Analysis On The Conceptual Metaphors In Amy Tan’s The Joy Luck Club

Based on the conceptual metaphor theory of Cognitive Linguistics, proposed by Lakoff and Johnson, this dissertation analyzes the conceptual metaphors in The Joy Luck Club, the masterpiece of Amy Tan, a Chinese American woman writer. In this dissertation, the author analyzes the novel from the perspective of conceptual metaphor, which has more advantage and more profound explanatory power. Through a deep analysis on the conceptual metaphor in language expression and narrative structure and a profound discussion of the theme, cultural connotations and the background of Amy Tan, the author tries to explain the choice of these conceptual metaphors in the novel results from her special growing experience. As a Chinese American, she grew in cross-cultural surroundings and received education both in China and America, which help a lot to form her unique way of thinking and cognitive mechanism. In this autobiographical novel, the first generation of the families emigrates from the turbulent China to America where the white culture is the main trend. Both the parents and the children are experiencing conflicts and blending of cultures, ways of thinking, and patterns of living, which equip the conceptual metaphors in the novel with its own characteristics. From the cognitive linguistics perspective, the dissertation analyses the source domains and the target domains of the conceptual metaphors to find their experience basis. Forming one’s conceptual system and using metaphors when she constructs the text have indivisible connections with her growing experience, living environments, social background, etc.In order to help readers to understand the cultural connotations and theme of The Joy Luck Club much more objectively and profoundly, this dissertation applies the conceptual metaphor theory to analyze the text. As is mentioned in Metaphors We Live by, metaphor is pervasive not only in language but also in thought and action. We can not live without metaphor. It is hoped that this dissertation will be suggestive for those researchers employing conceptual metaphor theory to study literary works.