Abstract
As explored in relevant literature, both ecolinguistics and cognitive linguistics emphasize metaphors as conceptual devices to frame the reality around us. Animal metaphor forms an ...interesting domain to comprehend human-animal relationship at the interface of ecolinguistics and cognitive linguistics. Deriving from this, the research questions the suitability of the animalized language through Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) and Conceptual Blending Theory (CBT). Data from Twitter has been analyzed to understand how the animals on social media impacts the human mind in establishing speciesism among Bengali speakers. Hence, to supplement the research with an ecological perspective, a mixed-method approach has been employed using three studies: (1) to understand the general public opinion on using animal metaphor; (2) to present the cognitive operations of the imaginative mind in using animal metaphor; and (3) to check the reflection of human attitude in real-time practices. The research findings highlight the harmful frames that social media can trigger in the mental spaces of the users – excluding animals
qua
animals. Additionally, the research also empirically verifies that animalized language use is one of the significant factors behind the speciesist attitudes among Bengali speakers. The research also seeks to sensitize humans towards the hateful nature of the animalized tweets.
Alison Landsberg’s concept of ‘prosthetic memory’ is one in a series of metaphors adopted by Memory Studies. In this article Landsberg’s tropic concept serves not only as a case study in relation to ...Memory Studies, but also as a prompt to scholars to engage critically with the use of metaphor in cultural/literary studies. Metaphors matter. Poorly used figurative language can hamper communication and restrict how a given topic is both circumscribed and analysed. According to conceptual metaphor theorists, metaphors influence how we think as well as how we speak, and thus, potentially, how we live. To this end the term ‘prosthetic memory’ is analysed in the context of the relationship between the literal and the figurative as manifested at various levels in Prosthetic Memory, from Landsberg’s use of a key film – The Thieving Hand – in her theory-building, to her stylistic tics and sleights of hand, to her probably unconscious use of verbal metaphors (considered by some as ‘dead’).
Buddhist meditation practices have become a topic of widespread interest in both science and medicine. Traditional Buddhist formulations describe meditation as a state of relaxed alertness that must ...guard against both excessive hyperarousal (restlessness) and excessive hypoarousal (drowsiness, sleep). Modern applications of meditation have emphasized the hypoarousing and relaxing effects without as much emphasis on the arousing or alertness‐promoting effects. In an attempt to counterbalance the plethora of data demonstrating the relaxing and hypoarousing effects of Buddhist meditation, this interdisciplinary review aims to provide evidence of meditation's arousing or wake‐promoting effects by drawing both from Buddhist textual sources and from scientific studies, including subjective, behavioral, and neuroimaging studies during wakefulness, meditation, and sleep. Factors that may influence whether meditation increases or decreases arousal are discussed, with particular emphasis on dose, expertise, and contemplative trajectory. The course of meditative progress suggests a nonlinear multiphasic trajectory, such that early phases that are more effortful may produce more fatigue and sleep propensity, while later stages produce greater wakefulness as a result of neuroplastic changes and more efficient processing.
This study attempts to reveal how language is being used in the conservation of orangutan in Bukit Lawang, North Sumatra, Indonesia. The researchers focus on investigating the framing and metaphor as ...the reflection of how language is being used to represent the ideology of the policy makers, conservationist, local communities in communicating the urgency of protecting orangutan. The problem is vivid since there is no attempt before by linguists to discover the role of language in the conservation of orangutan. Hence, the status quo remains unanswered. This research fills the gap of the missing links of the unknown about the language used in orangutan’ conservation. This research applied qualitative research in which the data gathered in the form of discourses from various sources like infographic, reports and interview. At the same time, this study embraced Stibbe’s approach in ecolinguistics. Some results are quite alarming because the type of the framing about orangutan is negative such as Human-wildlife conflict frame or destructive metaphor such as ‘orangutan is the pest’ and ‘the kidnapper’. There are also ambivalent framing and metaphor which put endangered animal in a vague situation.
The research examines the expressions of rejection used by Instagram users against Rohingya immigrants in Aceh Province. This study is grounded in the growing public apprehension surrounding the ...influx of Rohingya immigrants, which has been steadily rising over time. The current population of Rohingya immigrants in Indonesia is 1,600, since their initial arrival in Aceh in 2009. This instigates social and economic strife, in which the state of prosperity for the Acehnese population remains incomplete. The data source for this research is 500 comments from Instagram users on five posts on multiple Instagram media profiles. The research data was acquired in December 2023 and subsequently examined using a qualitative descriptive methodology. According to the study's findings, the most common form of rejection was one that used suggestions or other alternatives. It indicates that the individuals in Aceh exhibit a high degree of empathy; however, due to various conditions, they suggest alternative resolutions. Meanwhile, the most minimal form is rejection accompanied by gratitude. These findings demonstrate that Instagram users consider it unnecessary to use courteous language and consider it acceptable to reject Rohingya immigrants. This research also indicated that technological innovations have contributed to the advent of forms of language rejection. We have discovered novel types of rejection discourse, specifically employing symbols or emoticons, utilizing metaphors, and employing hashtags to exert influence over fellow Instagram users.
L'auteure, psychologue d'orientation psychanalytique, raconte comment un moment passé sur une plage en étant témoin d'un jeu d'enfants, entre sable et mer, lui a inspiré une réflexion concernant ...l'espace potentiel en psychothérapie analytique de l'enfant. À partir de la métaphore de la plage, d'exemples cliniques et de références à des psychanalystes et des philosophes, elle présente cette réflexion en introduisant l'idée de la plage comme lieu physique pouvant représenter un lieu psychique propice à l'établissement du jeu symbolique au potentiel créatif et transformateur. Elle propose certaines pistes théoricocliniques afin de promouvoir ces processus - transitionnels, transférentiels et symboliques - dans la psychothérapie analytique de l'enfant.
Metaphors are fundamental to creative thought and expression. Newly coined metaphors regularly infiltrate our collective vocabulary and gradually become familiar, but it is unclear how this shift ...from novel to conventionalized meaning happens in the brain. We investigated the neural career of metaphors in a functional magnetic resonance imaging study using extensively normed new metaphors and simulated the ordinary, gradual experience of metaphor conventionalization by manipulating participants' exposure to these metaphors. Results showed that the conventionalization of novel metaphors specifically tunes activity within bilateral inferior prefrontal cortex, left posterior middle temporal gyrus, and right postero-lateral occipital cortex. These results support theoretical accounts attributing a role for the right hemisphere in processing novel, low salience figurative meanings, but also show that conventionalization of metaphoric meaning is a bilaterally-mediated process. Metaphor conventionalization entails a decreased neural load within semantic networks rather than a hemispheric or regional shift across brain areas.
► Metaphor is a pervasive linguistic device for creating new meanings. ► Over time, these novel senses are conventionalized and understood directly. ► We explored the neural correlates of this shift from novel to familiar processing. ► Conventionalization decreased neural activation within both hemispheres. ► Comprehending novel metaphors is a bilaterally-mediated process.
Move in a crowd Li, Heng; Cao, Yu
Review of Cognitive Linguistics,
12/2023, Volume:
21, Issue:
2
Journal Article
Peer reviewed
Abstract
When spatializing time, individuals can either say that they walk towards the future as though time is a
stationary landscape (called ego-moving perspective), or that the future time moves ...towards them (called time-moving perspective).
A substantial body of experimental research has shown that people’s adoption of these two temporal perspectives may be malleable,
influenced by a broad set of factors. In the current research, we examined the novel possibility that the mere crowdedness of the
environment can influence people’s abstract thinking about time. We contended that exposure to the crowd may be linked to
increased anxiety, which can in turn lead to a greater preference for the time-moving perspective in the resolution of temporal
ambiguity. Two experiments found that social crowding, whether induced via a visualization task or through an assignment to a
crowded workstation, was sufficient to alter participants’ perspectives on the movement of events in time. Further, we found that
anxiety mediated the relationship between crowdedness and temporal reasoning. Taken together, these results offer unique insights
into the cognitive consequences of social crowding and provide a more complete understanding of how people adduce temporal
relationship.
Conceptual model of price location effects.
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•A price’s vertical location influences evaluations of that price.•Lower price locations lead to lower price perceptions and higher ...in-store sales.•Price location effects arise only among individuals who associate down with less and up with more.•Price location effects are attenuated when alternative associations (i.e., those relating down with more and up with less) are primed.
Can changing the vertical location of a price (e.g., presenting it above or below a product image in an advertisement or retail display) influence consumer response? Drawing from conceptual metaphor theory, we propose that a price’s vertical location can activate metaphors that relate vertical locations to magnitudinal concepts. These “down=less” and “up=more” metaphors can subsequently influence evaluations of a target price as being monetarily low or high in magnitude. Consistent with this premise, several lab and field investigations demonstrate that prices provided in low (vs. high) locations lead to lower price perceptions, more favorable purchase intentions, and higher in-store sales. Two final studies directly implicate the role of “down=less” and “up=more” metaphors by demonstrating that such price location effects a) arise only among individuals who associate down with less and up with more and b) are attenuated when inconsistent spatial-magnitude associations (i.e., those relating down with more and up with less) are primed. The theoretical and managerial implications of these findings are discussed as are future research directions.
Medicine contributes to every person’s health in terms of diagnosis, treatment or prevention of a disease. Hence, constructing the clinical picture and the diagnosis of a health condition and ...conveying complex technical information in a comprehensible language is of utmost importance. In this regard, medical professionals rely not only on Greco-Latin terms of Classical times, but also resort to metaphors to illuminate many facets of medical observations and clinical findings. These metaphors stem either from anthropomorphic or zoomorphic areas and act as primary interface between scientific thought and understanding. From this perspective, the present article examines the value of metaphor in medicine and through the employment of descriptive method, explores some of the most widespread zoomorphic metaphors, which denominate certain facial anomalies.
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