| Metaphor,as an important topic,has aroused the attention of many scholars in various disciplines both abroad and at home for more than 2000 years.With the proposing of Conceptual Metaphor Theory,it is believed that one of the human beings’ ordinary conceptual systems is metaphor in nature and metaphor can shape the way people think and act.It is an effective way and a main mechanism for people to express and understand the unfamiliar,invisible and abstract concepts(Lakoff & Johnson,1980: 4-60).Based on Conceptual Metaphor Theory,the current study makes a comparative analysis of conceptual metaphors in Friends and Love Apartment.Humor,being regarded as a disposition of mind,is a complicated feeling brought out by comic and sympathy elements.Based on different criteria,humors can be divided into different categories.Since humor is produced most frequently by people when they communicate with each other,the verbal humor will be the target of the current study.Besides,humors are abundant in situation comedies of Friends and Love Apartment.In order to narrow the research range and make the study more specific,the comparative analysis of verbal humors in these two sitcoms is focused on based on the literature review that have been done.The study aims to figure out how abstract concepts in Chinese verbal humors are constructed through metaphorical mapping,find out the similarities and differences between source domains of conceptual metaphors in Chinese and English verbal humors and summarize the reasons for the differences and similarities of Chinese and English verbal humors from cultural perspectives.With comparison as the study method and Conceptual Metaphor Theory as the theoretical framework,181 items of conceptual metaphors manually collected from the first two seasons in Friends and the first season in Love Apartment,with 90 items in English and91 items in Chinese,are analyzed.According to different source domains,the samples are further grouped into 51 structural metaphors in English,61 structural metaphors in Chinese,12 orientational metaphors in English,9 orientational metaphors in Chinese,27 ontological metaphors in English and 21 ontological metaphors in Chinese.A detailed analysis of the source domains of the conceptual metaphors in two sitcoms is carried out.Then,the study attempts to explain the similarities and differences of the source domains from differentperspectives.Through comparative analysis of conceptual metaphors in two sitcoms,there are some important findings.Firstly,most of the abstract,unfamiliar and invisible concepts in Chinese are also understood in terms of metaphors through metaphorical mapping from source domain to target domain.Second,in Chinese and English,there really exist the similarities as well as differences on using source domains to map the target domains.Last but not least,in accordance with the third research question,it can be found that the choosing of the source domain is not arbitrary and groundless,which can be dated back to religion,classical works,life experience,culture as well as the history rooted in each language.The study can provide some theoretical and practical implications for further studies.It provides a new perspective for the comparative analysis of verbal humors in Friends and Love Apartment.It has a guiding significance for understanding the verbal humors in these two sitcoms and a certain enlightening significance for future studies.In addition,it can also contribute to the better understanding of the metaphors in English and Chinese.However,due to insufficient corpus,it still has some limitations that can be improved by further studies. |
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