A Study Of Textual Metaphor In English Scientific Discourse

In the field of Systemic-Functional Linguistics, the study of grammatical metaphor is a significant part. Halliday classifies grammatical metaphor into two kinds: ideational metaphor and interpersonal metaphor. Based on the research of Halliday, Martin puts forward that textual metaphor should be included in the grammatical metaphor. He classifies textual metaphor into 5 types: meta-message relation, text reference, internal conjunction, negotiating texture and metaphorical theme. Many scholars, including Halliday, have reservations on it. Because of the controversy over textual metaphor, the theory of textual metaphor needs to be testified and perfected. The thesis is in an attempt to study the textual metaphor in English scientific discourse. The research of textual metaphor in English scientific discourse attempts to be meaningful from two aspects: 1) to discover how textual metaphor functions in construing the English scientific discourse; 2) to testify the rationales of the existence of textual metaphor based on the research.The thesis has 5 chapters. Chapter One briefly introduces the research question, the rationales of the present research, research methodology and the organization of the thesis. Chapter Two is the literature review of metaphor, including the development of metaphor and the introduction of the grammatical metaphor under the framework of Halliday's Systemic-Functional Linguistics. Chapter Three establishes the theoretical foundations of this thesis. Based on the study of Martin and Fan Wenfang, the framework for the analysis of textual metaphor in English scientific discourse is proposed. Chapter Four is the analysis and discussion of textual metaphor in English scientific discourse mainly in terms of functions of the textual metaphor in scientific discourse. Chapter Five is the conclusion in terms of major findings, contributions, limitations and further directions of the present research.The study of textual metaphor is a new realm in the field of metaphor study. The literature of the textual metaphor in the English scientific discourse is rather limited. It is found in the present research that the textual metaphor really exists in English scientific discourse and plays a great role in construing the texts. Accordingly the research on the textual metaphor can provide a fruitful framework for the study of the English scientific discourse.