A Cognitive Approach To Plant Metaphors In Desperate Housewives

Metaphors We Live By published by Lakoff and Johnson in 1980s, in which theory conceptual metaphor is first put forward. Metaphor thus is considered not just as a rhetorical figure of speech from language aspect but also a method of thinking and cognition of the world. Since then, metaphor studies have drawn increasing attention from linguists and, at the same time, attracted scholars from other different fields. Before cognitive studies of metaphor came into being linguists defined metaphor as a rhetoric function. With the introduction of cognitive linguistic theory, metaphor studies have come to a new turning point. Distinguished from the traditional metaphor studies, the modern metaphor theory is more of a cognitive process including human behaviors of perceiving and cognizing the world. A more remarkable and systematical statement of Conceptual Metaphor Theory is given by Lakoff and Johnson in Metaphors We Live By. What Lakoff and Johnson advocated is the idea that the critical essence of metaphor is cognitive, conceptual and also relevant in human life. Currently, as the research of metaphors is becoming more and more comprehensive, cognitive and systematic, the main stream of metaphor studies has been transferred from single course to multicourse.For English learners, watching American TV is a critical and effective way to learn American English and understand American customs and values. Desperate Housewives(DH), with its humorous and metaphorical euphemistic language style, is not only popular among the audience but also draw many scholars’attention. Although many researches on it have been done, few of them, especially plant metaphor studies, are carried out in line with cognition views. Therefore, in the framework of cognitive linguistics, the thesis aims to explore the conceptual metaphors of plant in Desperate Housewives (Season 1-Season3) guided by the Conceptual Metaphor Theory. A comprehensive study of the English dialogues is done on the basis of conceptual metaphor theory. During the process of studying the plant metaphors in DH, many plant metaphor usages in daily oral English are also found. Based on former studies, the thesis, to a certain extent, will improve the research of plant metaphors and help to clarify and enrich culture-relevant plant terms.