The system

Metaforhjemmesiden ved Carlo Grevy - ny e-mail

Nyt - antologi om metaforer, metaforteori, kognitiv semantik og fagsprog

14-03-05 / CG

Indhold

Some conclusions – research on 6000 computer metaphors

Pilot researches in fields of e.g. physics, mathematics, pedagogy, popular science, religion, ads, television language give the same indications:

The metaphors are structured systematically and can be arranged into 12 scenarios, including about 400 different typical metaphors
The metaphors are not as creative as often believed – on the contrary the metaphors can in some sense be predicted on the basic of the scenarios
The metaphors are widespread in specialized (and technical) language
The function of metaphors are always to map something unknown into the area of known (the field which Berger & Luckmann calls commonsense conscious), to the surface of our everyday knowledge
The function of metaphors is not to tell something new at all, but to tell something old, something we already know.

Some of these conclusions are in contrast to the way metaphors most often are seen. We often have this idea - with inspiration from looking at metaphors in literature I think: metaphors tell us something radically new. But this is not my conclusion. No - on the contrary: when we have something new in the world we use a lot of energy through metaphors telling us selves and others that these things are something old! And to do this we have a restricted system of linguistic possibilities. I call them scenarios; structures of words related to well know aspects of our everyday live. For instance: when computers accelerate, runs fast, has a high speed, and when data arrives to a place, when they are at home computers or at web hotels, we use old words from everyday experiences on how to come around physically in our everyday life, for instance how we use our car to get from our home to a hotel. And in using words from this scenario we say nothing new about computers, on the contrary: we tell that this hi technology is very common.

There are many possibilities to use metaphors, nearly 400. In my research I found, when I had examined about 3000 metaphors, that the metaphors never changed. People always used the same words (from the same scenarios) to tell something (old) about computers. It was not my thesis, that I should find the same metaphors, but from this point I intensively searched for some other to see if the area really was restricted. My conclusions after systematically examine 3000 metaphors more was that we always - and not only in the metaphor field - are using metaphors from the same scenarios.

The system

The scenarios

1. The non-human area

1.1. Reification

1.2. Botany

1.3. Animals

2. Human activities and rooms

2.1. Human activities

2.2. Various human social rooms.

2.2.1. Basic rooms for survival (production)

2.2.2. Social rooms outside the production

2.2.3. Art & culture

2.2.4. Social rooms without control

2.2.5. Social rooms diachronic

3. Orientation / movement

3.1. Physical rooms

3.2. Psychological rooms

1. The non-human area

1.1. Reification / Inanimate things

"Radio Data Packet Transmission"

"Note - if you have problems unpacking any of the following files…"

"Maps and Data Store"

"Integrated Data Communications Services Homepage"

"Check the order of text flows"

"Hot Page System updates for Information Technology"

(Physical, bodily attributes)

"COLD FACTS - the quarterly publication of CSA"

"Golden Networks Computer Help"

(Metal– inner qualities)

1.2. Botany

Activities (be in flower, to grow, to mature)

Results (to ennoble)

Objects (apples, fruits, trees)

"The writer plucks some of the fruits of authorship"

1.3. Animals

Animals (predators, reptiles etc.)

Other indications (living or dead "The Dead Pizza Files")

Clones

Sensitivity ("Note that most web servers are case-sensitive")

2. Human activities and rooms (including personification)

2.1. Human activities

Activities and conditions (make one’s contribution to…,be well mannered, fall between two stools – rule, manage, be generous)

Mental activities (to be intelligent, be awake, be grown up)

Communication (talk, use language, to communicate, to read, to write)

Perceive (see, hear, feel, watch, look after)

Solving problems

Intentionally

Glory and honor (respectable)

Responsibility

Proper names (Einstein, Mona Lisa)

Related to the human body

2.2. Various human social rooms

2.2.1. Basic rooms for survival / Production

Societies bases on hunting and fishing (hunting, fishing)

Agriculture

Trade (tools)

Trade (arranging, organizing, being concerned about the architecture, testing, constructing, and strike while the iron is hot)

Industry (machinery, engines, gears, overdrives, mechanics, workers)

Sale and service (to offer, to introduce, to deliver)

2.2.2. Social rooms outside the production 1

Parties (dance with the program)

Entertainment (acrobat)

Warnings, accidents (alarm bell, funeral)

Ceremonies

Intimacy

Policy (anarchy, machine breaker)

Law, jurisprudence

2.2.2. Social rooms outside the production 2 – the meal

The meal (appetite, samples, spam, menu, beans, wafers, Visual Cafe)

2.2.2. Social rooms outside the production 3 – relations between people

2.2.1. The family - biological (generations, sisters, brothers, babies, children, cousins, parents)he family - biological (generations, sisters, brothers, babies, children, cousins, parents)

2.2.2. Social rooms outside the production 4 – social arrangements

The family - cultural (marriage (seek in marriage, engagement, adoption)

Friendship and related relations (companion, darling, neighbor)

According to employment (serve, guard, agent, client, assistant, master, slave, inceptor)

Other relations (fan, nobility)

2.2.3. Art & culture

Art of painting (exhibitions, brush stroke, Picasso’s blue period)

Music (sweet music, give the keynote)

Textile engineering (tailored system, designed, collect under one hat)

Theatre (the scene, actor, the play, masquerade, soap opera, win an Oscar)

Sports, athletics (levels of power - the participants - the players - the competitors - the placing - the winner, the finalist)

Activities, type of sports (soccer, football, baseball, cycle race, martial art, surfing)

Games (gambling, chess, playing cards, game of dice)

2.2.4. Social rooms without control

Crimes

The persons (pirates, gangs, robbers)

The activities (the fights, firing, the taking of hostages)

The persons and activities handling the problems (cops, taking finger-prints)

War

The event (the war, the battle, the attack, the intervention)

The place (the front-line)

The participants (the warriors)

The tools (armament, pistols, guns)

The result (lose ground)

Disease and illness

The actors (virus, doctors)

The subject (health)

The indicators (infection)

The activities (take the computers temperature, use medicine)

The irrational

Religion (actors, subject, goal, activities – Christianity/other)

The fantastic, the fabulously and magic (actors, activities, accessories – wizards, pixies, ghost – prophesy, conjure, haunt - horn of plenty

2.2.5. Social rooms diachronic

Experiences from childhood

Knowledge on history

3. Orientation / movement

3.1. Physical rooms

Up/down (down, low, fall, rise, lower)

The surface (before, behind, area, background, breaking through, heavy, light, under, over, platform)

The landscape (at nightfall, the weather, the perspective)

The city (the office and the equipment – the house – the hotel – the library – the campus – the post office)

The journey (the vehicles, the places, the way to do it, the result – ships, cars – on roads, in the air – fast, slow, short cuts, overtaking, accelerating – get access, visit, leave)

3.2. Psychological rooms

Feelings and perceptions through the senses