Understanding Figurative Language.pdf

Understanding

Figurative

Language

oxford psychology series

Editors

Nicholas J. Mackintosh

Anne Treisman

Daniel Schacter

Lawrence Weiskrantz

Timothy Shallice

1. The neuropsychology of anxiety: an en-

quiry into the functions of the septohip-

pocampal system

J. A. Gray

2. Elements of episodic memory

E. Tulving

3. Conditioning and associative learning

N. J. Mackintosh

4. Visual masking: an integrative ap-

proach

B. G. Breitmeyer

5. The musical mind: the cognitive psy-

chology of music

J. Sloboda

6. Elements of psychophysical theory

J.-C. Falmagne

7. Animal intelligence

Edited by L. Weiskrantz

8. Response times: their role in inferring

elementary mental organization

R. D. Luce

9. Mental representations: a dual coding

approach

A. Paivio

10. Memory, imprinting, and the brain

G. Horn

11. Working memory

A. Baddeley

12. Blindsight: a case study and implica-

tions

L. Weiskrantz

13. Proﬁle analysis

D. M. Green

14. Spatial vision

R. L. DeValois and K. K. DeValois

15. The neural and behavioural organiza-

tion of goal-directed movements

M. Jeannerod

16. Visual pattern analyzers

N. V. Graham

17. Cognitive foundations of musical pitch

C. L. Krumhansl

18. Perceptual and associative learning

G. Hall

19. Implicit learning and tacit knowledge

A. S. Reber

20. Neuromotor mechanisms in human com-

munication

D. Kimura

21. The frontal lobes and voluntary action

R. E. Passingham

22. Classiﬁcation and cognition

W. Estes

23. Vowel perception and production

B. S. Rosner and J. B. Pickering

24. Visual stress

A. Wilkins

25. Electrophysiology of mind

Edited by M. Rugg and M. Coles

26. Attention and memory: an integrated

framework

N. Cowan

27. The visual brain in action

A. D. Milner and M. A. Goodale

28. Perceptual consequences of cochlear

damage

B. C. J. Moore

29. Binocular vision and stereopsis

I. P. Howard

30. The measurement of sensation

D. Laming

31. Conditioned taste aversion

J. Bures, F. Berm´dez-Rattoni, and

T. Yamamoto

32. The developing visual brain

J. Atkinson

33. Neuropsychology of anxiety, second edi-

tion

J. A. Gray and N. McNaughton

34. Looking down on human intelligence:

from psychometrics to the brain

I. J. Deary

35. From conditioning to conscious recollec-

tion: memory systems of the brain

H. Eichenbaum and N. J. Cohen

36. Understanding ﬁgurative language:

from metaphors to idioms

S. Glucksberg

Understanding

Figurative

Language

from metaphors

to idioms

Sam Glucksberg

with a contribution by

Matthew S. McGlone

oxford psychology series

number 36

2001

Oxford New York

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Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Glucksberg, Sam.

Understanding ﬁgurative language : from metaphors to idioms / Sam Glucksberg ;

with a contribution by Matthew S. McGlone.

p. cm.—(Oxford psychology series ; no. 36)

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN 0-19-511109-5

1. Figures of speech. I. McGlone, Matthew S., 1966– II. Title. III. Series.

P301 .G56 2000

808—dc21 00-025745

987654321

Printed in the United States of America

on acid-free paper

Preface

How do people understand utterances that are intended ﬁguratively? In

ﬁgurative language, the intended meaning does not coincide with the literal

meanings of the words and sentences that are used. In metaphor, for ex-

ample, literal meaning is often patently absurd, as in “New York may be

the next Orange County.” In idioms, the relation between literal meaning

and idiomatic meaning may be totally opaque, as in kicked the bucket or

bought the farm. Both of these idiomatic phrases mean “died,” but people

have no idea of how or why these idioms have come to mean what they

do.

Traditionally, ﬁgurative language such as metaphors and idioms has

been considered derivative from and more complex than ostensibly

straightforward literal language. A contemporary view, as exempliﬁed not

only in psychological but also in linguistic and philosophical research, is

that ﬁgurative language involves the same kinds of linguistic and pragmatic

operations that are used for ordinary, literal language. Put another way, we

can identify two sets of operations that people use in comprehending dis-

course. One set consists of purely linguistic operations, such as lexical

access, syntactic analysis, and so forth. A second set consists of a less well-

deﬁned grab-bag of operations, usually grouped under the term pragmatics.

Whatever the utility of this distinction, so-called literal language requires

the full use of both kinds of operations, no less and perhaps no different

than that required for ﬁgurative language.

Over the past decade my colleagues and I have studied how people use

and understand metaphor and idioms. We have focused exclusively on

ordinary language, expressions that are used in daily life, including con-

versations about everyday matters and that appear in newspapers, maga-

zines, and other media. We have explicitly excluded the more complex

uses of ﬁgurative language in poetry, ﬁction, or other forms of creative

writing. We have also excluded consideration of metaphor’s intricate and

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