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A Comparative Study Of The Center-periphery Image Schema And Its Metaphorical Extensions Between Chinese And English

Posted on:2015-10-31Degree:MasterType:Thesis
Country:ChinaCandidate:T T WuFull Text:PDF
GTID:2285330434455997Subject:Foreign Linguistics and Applied Linguistics
Abstract/Summary:PDF Full Text Request
As a widely used concept of cognitive linguistics, image schema theory, has beena hot topic in cognitive linguistic study in recent years. Generally speaking, imageschema theory was first proposed by Lakoff and Johnson (1980) in the ConceptualMetaphor Theory. They argued that image schemas could serve as source domains formetaphorical mapping, and thus contribute a great deal to the construction of metaphor.Highly abstract concepts are likely to be structured in complex ways by the inheritancerelations: a network of intermediate mappings. Meanwhile, abstract concepts can atleast in part, be traced back to image schemas. Based on the image schema andconceptual metaphor theory in cognitive linguistics, and with detailed analysis oftypical language phenomena in Chinese and English, this thesis attempts to explore theunderlying cognitive mechanisms behind these linguistic phenomena.One of the commonly used image schemas—the CENTER-PERIPHERY schemaplays an important role in human cognitive processes but has attracted little attention.By analyzing the rich language data selected from English and Chinese corpuses,classifying the abstract linguistic expressions of CENTER-PERIPHERY schema onthe basis of the portrayal of CENTER-PERIPHERY schema, and employing moderncognitive linguistic theories, this thesis attempts to explore how English and Chinesepeople construe meanings with image schema and metaphorical mechanisms andreveal the commonalities and dissimilarities between English and Chinese at thethinking level. After a detailed comparative analysis, this study achieves the followingfindings: 1. English and Chinese people share the same prototypical schema ofCENTER-PERIPHERY, and five similar variant schemas: Center is a constituent partof the whole and cannot be cut off from the whole; Periphery has a distinct boundary;Periphery has no distinct boundary; Periphery is a curved surface; Center andperiphery are linked by the FORCE schema. Moreover, their meaning extensions aremainly focused on the following domains: time domain, social domain, politic domain,economy domain, emotion domain and state domain.2. There also exist dissimilarities in CENTER-PERIPHERY schemas and theirmetaphorical mappings in English and Chinese also exhibit dissimilarities. In Chinese,there are3unique variant schemas: the variant formed by blending with theBALANCE schema, the variant formed by blending with the SCALE schema, and thevariant formed when center and periphery are of the same components.Correspondingly, there are also2unique metaphorical mappings in Chinese, whichfocus on the moral domain and the degree domain. However, there are no suchvariants or metaphorical mappings in English.3. The commonalities and dissimilarities existing in Chinese and English have aclose relationship with their experiences, especially those relevant to the broad culturalcontext and the natural and physical environment. Because the Doctrine of the Meanand the farming practice have affected all aspects of Chinese people’s lives, Chineselanguage tends to be more inclusive when compared with the English language.All of the above findings have proved that language is embodied. Languageexpressions of the abstract concepts are structured on the image schemas which appearto be knowledge structures that emerge directly from pre-conceptual embodiedexperience. These structures are meaningful at the conceptual level precisely becausethey derive from the level of bodily experience that is directly meaningful.The findings of the study have significant insights for comparative studies on theEnglish and Chinese language, and for future research in cognitive linguistics.However due to the limitations of the corpus data, especially the English resources, and the author’s current research ability, the study still needs to be further enriched.
Keywords/Search Tags:image schema, conceptual metaphor, CENTER-PERIPHERY imageschema, metaphorical extension, comparative study between Chinese and English
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