Tài liệu A contrastive analysis on metaphor about power in english and vietnamese idioms from cognitive linguistics perspective

VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ MINH A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS ON METAPHOR ABOUT POWER IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE IDIOMS FROM COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS PERSPECTIVE (PHÂN TÍCH ĐỐI CHIẾU ẨN DỤ VỀ QUYỀN LỰC TRONG THÀNH NGỮ ANH VIỆT NHÌN TỪ GÓC ĐỘ NGÔN NGỮ HỌC TRI NHẬN) M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English linguistics Code : 60220201 HANOI, 2016 VIETNAM NATIONAL UNIVERSITY, HANOI UNIVERSITY OF LANGUAGES AND INTERNATIONAL STUDIES FACULTY OF POST GRADUATE STUDIES NGUYỄN THỊ MINH A CONTRASTIVE ANALYSIS ON METAPHOR ABOUT POWER IN ENGLISH AND VIETNAMESE IDIOMS FROM COGNITIVE LINGUISTICS PERSPECTIVE (PHÂN TÍCH ĐỐI CHIẾU ẨN DỤ VỀ QUYỀN LỰC TRONG THÀNH NGỮ ANH VIỆT NHÌN TỪ GÓC ĐỘ NGÔN NGỮ HỌC TRI NHẬN) M.A. MINOR PROGRAMME THESIS Field : English linguistics Code : 60220201 Supervisor : Assoc. Prof. Dr. Lâm Quang Đông HANOI, 2016 DECLARATION BY CANDIDATE I hereby declare that this thesis is my own work and effort. It has not been submitted anywhere for any award. All the sources of information that have been used have been properly acknowledged. Hanoi, 2016 NGUYỄN THỊ MINH i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS This thesis has been completed with the invaluable and constant support and encouragement of my supervisor, family members and others. Although no listing of acknowledgements can ever be completed, I would still like to take this opportunity to express my sincere thanks to those people here. First and foremost, I would like to express my deep gratitude to my supervisor, Assoc. Prof. Dr. Lâm Quang Đông of ULIS, VNU for his helpful guidance, endless patience and whoehearted support. Without his enthusiastic and meaningful suggestions, comments and corrections, this study would not have been accomplished. My appreciation also goes to all the lecturers in the Faculty of Postgraduate Studies in University of Languages and International Studies, Vietnam National University, Hanoi for their useful lessons from which I have relevant knowledge and proper methods to fulfill this thesis. Furthermore, I greatly thank the librarians for their enthusiatic support when I looked for materials for writing this paper. Last but not least, I would like to express my sincere thanks to all members in my family and my friends for their invaluable support and encouragement. Hanoi, 2016 NGUYỄN THỊ MINH ii ABSTRACT This research mainly focused on metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms and aims at investigating the similarities as well as the differences between their usages in the two languages. Based on Lackoff and Johnson‟s framework about conceptual metaphor, nine categories of metaphor were classified including: power is the human body, power is the human activities, power is animals, power is relatives, power is physical forces, power is a thief, power is a game, power is a container and power is up and no power is down. Besides the similarity in expressing some metaphors like “power is up and no power is down”, for example, the two languages also had some distinctive features when metaphors “power is a container” and “power is a game” were only found in English and “power is a thief” were only found in Vietnamese. The result of study hopefully makes a small contribution to the translation of idioms in general and idioms about power in particular and to teaching and learning English language and culture. Key words: metaphor, idioms, power, language iii LIST OF TABLES AND ABBREVIATIONS No. Table No. Table name Page 1 1.1 One-to-one domain mapping example 12 2 1.2 One-to-many domain mapping example 12 3 1.3 Many-to-one domain mapping example 13 4 2.1 Quantity of samples analyzed 17 Quantity and percentage of conceptual 5 3.1 metaphors about power in English and 20 Vietnamese idioms Quantity and percentage of structural 6 3.2 metaphors about power in English and 21 Vietnamese idioms Quantity and percentage of ontological 7 3.3 metaphors about power in English and 22 Vietnamese idioms Quantity and percentage of orientational 8 3.4 metaphors about power in English and Vietnamese idioms LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 1. Sb: somebody 2. St: something iv 26 TABLE OF CONTENTS DECLARATION BY CANDIDATE .....................................................................i ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .................................................................................. II ABSTRACT ......................................................................................................... III LIST OF TABLES ...............................................................................................IV TABLE OF CONTENTS ...................................................................................... V PART A: INTRODUCTION ............................................................................... 1 1. RATIONALE OF THE STUDY ..................................................................... 1 2. OBJECTIVES OF THE STUDY AND RESEARCH QUESTIONS.............. 1 3. SCOPE OF THE STUDY ................................................................................ 2 4. METHODS AND PROCEDURES OF THE STUDY .................................... 2 5. SIGNIFICANCE OF THE STUDY ................................................................ 3 5.1. THEORETICAL SIGNIFICANCE ......................................................................... 3 5.2. PRACTICAL SIGNIFICANCE ............................................................................. 3 6. ORGANIZATION OF THE THESIS ............................................................. 3 PART B: DEVELOPMENT................................................................................ 5 CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND................................................................................................... 5 1.1. LITERATURE REVIEW ..................................................................................... 5 1.2. THEORETICAL BACKGROUND ......................................................................... 7 1.2.1. An overview of Cognitive Linguistics ........................................................ 7 1.2.2. Conceptual metaphor ................................................................................ 8 1.2.3. Classification of conceptual metaphor ...................................................... 9 1.2.4. Conceptual metaphoric domains and mapping ....................................... 12 1.2.5. Power ....................................................................................................... 15 1.2.6. Idioms ...................................................................................................... 16 CHAPTER 2: RESEARCH METHODOLOGY AND PROCEDURES ...... 18 2.1. RESEARCH METHODOLOGY .......................................................................... 18 2.2. DATA ............................................................................................................ 18 2.3. DATA COLLECTION....................................................................................... 18 2.4. DATA ANALYSIS ........................................................................................... 19 2.5. RESEARCH PROCEDURES .............................................................................. 19 v 2.6. RELIABILITY AND VALIDITY ........................................................................ 21 CHAPTER 3: FINDINGS AND DISCUSSION .............................................. 22 3.1. QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS ......................................................................... 22 3.1.1. Structural metaphors ................................................................................. 24 3.1.2.ONTOLOGICAL METAPHORS ................................................................. 25 3.1.3. Orientational metaphors............................................................................ 26 3.2. QUALITATIVE ANALYSIS ............................................................................ 26 3.2.1. Power is the human body........................................................................... 26 3.2.2. Power is the human activities .................................................................... 27 3.2.3. Power is animals ....................................................................................... 28 3.2.4. Power is relatives ...................................................................................... 29 3.2.5. Power is a thief .......................................................................................... 30 3.2.6. Power is a game......................................................................................... 30 3.2.7. Power is physical forces ............................................................................ 30 3.2.8. Power is a container .................................................................................. 31 3.2.9. Power is up, no power is down .................................................................. 32 3.3. SIMILARITIES AND DIFFERENCES ............................................................... 33 3.3.1. Similarities ................................................................................................. 33 3.3.2. Differences ................................................................................................. 34 PART C: CONCLUSION.................................................................................. 36 1. RECAPITULATION ..................................................................................... 36 2. IMPLICATIONS ........................................................................................... 36 2.1. IMPLICATION FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING .............................................. 36 2.2. IMPLICATION FOR TRANSLATION ................................................................. 37 3. LIMITATIONS AND SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER STUDY ............. 38 REFERENCES ................................................................................................... 39 APPENDIX ........................................................................................................... I vi PART A: INTRODUCTION 1. Rationale of the study In recent years, cognitive linguistics has flourished in Vietnam with increasing studies. One of the most important concepts of cognitive linguistics which emphasizes meaning construction (conceptualization) is metaphor. Metaphor is known as one of the most useful methods in meaning transfer that is used widely not only in daily life but also in literature. It helps people understand an abstract concept by referring to a concrete one. For example, we often metaphorically conceptualize such abstract concepts as love, argument in “Love is journey” or “Argument is war”, which are clearly analyzed by famous cognitive linguists like Lackoff and Johnson (1980). It appears so often and is utilized so widely that sometimes we use it subconsciously without realizing it. Nobody can deny idioms‟ importance in communication, learning, teaching and translation as well but it is a difficult area of English. According to Cooper (1999), idioms present a special language problem to all language learners because their figurative meanings are unpredictable. Also, their meanings are not the total sum of their parts and metaphor is considered one of the key factors to understand the meaning of idioms. When talking about idioms, we not only talk about the vocabulary and semantics of a language but also the cultures hidden behind. Therefore, this study also makes some initial investigation to see how cultures affect idioms in Vietnamese and English in the way they convey the concept of power. 2. Objectives of the study and research questions This study aims to investigate idioms that carry conceptual metaphor about power based on the theory of Lakoff and Johnson. To go further, this study is done to explore the similarities and the differences between the use of metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms that reflect the culture of each language community. Finally, this paper aims to provide some suggestions for 1 teaching, learning and translating of conceptual metaphor about power which is expressed in English and Vietnamese idioms. In other words, the study seeks answers to two research questions: Research question 1: How is the concept of power metaphorically expressed in English and Vietnamese idioms? Research question 2: What are the similarities and differences in expressions of conceptual metaphors about power in English and Vietnam idioms? 3. Scope of the study In this study, the analysis is based on the theory and classification of conceptual metaphors given by Lakoff and Johnson. Due to the limited time and ability, this research only investigated and contrasted conceptual metaphors about power in society and politics in English and Vietnamese idioms. Six dictionaries in both languages, three in English and three in Vietnamese were chosen. The selected idioms in English are cited from several dictionaries including: - Oxford Idioms Dictionary for Learners of English by Oxford University Press (2006) - Dictionary of American Idioms by Spears, R.A (2005) - Longman American Idioms Dictionary by Urban, R (2000) Idioms in Vietnamese are from: - Thành ngữ tiếng Việt by Nguyễn Lực, Lương Văn Đang (1993) - Từ điển giải thích thành ngữ tiếng Việt by Nguyễn Như Ý (1998) - Từ điển thành ngữ và tục ngữ Việt Nam by Nguyễn Lân (2014) 4. Methods and procedures of the study This study is based on conceptual metaphors framework introduced by Lackoff and Johnson (1980) in their invaluable book “Metaphor We Live By”. According to this model, conceptual metaphors are classified into three different kinds, namely structural metaphors, ontological metaphors and orientational metaphors. Firstly, contrastive and comparative analyses were carried out in order to identify the similarities and differences in expression of conceptual metaphor about 2 power in English and Vietnamese idioms. Secondly, qualitative and quantitative methods were used to analyze the data. Quantitatively, the data were analyzed in terms of the frequencies of structural, ontological and orientational metaphors. Qualitatively, the data were classified or examined based on such criteria as: Power is the human body; Power is a container; Power is up, and no power is down. 5. Significance of the study 5.1. Theoretical significance This study hopes to provide useful contributions to studies of cognitive linguistics, especially the role of conceptual metaphor in expressing the concept of power in idioms. 5.2. Practical significance This research is expected to help learners of English in Vietnam understand the differences between English and Vietnamese cultures through idioms. Moreover, it can contribute to improvement of reading comprehension, translation and the analysis of literary works. 6. Organization of the thesis Part A: Introduction. This part presents the rationale, the aims, and the methodology of the study. The scope, the significance of the study and the organization of the thesis are also described. Part B: Development. This part consists of three chapters: Chapter 1: Literature Review and Theoretical Background. This chapter provides fundamental knowledge of cognitive linguistics in general and conceptual metaphors in particular. Some related concepts are also discussed, such as power and idioms. This chapter ends with related studies. Chapter 2: Research Methodology and Procedures. This chapter presents the methods and the procedures of the research including how the data were collected, described and analyzed. Chapter 3: Findings and Discussions. This chapter presents the result of my 3 analysis of conceptual metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms, their differences and similarities in the two languages. Part C: Conclusion. This part summarizes the results of the studies and implications for learning, teaching and translating idioms. Some suggestions for further research and limitations are presented in this part as well. 4 PART B: DEVELOPMENT CHAPTER 1: LITERATURE REVIEW AND THEORETICAL BACKGROUND This chapter will provide a critical analysis of the previous studies about metaphors, idioms as well as power. Key concepts such as cognitive linguistics, conceptual metaphors, power and idioms are reviewed with the aim of establishing a theoretical background for the comparative and contrastive analysis of conceptual metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms. 1.1. Literature review Beginning from the last half of the twentieth century, Cognitive Linguistics has actually become an interesting research trend in order to investigate the relationship among language, mind and socio-physical experience of human beings. So many viewpoints about conceptual metaphor are presented clearly in the famous book by Lackoff and Johnson in 1980. Thanks to the guide of Lackoff and Johnson‟s theory about conceptual metaphor, even the most abstract and tangible concept is also metaphorically understood by more concrete one through mapping domains. It actually encourages me to investigate the conceptual metaphor about power, one abstract and tangible concept. In Vietnam, so many linguists have contributed to the development of cognitive linguistics through their famous studies, namely Lý Toàn Thắng (2005), Trần Văn Cơ (2007), Nguyễn Đức Tồn (2007). If Lý Toàn Thắng (2005) systematically presents the background of cognitive linguistics and its significance, Trần Văn Cơ (2007), on the other hand, focuses more on cognition and related field of cognitive linguistics, especially conceptual metaphor and its development in Vietnam and all over the world. He also emphasizes that conceptual metaphors are used to understand one concept in terms of another. Those famous linguists have made great contribution to the foundation and 5 development of cognitive field in the world in general and in Vietnam in particular. Besides famous linguists, who set the foundation of cognitive field in Vietnam as well as all over the world, other researchers also pay their attention to the cognitive field in general and metaphor in particular. When studying conceptual metaphor, Zhang, Y (2012) emphasizes universality and variation of love metaphor in English and Chinese. By using comparative and contrastive analysis, the author then gives out reasons for variation of conceptual metaphors. Also from cognitive view, Hồ Thị Thu Trang (2010) investigates ways of denoting characteristics through domestic animal metaphor. In this research, she once more confirms the existence of metaphor in our daily lives through analyzing words and phrases about human characteristics. Although the two above studies are not related much to my study, they actually give me the clear view about cognitive linguistics as well as conceptual metaphor and their methodology. Nguyễn Thị Yến Thoa (2005) points out some metaphors relating to parts of human body in English and Vietnamese words and phrases. Relating to “hand” in English and “bàn tay” in Vietnamese, she gives some examples of metaphors but all of them describe the function of hands in both languages. In this study, she has not referred to metaphors in idioms which contain “hand” element. General speaking, cognitive linguistics in general and metaphor in particular have been an attractive topic to researchers in Vietnam. Nguyễn Ngọc Vũ (2012) also investigates conceptual metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms which contain the word “hand”. Firstly, in that research, he once more confirms that the conceptual metaphor is the basis to create meaning of most of the idioms in both languages. Secondly, thanks to the comparison between English and Vietnamese conceptualization, the learners can have better understanding about the two languages, especially how the abstract 6 concept “power” is understood by the more concrete concept of “hand”. Also researching on power, Lương Thị Hiền (2007) does not base on conceptual metaphor about power; she focuses on describing words that denote power in daily communication in Vietnamese family. She also gives a critical analysis of power from discourse analysis approach in that study. Despite all the existing books and research on power and conceptualization in the world in general and in Vietnam in particular, there has been no specific study on conceptual metaphor about power in English and Vietnamese idioms. In this study, power in society and politics is especially emphasized and hopefully, it might help teachers, learners, and translators understand the two languages better. Therefore, it has inspired me to carry out this study. 1.2. Theoretical background 1.2.1. An overview of Cognitive Linguistics In Cognitive Linguistics, cognition is the key word used to refer to cognitive processes in which people, through their brain, receive, transmit and operate upon information (Lý Toàn Thắng, 2008).Therefore, linguistic knowledge emerges in general cognition and thinking. According to Fauconnier and Turner (1998), Cognitive Linguistics is considered“a powerful approach to the study of language, conceptual systems, human cognition, and general meaning construction”. This approach is different from others in language sciences because it investigates the relationship between human language, the mind, and socio-physical experience (Evans, 2012). Therefore, this approach has exerted great influence on other fields of cognitive science. According to Evans (2012), Cognitive Linguistics is guided by two primary commitments. Cognitive Commitment and Generalization Commitment are two terms used by Lackoff (1991:53) to show the cognition of human-beings through brains and naming things. Cognitive Commitment helps to recognize the principles of linguistic structure in which the knowledge about human cognition 7 is reflected from other cognitive and brain disciplines. Meanwhile, the Generalization Commitment represents a dedication which characterizes general principles and they are applied to all aspects of human language. There are two main branches or approaches of cognitivism, namely cognitive approaches to grammar and cognitive semantics (Talmy, 2000). Cognitive semantics investigates the relationship between experience, the conceptual system and the semantic structure encoded by language (Evans and Green, 2006). This study mainly focuses on cognitive semantics because it concerns with the model of meaning. In summary, cognitive linguistics in general and cognitive semantics in particular plays an important role in analyzing meaning, and so this study analyzes the linguistics expressions, and idioms that carry the meaning of power. 1.2.2. Conceptual metaphor Since the appearance of Cognitive linguistics in the mid-1970s, metaphor has attracted many scholars like Lackoff and Johnson (1980), Turner (1987), and Kovecses (2010). Metaphor is known as “understanding and experiencing one kind of thing in terms of another” (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980:5). The transference of meaning is based on the similarities of two objects. Suggested by Lackoff and Johnson (1980), the Conceptual Metaphor theory is considered one of the earliest and the most influential theoretical framework. Actually, metaphor is widely used in daily life like “the way we think, what we experience, and what we do every day”. It is not simply “a figure of speech” (McGlone, 2007:109); it is actually called “fundamentally metaphorical in nature”. Most of the metaphors in everyday language are conventional in nature, that is, they are stable expressions systematically used by people. According to McGlone (2007), traditional theory considers metaphor as the simplistic comparison through schematic forms like: X is Y or X is like Y. The idiom “Call the shots/tunes”, for example, is metaphorically used to talk about 8 people with great power or people who control everyone. It is an example to reject the old linguistic formula. Nowadays, that old theory is replaced by the advanced viewpoint developed by Lackoff and his colleagues. Conceptual metaphor, as Lackoff and Johnson referred, is considered “the systematic structuring or restructuring” in which a target or abstract domain can be understood or reconceptualized in terms of a source domain, a more concrete one. Metaphor is basically considered the foundation to create idioms (Nguyễn Ngọc Vũ, 2012). For example, “have a big hand” means that somebody has had a lot of influence over something (Wright, 1999) because hand is the symbol of power. In order to clearly understand the function of conceptual metaphor in creating idioms, this paper mainly focuses on analyzing conceptual metaphor about power in English idioms and contrasts them with Vietnamese idioms. To sum up, metaphor is “a matter of extraordinary rather than ordinary language” (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980:3) and it takes part in everyday language and life. They are natural and unconsciously, they are conceptual means to understand even the most abstract concepts through concrete ones. 1.2.3. Classification of conceptual metaphor According to the cognitive function, Lackoff and Johnson (1980) classify metaphors into three overlapping groups including structural, ontological and orientational metaphors. 1.2.3.1. Structural metaphors Structural metaphors, as in the famous book Metaphors We Live By, are cases where one concept is metaphorically structured in terms of another (Lackoff and Johnson, 2003:14). It also makes up the largest portion in conceptual metaphors. Structural metaphor is “internally consistent" and it "involves the structuring of one kind of experience or activity in terms of another kind of experience or activity” (Lackoff & Johnson, 1980:197). Therefore, in structural metaphors, one concept is understood and expressed in terms of another structure, sharply 9 defined concept. The cognitive function of metaphors ARGUMENT IS WAR is a typical example of a structural metaphor. a. Your claims are indefensible. b. He attacked every weak point in my argument. His criticisms were right on target. c. I demolished his argument. d. I've never won an argument with him. e. You disagree? Okay, shoot! f. If you use that strategy, he'll wipe you out. He shot down all of my arguments. (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980:4) In those examples, an internally consistent WAR structure is imposed on the concept of ARGUMENT. Arguments and wars are not the same concept; argument is verbal discourse while wars refer to armed conflict and they perform different kinds of action. But ARGUMENT is partially structured, understood, performed, and talked about in terms of WAR like attack, defend or eventually win or lose. The concept and the language are also metaphorically structured. In conclusion, structural metaphors are cases which allow us to use one highly structured and clear concept to structure another. 1.2.3.2. Ontological metaphors One of three overlapping categories of conceptual metaphors identified by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in Metaphors We Live By (1980) is ontological metaphor. It is defined as "ways of viewing events, activities, emotions, ideas, etc., as entities and substances". In this group of metaphors, we can conceive intangible concepts, such as feelings, activities, and ideas as object and substances, and set up artificial boundaries for them. As a result, once we can identify our experiences as entities or substances, we can refer to them, categorize them, group them, and quantify them (Lackoff and Johnson, 2003:26). Ontological metaphors are used to comprehend events, actions, activities, and 10 states. Events and actions are conceptualized metaphorically as objects, activities as substances, states as containers. The most typical example of ontological metaphor is container metaphor (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980). We are physical beings, bounded and set off from the rest of the world by the surface of our skins, and we experience the rest of the world as outside us. Each of us is a container, with a bounding surface and an in-out orientation. We project our own in-out orientation onto other physical objects that are bounded by surfaces. For example, VISUAL FIELDS ARE CONTAINERS metaphors show up as follows: a. The ship is coming into view. b. I have him in sight. c. I can't see him-the tree is in the way. He's out of sight now. d. That's in the center of my field of vision. There's nothing in sight. (Lackoff and Johnson, 2003:31) Visual fields are conceptualized like containers or rooms with an outside and inside. The movement of the sight is described as the movement out of and into a container. Thanks to ontological metaphors, non-physical objectscan be characterized as a physical entity. 1.2.3.3. Orientational metaphor Orientational metaphor is defined as “a concept of spatial orientation” (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980:14). The spatial relationships such as up-down, in-out, on-off, and front-back, deep-shallow and central-peripheral are our experience about space which we have acquired in our lives. Orientational metaphors give a concept of spatial orientation; for example, HAPPY IS UP and actually, they provide even less conceptual structure for target concept than ontological ones (Kövecses, 2002:35). There are so many examples of orientational metaphors, for examples, HAPPY IS UP and SAD IS DOWN, which prove the existence of metaphor in our daily life. 11 a. I‟m feeling up today. b. I‟m feeling down. c. You‟re in high spirits. d. e. He‟s really low these days. e. My spirit rose. f. f. My spirit sank. (Lackoff and Johnson, 2003:16) Happiness is normally defined as positive emotional state while sadness is on the contrary. The concept of “happiness” is expressed with upward orientation words like up, high, rose while the concept of “sadness” is identified with downward orientation words like down, low, sank. As Lackoff and Johnson (1980:14-21) state, orientational metaphors are based on physical and cultural experience and they can vary from culture to culture. 1.2.4. Conceptual metaphoric domains and mapping Lackoff and Johnson (1980:5) point out that in the studies of conceptual metaphor, one concept domain can be understood by another concept domain. Trần Văn Cơ (2011) also shares the opinion that conceptual metaphor is the main mechanism through which we can easily understand abstract concepts. In order to generate a conceptual metaphor and understand abstract concepts we must use a method called metaphorical mapping to connect two domains. There are many terms used to refer to these two domains in metaphorical mapping. They are called Source and Target (Lackoff and Johnson, 1980) or Base and Target (Gentner, 1983), or vehicle and Tenor (Richard, 1936), etc. Based on the conceptual metaphor theory developed by Lackoff and Johnson, which is used as the main guide in this study, source and target domains will be used in this thesis. The domain where the concept is mapped from is the source domain and the domain where the concept is mapped onto is the target domain (Johansen, 2007). Normally, the abstract concept is the target domain and the 12