Mind, Metaphor and Language Teaching

✍ Scribed by Randal Holme

• Year: 2004
• Tongue: English
• Leaves: 257
• Category: Library

✦ Synopsis

Understanding metaphor raises key questions about the relationship between language and meaning, and between language and mind. This book explores how this understanding can impact upon the theory and practice of language teaching. After summarizing the cognitive basis of metaphor and other figures of speech, it looks at how this knowledge can inform classroom practice. Finally, it sets out how we can use these insights to re-appraise language learning theory in a way that treats it as consonant with the cognitive nature of language.

✦ Table of Contents

Cover......Page 1
Contents......Page 6
List of Tables and Figures......Page 9
Acknowledgements......Page 12
Introduction......Page 13
Early perspectives......Page 16
The rehabilitation of metaphor......Page 18
The problem of knowing when something is a metaphor or not......Page 20
Metaphor and relevance theory......Page 21
The cognitive view of metaphor......Page 24
Conceptual metaphor: how metaphors share common themes......Page 25
How we shape abstract concepts with the metaphors we use to grasp them......Page 26
The lack of a clear distinction between the metaphorical and the literal......Page 29
Metaphors as a transfer of meaning from one domain to another: mapping and blending......Page 32
How abstract meaning is conceptualised through metaphor and image schema......Page 37
Some of the conceptual metaphors that produce abstract language are culturally-specific and some are universal......Page 39
Grammar as originating in metaphor over time......Page 40
Conclusions......Page 42
2 Using Figurative Language......Page 43
Stretching the domain......Page 44
What categories mean......Page 45
What teachers and students can do with their understanding of categories......Page 52
Achieving greater freedom with meaning: describing things as other than themselves......Page 59
Layering......Page 64
Metaphors looking for a meaning......Page 67
Conclusions......Page 71
3 Teaching the Language and Structure of Metaphor......Page 74
Metaphor and parts-of-speech......Page 75
Metaphors that identify themselves: grammatical metaphor......Page 81
Elliptical similes......Page 93
Marked metaphors......Page 104
Conclusion......Page 108
Allegory......Page 113
Analogy......Page 115
Analogues, models and writing instruction......Page 124
Teaching with analogy: conclusions......Page 133
Bridging the gap between learning theory and language theory......Page 135
Using metaphor to teach abstract meaning......Page 139
Metaphor teaches students about language......Page 141
Using metaphor in the construction of discourse......Page 144
Expressing deductive and inductive arguments......Page 153
Cause-and-effect paths......Page 157
Conclusion......Page 162
6 Metaphor and the Teaching of Grammar......Page 165
Phrasal verbs......Page 170
Tense and time......Page 181
Reference......Page 183
Expressing time......Page 187
Conclusions......Page 193
7 The Metaphor of Learning......Page 195
There is no reliable way to distinguish acquired language knowledge from learnt language knowledge......Page 197
Generative theories of SLA......Page 199
The modular mind......Page 204
Cognitivist and generative positions......Page 206
Student errors, CBT (cognitive blend theory) and the remodelling of second-language learning......Page 208
Towards a blend-structure model of second-language learning......Page 211
Cognitive blend theory (CBT) and language learning......Page 212
How a CBT model can account for language learning......Page 223
A blend-structure model of language learning: understanding and correcting student errors......Page 226
Conclusions......Page 234
Cognitive not social relevance......Page 236
Cultural empathy......Page 237
Affective is effective......Page 238
A construction-based pedagogy: exploiting the spatial construction of meaning......Page 239
A participatory pedagogy......Page 241
Bibliography......Page 244
C......Page 252
G......Page 253
L......Page 254
N......Page 255
S......Page 256
Z......Page 257