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Science Forum Index » Cognitive Science Forum » Spatial metaphors
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| Daniel Kelly (AKA Jack) |
 Posted: Fri Nov 28, 2003 10:18 am |
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Guest
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Hi,
I'm researching the 1st chapter of my PhD thesis and I'd be very
appreciative to hear your views and ideas on the following question:
Where do we use spatial and mapping metaphors to describe aspects of the
world and society?
And could you point me towards any philosophical / psychological literature
on this subject?
Examples I've bumped into are:
1) Descriptions of narrative structure & characterisation (the "character
arc", "where have you got to in the story?", depth of the character, etc.)
2) Family trees (especially in incestuous / inbred family structures)
3) Social & professional hierarchy ("The King powered above all his
subjects", "his family life was going down the tube")
4) Graphical representation of music (something similar to Media Player's
visualisations; and dancing)
5) Time (time line)
6) Hypertext "maps"
7) Data visualisation (graphs, 3D representations etc)
8) Hand gestures to accompany speech
Thanks,
Jack |
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| Joe Legris |
| Posted: Fri Nov 28, 2003 11:02 am |
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Daniel Kelly (AKA Jack) wrote:
Quote: Hi,
I'm researching the 1st chapter of my PhD thesis and I'd be very
appreciative to hear your views and ideas on the following question:
Where do we use spatial and mapping metaphors to describe aspects of the
world and society?
And could you point me towards any philosophical / psychological literature
on this subject?
Examples I've bumped into are:
1) Descriptions of narrative structure & characterisation (the "character
arc", "where have you got to in the story?", depth of the character, etc.)
2) Family trees (especially in incestuous / inbred family structures)
3) Social & professional hierarchy ("The King powered above all his
subjects", "his family life was going down the tube")
4) Graphical representation of music (something similar to Media Player's
visualisations; and dancing)
5) Time (time line)
6) Hypertext "maps"
7) Data visualisation (graphs, 3D representations etc)
8) Hand gestures to accompany speech
Thanks,
Jack
I would ask first, why do we use metaphors at all?
"strength of character"
"The King crushed his subjects"
"His family life was the shits"
Facial gestures to accompany speech
Do animals do it? Chimps seem to imitate each other. Is that a "spatial"
metaphor?
In one sense all language is metaphorical because even a strictly
literal statement cannot perfectly represent the event it describes.
Spatial metaphors are easily conveyed by gestures and may capture
salient aspects of an event that others miss. Also, non-spatial
metaphors may require feats of abstract comprehension. Spatial metaphors
are intelligible to anyone who can grasp the intuitive ideas of
position, speed and force.
--
Joe Legris |
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| Craig Franck |
| Posted: Fri Nov 28, 2003 5:14 pm |
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Guest
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"Daniel Kelly (AKA Jack)" wrote
Quote: I'm researching the 1st chapter of my PhD thesis and I'd be very
appreciative to hear your views and ideas on the following question:
Where do we use spatial and mapping metaphors to describe aspects of the
world and society?
A theory as to _why_ we use them centers on the fact that the
brains of other animals have a high degree of left/right functional
symmetry that we now lack. The side of our brain that deals with
language has its linguistic skills built on top of what once had been
a mostly spatiotemporal framework.
It follows from this that since language itself is biased in favor of
spatial metaphors because they mirror its low-level functions that
they would permeate all linguistic meaning. It's just a question of
how faded the metaphors have become. I would take a good look
at the roots of words (particularly Indo-European roots) since the
words we use and how we characterize things are intimately related.
I would not be surprised if going back far enough you would find
an almost one-to-one correspondence between words and concrete
things (for example, "help" and "hand" came from the same word).
But I still think it's a separate issue as to why the metaphors actually
seem to help us think even though it would explain why "He has his
hands full" might be applied to someone who has a lot of thinking
to do; it's more an issue of why the metaphor seems apt then as to
where the words come from, although you could argue the two are
inextricably related.
--
Craig Franck
craig.franck@verizon.net
Cortland, NY |
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| PGreenfinch |
| Posted: Wed Dec 03, 2003 6:17 pm |
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Business competition as conquest of territories.
"Daniel Kelly (AKA Jack)" <d.kellyNOSPAM@NOSPAM.ucl.ac.uk> a écrit dans le
message de news:bq7ou5$hle$1@uns-a.ucl.ac.uk...
Quote: Hi,
I'm researching the 1st chapter of my PhD thesis and I'd be very
appreciative to hear your views and ideas on the following question:
Where do we use spatial and mapping metaphors to describe aspects of the
world and society?
And could you point me towards any philosophical / psychological
literature
on this subject?
Examples I've bumped into are:
1) Descriptions of narrative structure & characterisation (the "character
arc", "where have you got to in the story?", depth of the character, etc.)
2) Family trees (especially in incestuous / inbred family structures)
3) Social & professional hierarchy ("The King powered above all his
subjects", "his family life was going down the tube")
4) Graphical representation of music (something similar to Media Player's
visualisations; and dancing)
5) Time (time line)
6) Hypertext "maps"
7) Data visualisation (graphs, 3D representations etc)
8) Hand gestures to accompany speech
Thanks,
Jack
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| Glen M. Sizemore |
| Posted: Fri Dec 05, 2003 7:56 am |
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Guest
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JL: I would ask first, why do we use metaphors at all?
GS: Sometimes it is reinforced by a specialized community as in literature
etc. But the main answer to your question is "because that's the way
stimulus control of verbal behavior works." A certain kind of verbal operant
(the tact) is under stimulus control of certain features of the world, as
when the phrase "blow up" is under stimulus control of aspects of a chemical
explosion (intensity, quick onset, destruction etc.). When something in the
world displays some of the same properties - like when someone gets angry -
the response is made more probable, and we say "he blew up." Of course, once
this becomes "standard" it ceases to be a metaphor in some sense.
Oh.....right...this is more "unprovable" than cognitive processes that can
be assigned any property at will.
"strength of character"
"The King crushed his subjects"
"His family life was the shits"
Facial gestures to accompany speech
JL: Do animals do it?
GS: It could be arranged. But you would simply deny that it is relevant.
JL: Chimps seem to imitate each other. Is that a "spatial"
metaphor?
GS: No.
JL: In one sense all language is metaphorical because even a strictly
literal statement cannot perfectly represent the event it describes.
GS: That doesn't make it metaphorical, and not all language is a matter of
"representation" in the sense you mean it here.
JL: Spatial metaphors are easily conveyed by gestures and may capture
salient aspects of an event that others miss. Also, non-spatial
metaphors may require feats of abstract comprehension. Spatial metaphors
are intelligible to anyone who can grasp the intuitive ideas of
position, speed and force.
GS: And that says nothing (BTW, "grasping" in this sense was once
metaphorical - like "he blew up"). It tells us about as much about the
variables that produce metaphorical extension as chemical explosions tell us
about anger.
"Joe Legris" <jalegris@xympatico.ca> wrote in message
news:3FC7718D.2010605@xympatico.ca...
Quote: Daniel Kelly (AKA Jack) wrote:
Hi,
I'm researching the 1st chapter of my PhD thesis and I'd be very
appreciative to hear your views and ideas on the following question:
Where do we use spatial and mapping metaphors to describe aspects of the
world and society?
And could you point me towards any philosophical / psychological
literature
on this subject?
Examples I've bumped into are:
1) Descriptions of narrative structure & characterisation (the
"character
arc", "where have you got to in the story?", depth of the character,
etc.)
2) Family trees (especially in incestuous / inbred family structures)
3) Social & professional hierarchy ("The King powered above all his
subjects", "his family life was going down the tube")
4) Graphical representation of music (something similar to Media
Player's
visualisations; and dancing)
5) Time (time line)
6) Hypertext "maps"
7) Data visualisation (graphs, 3D representations etc)
8) Hand gestures to accompany speech
Thanks,
Jack
I would ask first, why do we use metaphors at all?
"strength of character"
"The King crushed his subjects"
"His family life was the shits"
Facial gestures to accompany speech
Do animals do it? Chimps seem to imitate each other. Is that a "spatial"
metaphor?
In one sense all language is metaphorical because even a strictly
literal statement cannot perfectly represent the event it describes.
Spatial metaphors are easily conveyed by gestures and may capture
salient aspects of an event that others miss. Also, non-spatial
metaphors may require feats of abstract comprehension. Spatial metaphors
are intelligible to anyone who can grasp the intuitive ideas of
position, speed and force.
--
Joe Legris
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