On Crosscultural Understanding Of Metaphorical Mapping In Flora

Metaphor is a cognitive phenomenon that one kind of thing is understood and experienced in terms of another. It is deeply rooted in our culture, and is pervasive in everyday language and thought. It serves as a tool to construct concepts, and also plays a role of the learning target. Metaphor can be classified into groups according to types of vehicle, like animal metaphors and plant metaphors. The dissertation is mainly concerned with the plant metaphor, which includes context-independent flora words with cultural connotations, and those context-dependent figurative phrases related to plants.The plant metaphor stems from our acquaintance with the nature, functions and values of flora. It comes into being by projecting features of plants onto the target domains of either human being or physical objects, thus enables people to understand an abstract and complicated concept through their perception of physical features of a plant or their bodily experience that associated with a typical function of the plant. Plant metaphors of a particular language contain the thinking mode and cultural connotations that are specific to the langauge. Therefore, the true meaning of a metaphor which goes beyond its literal sense, is self-evident for native speakers, but by no means easy for foreign or second language learners to understand. However, most researches concerned with plant metaphors so far,have been limited to the comparative studies regarding the metaphor itself (including the elaboration and comparison of cultural connotations of plant words). Seldom have researchers focus on the learners’ comprehension of L2plant metaphors. Then our research takes the task. From the perspective of second language acquisition, this dissertation goes to examine L2learners’ understanding of plant metaphors, to figure out the misunderstandings they tend to make and the measures they usually employ in the process of acquiring L2figurative words and phrases. These cognitive information, coupled with cultural meanings of the metaphor and cultural background of L2learners, helps us establish a cognitive model to promote acquisition of L2plant metaphors, and to facilitate L2metaphor teaching in class.Under the theoretical framework of conceptual metaphor, this dissertation begins with a comparative studies of English-Chinese plant metaphors, which are categorized into groups by different mapping relationship between the source domain and the target domain. Cultural factors that result in the differences and similarities of English-Chinese plant metaphors are also explored. Then, questionnaires are designed based on the results of comparison and delivered to investigate the status quo of L2learners’ understanding of plant metaphors, to identify misunderstandings appearing in their cognitive processing of the figurative langauge, and to clarify elements that exert influence on the process of cognition. On the basis of the investigation, a cognitive model integrating cognitive styles and cultural factors is set up for promoting cross-cultural understanding of English-Chinese plant metaphors. Finally, we discuss the implications for the Chinese metaphor teaching.The major achievements of our research include:1. The results of the comparative study reveal that English and Chinese plant metaphors share only a few similarities. Disparities are manifested in three aspects: the total number of plant metaphors, target domains, and source domains. Efforts are also made on the exploration of causes which lead to the differences demonstrated in each mapping relationship.2. The research results show that:culture background, langauge context, cognitive styles (like association and inference), and the inappropriate visual stimulus are the shared factors which affect L2learners’ understanding of metaphorical expressions. Besides, culture transfer, context-based inference, and association stems from literal meaning of sentences are the cognitive measures often employed by second language learners in their understanding of plant metaphors. Of all the factors, culture background is the most influential on metaphor understanding.3. A cross-cultural understanding model of plant metaphors is proposed. Based on the research results, the cognitive model is established with a layered structure integrateing cognitive styles and cultural factors. It helps promote the understanding of L2plant metaphors, and facilitates the constitution of concepts that are specific to the target culture.The dissertation consists of seven chapters.Chapter1is the introduction in which we specify research background (including a brief review of plant metaphor studies), the significance and creativities of our research, and the organization of the dissertation as well.Chapter2elaborates the theoretical framework for metaphor understanding and the whole design of our research. A brief account is given on the essence of metaphor, its working mechanism and world-wide discussion over the nature of metaphor understanding. Features of metaphorical competence development in the process of L1and L2acquisition are compared. We also examine the influence that association and cultural background exert on metaphorical thinking and the inference of figurative meaning. Finally, this chapter explains the overall design of our research.Chapter3is a comparative study of English and Chinese plant metaphors. A list of plants is firstly fixed based on The English-Chinese Encyclopaedia of Knowledge and serves as the reference to the plant species for the collection of plant metaphorical expressions from dictionaries. Then, comparison is drawn and cultural analysis is made in each category divided by different mapping relationship of concept domains. The philosophical, cultural and linguistic causes that lead to distinctions between plant metaphors of the two languages are finally summarized.In Chapter4we attempt to look into the second langauge learners’understanding of plant metaphors. We explain in detail the questionnaire design and the procedure of our investigation. Through analyzing and comparing data, we try to find the misunderstandings that second langauge learners make in their cognitive processes of the figurative language, and generalize the influential factors on metaphor understanding and cognitive styles favored and employed by learners in the process of metaphor acquisition.Chapter5focuses on the establishment of cross-cultural understanding model of English-Chinese plant metaphors. It begins by introduing the differences between traditional crosscultural understanding models and the new model we propose. Then it goes on to elaborate each layer of the structured model. The chapter closes with a presentation of the constituted whole and the evaluation of its traits, values and significance.Implications for Chinese plant metaphor teaching brought about by our investigation and research are presented in Chapter6. Through examining L2metaphor teaching both at home and abroad, we point out the limitations of Chinese metaphor teaching. We believe that metaphor acquisition is a good way to acquire thinking mode and culture patterns of the target language. Therefore, in writing this dissertation, we hope to raise the awareness of both Chinese instructors and learners of the important role of metaphor in the acquisition of Chinese way of thinking, the understanding of Chinese culture, as well as the development of metaphorical competence in Chinese teaching and learning.The last chapter summarizes the major achievements of our research, reveals the limitations of the dissertation, and sheds light on the orientation for further studies.