The metaphor “love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese

Abstract

Abstract. Metaphor has been studied for a long time by many linguists. For traditional schools of linguistics, metaphor is merely a figure of speech used in literature. However, cognitive linguistics presents a different view of metaphor stating that metaphor is not only  in literature but also pervasive in daily life language, and that it serves as a means of expressing thoughts as well as a vehicle of cognition that helps human beings recognize the world. This paper summarizes major views of metaphor in the light of traditional linguistics and cognitive linguistics. Also, the paper investigates the representations of the cognitive metaphor “Love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese, discussing what mechanism helps language users to metaphorize an abstract concept (love) on the basis of another concept (journey).

Keywords: Cognitive linguistics, conceptual metaphor, love, journey, conceptual domain, experience, metaphorical concept, metaphorical expressions, source-to-target mapping.