Theme Construction Of Paralysis:a Metonymic Approach To Illness Discourse In Dubliners

With the development of cognitive linguistics in recent years,metonymy,one of the most important cognitive models,has been widely recognized as a new perspective for studying textual construction.The scholars pay more attention to the discourse cohesive function of metonymy,but discourse theme construction function of metonymy has received less attention.This study from the perspective of metonymy explores how disease discourse in Dubliners constructs its paralysis theme.The building between illness discourse and paralysis theme was drawn by a MemberCategory relation between paralysis and illness.There is no doubt that metonymy plays an important role in the theme construction of Dubliners.Metonymically motivated thinking exists both in the generation and understanding of literary texts.The development of theme is a continuous process,in which a sub-theme turns to another adjacent sub-theme and then the co-occurrence of several sub-themes constructs the theme of text.The continuity nature of metonymy determines its important place in literature works.To present the cognitive process from disease discourse to paralysis theme,the disease discourse should be selected from 15 short stories of Dubliners.And then in micro-construction of text,this study analyzes metonymic relations between disease discourses in each story and presents these relations in figures.The analysis procedure of four stories will be elaborated.In macro-level,the metonymic relations between 15 short stories are presented both in content and form aspects.Finally,the distribution of metonymic relation types of disease discourse in Dubliners is summarized.Findings from the study revealed that metonymically motivated thinking will be employed both in the macro-construction and micro-construction of text theme.At the micro level,metonymic thinking manifests itself in the disease discourse,a componential element of theme.The metonymic relation of disease discourse in each story forms a kind of disease and there are 15 kinds of diseases in Dubliners,including stroke,disillusion of liberty,disillusion of love,autism,etc.At the macro level,metonymic thinking runs through the process of meaning expression of content and form.On the content side,15 kinds of diseases in 15 short stories formmetonymic relationship with paralysis theme.On the form side,the symptoms in fifteen chapters can be divided into 4 parts like 4 stages in a whole life and find that paralysis penetrates continuously over the life span,which is a dynamic process.The degree of paralysis varies from stage to stage and shows a rising trend.Besides,the type of part-whole metonymy takes 74% of all,part-part type 26%.The reason for the results is a reflection of the general function and purpose of Dubliners to certain.Paralysis stands for disease;a stage of life stands for the whole life;a city Dublin stands for all cities in the world.The part-whole metonymic relation is more universal in the process of thematic construction of Dubliners.