English Concept Of Metaphor

Traditionally, metaphor has always been considered as a rhetorical means used in literature. With the publication of Metaphors We Live By in 1980, Lackoff et al. have exerted a profound influence on both linguistics and cognitive science.They claim, firstly, that metaphor is fundamentally conceptual, not linguistic; secondly , that metaphors are mapping across conceptual domains ;and thirdly, that metaphorical mappings vary in university ;some seem to be universal, others are widespread, and some seem to be culture-specific.The main purpose of this thesis is to contribute to the contemporary theory of metaphor from the viewpoint of comparison between English and Chinese; this thesis tries to provide evidence for the claim of contemporary theory of metaphor that abstract reasoning is understood ,at least partially, metaphorically in terms of our physical experience. And this thesis tries to find out what conceptual metaphors are universal, or widespread, and what conceptual metaphors are culture specific; and probe into the deep cultural reason underlying the differences between the two conceptual systems. In order to answer the problems above, I select some typical conceptual metaphors covering emotion, time, space, money, life, and human body "heart" from Chinese and English.