Metaphor, Idiom, and Figuration

Bibliographic Data

ID19429263
AuthorsNicholas C Burbules (0000-0003-4956-5590), Gregory Schraw, Woodrow Trathen (0000-0002-4280-8433)
Year1989
Volume4
Issue2
Pages93-110
Publication date1989-06-01
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueMetaphor and Symbolic Activity (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0885-7253 • E-ISSN: 2379-0288
PublisherInforma UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB)
DOI10.1207/s15327868ms0402_2
OpenAlexW1997968888
LanguageEN
Citations received6
References cited9

Metaphor, specifically, and figurative language, generally, have been of interest to philosophers and literary theorists since Aristotle's Poetics. Yet we still lack clear criteria for what it means for an expression to be figurative, and how this is to be distinguished from literal usage. We argue here that this question has remained unanswered, in part, because it has been misconceived. One important source of misunderstanding has been the almost universal tendency to view metaphors and other tropes as comprising two discrete meanings, one that is literal, and one that is figurative. Rather, we propose that metaphorical and literal phrases are both understood by drawing on denotative and connotative associations of their terms in an interactive fashion, and that assessments of adequacy for an interpretation--whether literal or figurative--refer to the same basic criteria. Metaphors are phrases with a high degree of tolerance for such interpretation, literals much less so, and idioms even less. Interpreting idioms depends more on the retrieval of a specific and conventional meaning. In this sense, idioms are hardly "figurative" at all

Epistemology · Figure of speech · Linguistics · Literal and figurative language · Literal translation · Metaphor · Poetics · Poetry · Source text · Classical Philosophy and Thought · Computer Science · Language, Metaphor, and Cognition · Philosophy

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