Figurative Language
Published on 6. March 2014
Book
Paperback/Softback
256 pages
978-0-521-18473-1 (ISBN)
Description
This lively introduction to figurative language explains a broad range of concepts, including metaphor, metonymy, simile, and blending, and develops new tools for analyzing them. It coherently grounds the linguistic understanding of these concepts in basic cognitive mechanisms such as categorization, frames, mental spaces, and viewpoint; and it fits them into a consistent framework which is applied to cross-linguistic data and also to figurative structures in gesture and the visual arts. Comprehensive and practical, the book includes analyses of figurative uses of both word meanings and linguistic constructions. * Provides definitions of major concepts * Offers in-depth analyses of examples, exploring multiple levels of complexity * Surveys figurative structures in different discourse genres * Helps students to connect figurative usage with the conceptual underpinnings of language * Goes beyond English to explore cross-linguistic and cross-modal data
Reviews / Votes
'This book breaks new ground in the cognitive linguistic study of metaphor, simile and metonymy. A must read for anyone interested in figurative language, cognition and discourse.' Elena Semino, Lancaster University 'Figurative Language is a marvelous book that will serve as both a very readable textbook for students and a source of research ideas for even expert figurative language scholars. The presentation of the complex cognitive linguistic literature on this topic is complete, well-organized, and illustrated with wonderful examples from literature, politics, science and religious discourse. I was most impressed by the way Dancygier and Sweetser blend together the diverse aspects of figuration into a more general framework that reveals deeper insights into the relations between language, thought, and culture.' Raymond W. Gibbs, Jr, University of California, Santa Cruz '... clearly has educational value for students, but the book's powerful explanatory framework also will be of interest to scholars in linguistics, cognition, and literature ... thought provoking and insightful.' PsycCRITIQUESMore details
Series
Language
English
Place of publication
Cambridge
United Kingdom
Target group
Professional and scholarly
Product notice
Paperback (trade)
Illustrations
8 Tables, black and white; 1 Halftones, unspecified; 5 Line drawings, unspecified
Dimensions
Height: 244 mm
Width: 170 mm
Thickness: 15 mm
Weight
455 gr
ISBN-13
978-0-521-18473-1 (9780521184731)
Copyright in bibliographic data and cover images is held by Nielsen Book Services Limited or by the publishers or by their respective licensors: all rights reserved.
Schweitzer Classification
Other editions
Additional editions
Barbara Dancygier | Eve Sweetser
Figurative Language
Book
03/2014
Cambridge University Press
€125.30
Shipment within 15-20 days
Barbara Dancygier | Eve Sweetser
Figurative Language
E-Book
02/2014
1st Edition
Cambridge University Press
€32.49
Available for download
Persons
Barbara Dancygier is Professor in the Department of English at the University of British Columbia. Eve Sweetser is Professor in the Department of Linguistics at the University of California, Berkeley.
Content
1. Introduction; 2. The basics of metaphor; 3. Metaphoric structure: levels and relations; 4. Mental spaces and blending; 5. Metonymy; 6. Grammatical constructions and figurative meaning; 7. The cross-linguistic study of metaphor; 8. Figurative language in discourse; 9. Concluding remarks.