in which relational nouns (e.g. “father”, “friend”,
“killer”, … ) or non-processual event nouns (e.g. “injury”, “sting”, …)
appear, since these two subtypes together represent the vast majority of the
examples of metaphoric PP constructions from the corpus.

Chapter Eight focuses on a combination of the previous constructions. In
particular, the chapter focuses on the so-called “xyz” construction, which
plays a main role in metaphor and has been studied from Aristotle till today.
The xyz construction traditionally takes the form “x is y of z”, where x, y
and z are NPs (e.g. “old age is the sunset of life”), and in this chapter, it
is argued that there are two main variants to this construction, one in which
z is the target domain, and one in which z is the source domain. Also, in this
chapter, the author shows how, when multiple metaphoric constructions combine
to evoke a metaphor, they do so in a regular way.

Chapter Nine extends the discussion to larger structures which go beyond
sentence boundaries. Here, multi-clause constructions (namely, relative
clauses and conditional clauses) and rhetorical figures, such as parallelism,
negation of the literal, and allegory, are all explored. The purpose of
analysing these last peculiar and uncommon constructions is because, since
they exist exclusively to evoke metaphors and do not have a non-metaphoric
counterpart, the mechanisms of metaphor evocation may be particularly
intriguing.

Chapter Ten is dedicated to conclusions, in which the author summarizes her
work.  Furthermore, the chapter points out some limitations of the study:
first, it focuses on the English language only; second, it accounts for
metaphor evocation in a limited set of constructions; and last, the analysis
is limited to the most-studied metaphors, as represented in the Master
Metaphor List.

Finally, the book provides an index of both subjects and metaphoric
constructions, as well as an index of primary sources.

EVALUATION

“Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric Language” aims to provide an analysis
of the main strategies for metaphor evocation within the English language.
This goal is certainly met, since the outcome of the research is a
fine-grained analysis of a rich subset of well-known English metaphors. As the
author herself underlines, however, the book is not to be intended as a
comprehensive guide to English metaphors. Rather, its most notable value
(aside from its thorough analyses of a variety of case studies) is that it
shows the way toward a new approach to metaphoric language. In fact, the
findings presented here certainly seem to prove the effectiveness of an
integrated approach to linguistic metaphor that takes into account efforts
from any area concerned with the issue.

>From a readership point of view, “Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric
Language” will be of interest to different kinds of readers: on the one hand,
since the book provides a clear overview of a variety of cognitive linguistic
theories concerned with metaphorical and non-metaphorical language, it suits
readers looking for a survey on the subject; on the other hand, semanticists
and syntacticians looking for a new account of linguistic metaphor will
definitely benefit from it, especially due to both the new methodology and the
empirical data presented.

In terms of internal structure, the book is coherent and well organised,
despite the complexity of the topic. In the first chapter, the book’s purpose,
its theoretical background and its terminology are clearly illustrated. As for
the methodology, its step-by-step description is postponed to the last
chapter; on the one hand, this gives coherence to the book and definitely
helps enhance the strong points of the proposed approach, however, on the
other hand, a general overview of the process of the work may have been better
suited for the first chapter, especially for readers who are less familiar
with the discipline. The analysis of how conceptual metaphor may surface
through language is systematically presented chapter by chapter, describing a
path that goes “from language, to frames, to metaphor” (p. 168). Finally, the
last chapter summarizes the achievements of the study, along with some
emerging issues that could be addressed in future works: testing whether the
generalizations presented for the English language stand up to
cross-linguistic research; expanding the inventory of constructions
instantiating metaphors, since the book focuses mainly on the best-known ones;
and increasing the inventory of metaphors.

“Frames and Constructions in Metaphoric Language” is a stimulating read that
gives new insights about well-known issues and supplies a fresh approach to
the study of conceptual and linguistic metaphor. Also, the book is engaging
from the point of view of both form and content. In fact, even if the topic on
which the research focuses is not easy to address, the use of examples taken
from a corpus and the systematic contextualization of what is theoretically
described make the reading clear and pleasant to those who work on metaphor
and related fields.

REFERENCES

Antonopoulou, E. & Nikiforidou, K. (2009). Deconstructing Verbal Humour with
Construction Grammar. In Brône, G. & Vandaele, J. (Eds), Cognitive Poetics:
Goals, Gains and Gaps (pp. 289-314). Berlin-New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Brooke-Rose, C. (1958). A Grammar of Metaphor. London: Secker and Warburg Ltd.

Croft, W. (2003). The Role of Domains in the Interpretation of Metaphors and
Metonymies. In Dirven R. & Porings R. (Eds), Metaphor and Metonymy in
Comparison and Contrast (pp. 161-206). Berlin/New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Deignan, A. (2005). Metaphor and Corpus Linguistics. Amsterdam/Philadelphia:
John Benjamins Publishing Co.

Fillmore, C. J. (1982). Frame Semantics. In The Linguistic Society of Korea
(Ed.), Linguistics in the Morning Calm (pp. 111-137). Seoul: Hanshin
Publishing Co.

FrameNet (2012). FrameNet Release 1.5. Freely available as a download from the
FrameNet project. Updated data available at
https://framenet.icsi.berkeley.edu/fndrupal/ (accessed May 2013).

Lakoff, G. (1993). The Contemporary Theory of Metaphor. In Ortony A. (Ed),
Metaphor and Thoughts (202-251). Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors We Live By. Chicago: University of
Chicago Press.

Lakoff, G., Espensen, J. & Schwartz A. (1991). Master Metaphor List, Second
Draft Copy. Technical report, Cognitive Linguistics Group, University of
California, Berkeley.

Langacker, R. W. (1997). Constituency, Dependency and Conceptual Grouping.
Cognitive Linguistics, 8(1), 1-32.

Langacker, R. W. (2002). Concept, Image and Symbol: The Cognitive Basis of
Grammar. New York: Mouton de Gruyter.

Pragglejaz Group (2007). MIP: A Method for Identifying Metaphorically Used
Words in Discourse. Metaphor and Symbol, 22(1), 1-39.

Sullivan, K. (2009). Grammatical Constructions in Metaphoric Language. In
Lewandowska-Tomaszczyk B. and Dziwirek K. (Eds.), Cognitive Corpus Linguistics
(pp. 57-80). Frankurt/Main: Peter Lang.

Turner, M. (1987). Death Is the Mother of Beauty: Mind, Metaphor, Criticism.
Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

Turner, M. (1991). Reading Minds: The Study of English in the Age of Cognitive
Science. Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press.


ABOUT THE REVIEWER

Alessia Bianchini is currently a Ph.D. student at the University of Pavia
(Italy). Her research interests include Corpus Linguistics and Computational
Linguistics and particularly the interface syntax-semantics.








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