A Cognitive Study Of Computer Metaphor

As computer and Internet advance at a rapid pace, they are being pervasive in our society, which forms computer culture and Internet culture. Concomitant with this computer civilization is the large amount of computer metaphorical language. Many scholars did research on computer metaphor from various angles. But the previous studies have two major problems. First, most studies are concerned with computer visual metaphors and discuss how to apply them to GUI (Graphical User's Interface) design, software development and website construction; metaphorical language about computer is not involved. Second, some studies are concerned with metaphorical language, but they only treat them as a figure of speech and did their research within the framework of traditional metaphor theory. In view of the above, I would like to make a systematic analysis about computer metaphor from cognitive perspective based on two most influential metaphor theories, that is, Lakoff's conceptual metaphor theory and Fauconnier's conceptual blending theory.According to Lakoff, metaphor is not simply a matter of language, but of thought and reasoning. Metaphorical language is secondary and it is only a surface representation of metaphorical thinking. Lakoff's theory is simple and easy to explain highly entrenched conventional metaphors, but it has some limitations such as unidirectioality of mappings and cannot explain satisfactorily all the metaphorical phenomena; while Fauconnier's conceptual blending theory gives complement to Lakoff's metaphor theory. According to Fauconnier, Lakoff's two-domain model is only a special case of four-space model. Fauconnier uses four or more mental spaces, multiple projections and emergent structure to make dynamic and on-line analysis of metaphor. Thus Fauconnier's blending theory is more convincing in explaining novel metaphors. These two theories are complementary and can adequately explain computer metaphor. Through the analysis of computer metaphor, this paper tries to answer the following questions:1. How do people conceptualize computer and Internet?2. What are the effects of these metaphors on the vocabulary of English language?Based on large amount of linguistic data, I propose the view that metaphor is the basis of comprehending computer and Internet; that the existent computer metaphors have a great influence on the vocabulary of English language.There still exist some insufficient discussions in this paper although computer metaphor is analyzed in great detail based on the two cognitive metaphor theories. Particularly since the linguistic data are from English language and the discussion about computer metaphor is under the background of English culture, computer metaphor in other language culture is not concerned. Therefore, the cultural difference about computer metaphor needs further research.