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The Comparison of the Metaphors of Love in Chinese and English Cultures

摘要：随着认知语言学的兴起，隐喻的作用开始获得重新认识。在传统修辞学中，比喻只是被当作一种修辞格来看待。而在新兴的认知语言学中，隐喻却占据着重位置:它被当作一种重要的认知工具，帮助我们更好地了解这个世界，它是如要，以至于成为我们赖以生存的基础。本文的研究证实了莱可夫的观点:隐喻是无处不在的，它对人类理解抽象事理解客观世界及谈话都发挥着重要的作用，而且也符合隐喻的形成是建立在自身体验之上的理论。通过研究可以看到基督教、个人主义及对物质生活和金钱的严重强烈的影响了英语语言中爱情的概念化;而中国传统的阴阳理论，儒家学说，及体主义则对汉语语言中爱情概念的形成有着深远的影响。
关键词:概念隐喻；认知；爱情；文化

Abstract:
In the traditional rhetoric, metaphor is only a figure of speech while in the newly rising cognitive linguistics, metaphor occupies a central position, and it is regarded as an important cognitive tool to help us understand this world better and clearer. It is so important that it has become the metaphor we live by. This dissertation makes a comparative study of love metaphors in English and those in Chinese from the perspective of cognitive linguistics, with the aim of supporting the contemporary cognitive theory of metaphor from the viewpoints of both English and Chinese cultures. This dissertation makes a comparative study of love metaphors in English and those in Chinese from the perspective of cognitive linguistics, with the aim of supporting the contemporary cognitive theory of metaphor from the viewpoints of both English and Chinese cultures.
This study supports that metaphor is so pervasive and irreducible in the expression of abstract emotion like love that it appears to play an essential or indispensable role in our understanding and speaking. It also offers evidence supporting Layoff and Kvasses (1987) suggestion that emotional concepts are embodied, that is, they have a basis in bodily experience. This thesis also reveals the relationship between metaphor and culture. English language is mainly influenced by the idea of Christianity, materialism, and individualism. However, the conceptualization of love in Chinese language is strongly influenced by the Confucianism, yin-yang theory, and collectivism.
Keywords: Conceptual metaphor; Cognition love culture

Chapter 1 Introduction

As we all know, when confronting reality everybody faces a kaleidoscope of phenomena ranging from the natural to the social, to the imaginary, to the totally abstract. Comprehension of such a broad inventory of reality and non-reality requires language, the tool that permits us to take verbal stock of objective and subjective experiences alike. In mans ongoing endeavor to conceptualize and verbalize a world that can never be fully known, language is a vital intermediary. Language provides a repertoire of coping mechanisms, of which metaphor is one of the most powerful and useful (Malotki, 1983).
Therefore, the importance of metaphor to human language and cognition cannot be overemphasized. It is so common that we probably may not notice its existence and influences on us. The British rhetorician I. A. Richards once said that our daily conversation might include a metaphor every three sentences. Important as it is, metaphor has attracted the attention of scholars interested in language, especially rhetoricians and literary critics, for more than 2000 years. And the discussions and disputes on metaphor have lasted from then on.
I divide this paper into five parts. Besides the first part the introduction here, the second part provides a general review of the cognitive a本论文由英语论文网提供整理，提供论文代写，英语论文代写，代写论文，代写英语论文，代写留学生论文，代写英文论文，留学生论文代写相关核心关键词搜索。