Seeing through Metaphor: Teaching Figurative Literacy (original) (raw)
Students’ and Lecturers’ Perspectives on the Factors Influencing One’s Metaphor Competence
2013
This article aimed to see the perspective of lecturers and students regarding the factors influencing people's metaphor competence in daily life. Twenty-one students were interviewed and ten lecturers were sent a questionnaire asking about the factors that might influence the use of metaphors. The results show that both lecturers and students agree that language mastery is not the only one which determines the ability of people in comprehending and producing metaphors. Other non-linguistic factors such as habits, environment, personality, social network, logical thinking and general knowledge also influence people. The respondents propose that metaphors are to be taught to students not only in language subjects but also in other subjects such as Character Building or other social subjects.
Metaphorical Vocabulary in English as a Medium of Instruction Courses
JALT 2021 Post-Conference Publication, 2022
English as a Medium of Instruction (EMI) programs are growing in popularity in Japanese universities. Accordingly, there is a need to examine the linguistic demands of EMI instruction. The value of lexical knowledge is well known, but there is also growing recognition of the importance of metaphor in expressing abstract concepts in academic disciplines. Lack of metaphor awareness is known to affect learner comprehension, but no systematic studies of metaphor in Japanese university EMI courses have yet been conducted. This study used a two- million-word corpus of EMI course materials to identify common metaphors used to describe key concepts in applied linguistics, literature, philosophy, and political science. The findings confirm that metaphor is frequently used in EMI instruction. Results suggest that in applied linguistics, philosophy, and political science 10 to 25% of metaphor use can be accounted for by 9 to 12 conceptual metaphors, while literature appears to draw on a wider range of source terms.
1. The Creative Power of Metaphor
Creative Multilingualism
Chapter 1 looks at processes of figurative language in the interplay between thought and language from the vantage point of cognitive linguistics, exploring how different languages give their speakers different perspectives on the world through the way metaphors shape even the most fundamental concepts, such as time.
Literature review of three journals on metaphor
With advances in science and technology, creative thinking and language proficiency are urgent needed in English as a Foreign Language (EFL) teaching and learning. However, in some universities, language skills training stress the imitation, while ignores students’ thinking ability, innovation ability, the ability to analyze the problems and put forward individual opinion. In George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s (1980) Metaphor We Live By, metaphor is not simply a matter of word or linguistic expressions, but of concept, of thinking of one thing in terms of another. As a ubiquitous phenomenon in language, Metaphor is the motive power of the language system’s development and change, and a leading way to close the gap between the old and new knowledge of students. The use of conceptual metaphor teaching method in EFL class can enhance the students’ abilities of metaphor input and output, that is, the effects on vocabulary, reading and writing abilities. Besides, metaphor can provide insights into complex concepts of teaching and thus provide a window into the comprehension of teachers’ personal experiences. Although the significance of metaphor in EFL teaching and learning have been recognized by most scholars, metaphor is still paid no or little attention to be adopted in EFL class and treated as a merely rhetorical device. So how to apply metaphor enriched teaching and learning approaches in EFL class to cultivate the students’ critical thinking and conceptual fluency has great significance.
The Cambridge handbook of metaphor and …, 2008
The Cambridge Handbook of Metaphor and Thought offers the most comprehensive collection of essays in multidisciplinary metaphor scholarship that has ever been published. These essays explore the significance of metaphor in language, thought, culture, and artistic expression. There are five main themes of the book: the roots of metaphor, metaphor understanding, metaphor in language and culture, metaphor in reasoning and feeling, and metaphor in nonverbal expression. Contributors come from a variety of academic disciplines, including psychology, linguistics, philosophy, cognitive science, literature, education, music, and law.
338-361 SAUDI ENGLISH MAJORS THROUGH METAPHOR.pdf
A large number of studies focusing on language teachers' and learners' understandings of teaching and/or learning have used metaphor analysis as their tool of enquiry, however, very few studies to date have begun to examine students' conceptualizations of specific language skills, such as academic writing through metaphor analysis. In the light of this, the present study set out to fill this lacuna by investigating the various perspectives of Saudi English majors about the concept of learning essay writing through metaphor analysis. To elicit learners' metaphors, 77 English majors studying at Qassim University were given a questionnaire that solicited their metaphors for the concept of learning essay writing.They completed a metaphor elicitation questionnaire with the prompt “Learning essay writing is like . . . because ...” by focusing on only one metaphor to indicate their conceptualization of learning essay writing. To triangulate the data collected by metaphor elicitation questionnaire, semi-structured interview is adoptedto find out about the participants' underlying reasons for the metaphors they offered. Results of the current study lead to five major conclusions:(1)metaphor is aneffective tool to better understand English major students’ conceptualizations about learning essay writing; (2) learners mostly perceived writing as a skill requiring much effort and also giving pleasure; (3) learners perceived learning essay writing as a difficult process and that being a successful writer requires a variety of demands such as hard work, perseverance, patience, and a positive attitude;(4) the elicited metaphors also highlight both positive and negative perceptions of learning essay writing and (5)the Saudi students’ metaphorical perspectives were related to three approaches of teaching writing: the product approach, the process approach and the genre approach.
Academic Research & Reviews in Social, Human and Administrative Sciences -II-Edited by Maria Emilia Camargo , 2023
Individuals strive to comprehend and make sense of their environment from the moment of birth. Individuals may use both non-verbal and verbal expressions when articulating these interpretations, frequently employing metaphors to enrich and enhance their verbal communication. In other words, perceptions or thoughts regarding a concept, event, or phenomenon are frequently expressed via metaphors. Many consider a metaphor to be an instrument of poetic imagination, an artistic expression of language, as opposed to something mundane (Lakoff & Johnsen, 1980). Furthermore, it is important to note that metaphors permeate not only language, but also thought and action in everyday life. Education is a domain where metaphors are prevalent. Students can benefit from more effective and lasting learning environments when metaphors are used as instruments for comprehension and explanation. Furthermore, metaphors can reveal students' perceptions of events, phenomena, and situations. By analyzing metaphorical insights, we can develop solutions and recommendations that improve the educational process and the student experience. In this section of the book, the concept of metaphor will be examined; we will venture into the primary functions of metaphors, their classification, application areas, and educational use. In addition, we will examine the concept of student and student metaphors.
What matters: teaching and metaphor
2012
This work outlines an ecology of meaning in which metaphor plays a central role. Its purpose is to suggest how teachers, through ongoing reflection of meaningmaking in the classroom, might come to a new understanding of a Freirean dialogical praxis. To support such reflection, the thesis develops a phenomenological theory of meaning that characterizes the various agents of meaning-making as interdependent. It is especially concerned with the following elements: being, meaning, subjectivity, language, and metaphor, where the latter is understood not as a literary trope but a fundamental mode of communication among entities of all kinds. Formally, the argument is developed using the tools of Lyric Philosophy, in which the writer's own voice is juxtaposed with others in such a way that meaning emerges through the tension between the two. A narrative literature review provides an alternative access route to some key concepts.