| Pre-school children's science education,as a part of the science education reform newly initiated by China,plays a major role in facilitating the individual growth of children as well as the national scientific literacy.Being one of the most important ways to inform children of scientific knowledge,the importance of children's science picture books has been gradually recognized by the public.In order to conceptualize science realities in a more digestible way,children's science picture books usually employ lots of metaphors.This,however,poses a challenge for us that how we can correctly interpret metaphors deploying both visual and verbal elements in children's science picture books.The present study,under the scope of cognitive metaphor,draws its attention on the meaning construction of metaphors in children's science picture books and mainly explores the following research questions:(1)What are the types,ratios and features of metaphors in children's science picture books?(2)How do different types of metaphors construct metaphorical meaning in children's science picture books?(3)What are the cognitive pragmatic functions of metaphors in children's science picture books?To answer the questions,25 well-known children's science picture books targeting at pre-school children(age from 3 to 5)are collected.The chosen books involve a wide range of content,including life nature,physics,and social science.By taking Pragglejaz Group's(2007)metaphor identification procedure(MIP)and the formulation of processes of visual rhetoric(Morris,1993;Jennifer,O'Halloran et al.,2016),this study first identifies and classifies metaphors in children's science picture books.With the help of NVivo11,a powerful analytical software on qualitative data,the research data found in collected books are able to be annotated and analyzed quantitively,which prepares for the further qualitative investigation on the feature,meaning-making process and functions of metaphors in children's science picture books from the perspective of cognitive metaphor and relevance theory.The research findings are presented as follows:(1)According to the rhetorical process of source-target mapping,metaphors in children's science picture books can be characterized into four types: personification metaphor,monsterization metaphor,domestication metaphor and cross-experience metaphor.Among the four types of metaphors,personification metaphor accounts for the largest proportion(52.0%).Cross-experience metaphor,monsterization metaphor and domestication metaphor respectively take the ratio of 14.0%,12.7% and 21.3%.The utilization frequency of a metaphor is in reverse proportion to the abstraction that its source domain manifests.Moreover,metaphors in children's science picture books demonstrate a multimodal nature;that is,pictorial mode is the main carrier of source domain and verbal mode is responsible for the manifestation of target domain.It should be noted that 32.0% metaphorical meaning-making processes involve metonymy,and whole-part metonymy and causation metonymy remain the two most common metonymies in children's science picture books.(2)The results show that different types of metaphors have different emphasis and meaning-making processes.Drawing on metaphor NON-HUMAN OBJECTS ARE HUMANS,personification metaphors map human characteristics onto the account of abstract science topics,thus depicting active and willful agents with whose actions the scientific phenomenon can be easily understood.The ground for personification metaphors to construct metaphorical meaning mainly lies in two ways: metonymy and social connotations.Monsterization metaphors deploy the monster as source domain to conceptualize scientific realities with adverse effect,addressing the negative side of target domain with metaphor ADVERSE EVENTS ARE ACTIONS OF MONSTERS.Domestication metaphors focus on the dualism between scientific and mundane by using commonplace objects or events to familiarize children's understanding of abstract and less-known scientific conceptions.The sources of domestication metaphors are more diversified compared with other three types of metaphors.Cross-experience metaphors are deployed to address the dualism between mind and body.In children's science picture books,this mind-body association is mainly embedded in the metaphor MIND IS BODY to conceptualize abstract mental emotion.It is worth stressing that in this type of metaphor bodily experience as the source domain is depicted as conventional symbols to represent abstract mental emotions.Despite their conventional depictions,the hidden motivation of cross-experience metaphors can be traced back to the interaction between mind and body.(3)Metaphors in children's science picture books mainly perform three functions: informative function,evocative function and aesthetic function.As the major function,the informative potential of metaphors is achieved through the representation of resemblance or correlation between source and target domain.This way is approachable,coping well with quite abstract and complicated scientific topics.The evocative function of metaphors in children's science picture books is achieved 1)by referring to the characteristic “highlighting and hiding” of metaphors and 2)by creating novel metaphors so as to guide children to develop their logical and imaginative thinking.And ways to realize the aesthetic function of metaphors in children's science picture books involve the creation of novel metaphor,the utilization of color metaphor and multimodal metaphors' distinctive features.To conclude,the findings of the research expand the range of metaphor study and evidently demonstrate the effectiveness of cognitive metaphor for interpreting metaphors in various genres of discourse.Practically,it serves as reference and guidance for the instruction and design of children's science picture books. |
PDF Full Text Request