Metonymy

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Metonymy MetaphorA Practical Deconstruction

• John Barnden
• School of Computer Science
• University of Birmingham, UK
• Collaborators in this work
• Sheila Glasbey, Mark Lee, Alan Wallington
• From research supported by EPSRC, ESRC DTI

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Preface

• An ongoing conceptual analysis ...
• motivated by experiences in developing the
  ATT-Meta reasoning system for metaphor
  understanding refs. on request

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Plan of Rest of Talk

• Background and motivation.
• Difficulties in distinguishing metaphor and
  metonymy, and
• possible dimensions along which metaphor and
  metonymy may differ.
• Conclusion MM as different rough, intersecting
  clouds within the space defined by those
  dimensions.
• NB distinction difficulty is not novel
  (broadly), but we extend the complaints and make
  an explicit and radical move to a multi-dimension
  account.

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Metaphor and Metonymy

• Chambers Dictionary, New Ninth Edition
• Metaphor a figure of speech by which a thing
  TARGET is spoken of as being that which it only
  resembles SOURCE.
• Metonymy the use of the name of SOURCE a
  single aspect of or adjunct to a thing as a way
  of referring to the thing itself TARGET. with
  some slight paraphrase
• Metaphor examples
• Deep in the recesses of her mind, Anne believed
  that
• Mike is a tiger.
• Metonymy examples
• Mary played Bach.
• Pete drank three bottles.
• England won the match.

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Difficulties

• More definitions/accounts than researchers!
• And fewer definitions than researchers!!
• Vagueness (and sometimes metaphoricity!) of and
  complications in such terms as thing, name,
  spoken of as being, resembles, aspect,
  adjunct, referring in definitions above
• and of terms such as domain and mapping
  used in other definitions/accounts.
• Differences of opinion about the degree to which
  metaphor metonymy are a matter of language
  versus thought syntax versus semantics versus
  pragmatics etc.

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Difficulties, contd.

• Any metaphor in which the mappings are identity
  mappings (as in simple feature-transfer accounts,
  or the Glucksberg categorization account that
  finds a common category) can be viewed as just
  metonymic steps to the mapped items (cf. Ricoeur
  1977).
• Referential metaphor many authors referential
  use of metaphorical mapping links.
• The cream puff lost the match.
• This could be casts as metonymic use of
  metaphorical links.
• Doesnt of itself preclude a distinctly
  metaphorical residue.

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Similarity versus Contiguity

• Typically (perhaps), metaphor rests on similarity
  (resembles above) in some way whereas metonymy
  rests on contiguity (adjuncts above). But
• Slipperiness of notions of similarity and
  contiguity e.g., Chiappe (1998), Cooper (1986),
  Dirven (2002), Riemer (2002).
• Metaphor as creating similarity (e.g., Indurkhya,
  1992), as in viewing a cloud creatively as an
  animal The camel is playing with the goose.

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Similarity versus Contiguity, contd.

• Similarity and contiguity are NOT crisply
  distinguishable..
• Contiguity through representational connection
• John is to the left of the picture.
• Metonymy using THING FOR REPRESENTATION OF IT.
• But image of John is (normally) perceptually
  similar to John. Precisely the point of the
  representationnot accidental.
• Mereological (part-of) contiguity
• John washed his car.
• But bodywork is (relevantly) similar to whole, re
  external appearance.
• Mary saw the suits walk in.
• But someonesuit is (relevantly) similar to the
  suit itself, re appearance.
• (?)The diameter of the Earth is miles.
• But rocky part is similar to whole planet, re
  appearance.
• And perceptual similarity is important in much
  metaphor.

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Similarity versus Contiguity, contd., and
Subjectivity of S/T Links

• Conversely, why doesnt a similarity count as a
  contiguity?
• Similarity is more in the mind, but a contiguity
  is in the world??
• and metaphor is a matter of subjective links, but
  metonymy a matter of objective links?? BUT...
• Arent familiar, socially-agreed metaphorical S/T
  links just as objective as socially constructed
  relations such as ownership, production,
  authorship, etc.? Dont isomorphisms objectively
  exist?
• So a price increase really is like an upward
  movement, just as much as a football team is
  connected to a country?

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Hypotheticality of Source Aspects

• Typically, in metaphor the source item/scenario
  is not an actual thing/scenario, whereas in
  metonymy it is cf. suggestions in Lodge 1977,
  Riemer 2002, Warren 2002, 2006. But
• Thatcher is the Reagan of the UK.
• Metaphor, but S item actual.
• Dragons are on the top shelf.
• Metonymy, but S item hypothetical/unreal.
• The soldier laid his rifle aside i.e., he quit
  soldiering.
• Metonymy, but S item possibly hypothetical.

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S/T Links as Part of The Meaning

• Some researchers Dirven 2002, Warren 2002 have
  come close to saying
• In a metonymy, part of the meaning is the S/T
  link itself the link does not serve just to
  access the T item. Whereas in metaphor the link
  is not included in the meaning. Warren (2006)
  even says the source items are annihilated.
• His shoes are neatly tied
• is to be understood roughly as if it had
  been
• Parts of his shoes, namely the laces, are neatly
  tied.
• Very appealing point about metonymy, but
• A case can be made for the linkage to the source
  in some or perhaps many metaphors ALSO to be part
  of the meaning

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S/T Links as Part of Metaphor Meaning

• Maries problem in Stern (2000)
• I wont swallow that.
• Spoken by anorexic Marie when forbidden by her
  mother to do something. Stern claims the analogy
  to not-eating is part of Maries meaning.
• (?)The T aspects attended to may only be
  identifiable in terms of S/T links.
• The camel a cloud has broken its neck
• (The particular part of the cloud may not have
  clear delineation may have to internally
  represent it as something like the neck bit of
  the cloud)
• The rate of exchange in her marriage had
  worsened, Mary felt.
• (Exchange of what? May have to internally
  represent as whatever is viewed in Marys
  marriage as financial currency

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• Metaphor with irony or contrast (latter e.g.,
  Fass 1997)
• Speakers neighbour is going on holiday to Lake
  Windermere speaker points to his small garden
  pond, on which there are several toy sailing
  boats and says
• This is our Lake Windermere
• Arguably, the meaning is not just that the thing
  pointed to is the speakers pond, that it has
  boats, that it and the boats are small (via
  irony), that its where the speaker is going to
  spend his holiday, etc.
• but, more richly,
• precisely that the pond and toy boats contrast
  dramatically with a proper lake, and with Lake
  Windermere in particular.

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Domains in Metaphor(cf. Lakoff and many
followers )

• Common to cast metaphor as a matter of
  connections between domains (or other related
  constructs such as Idealized Cognitive Models)
• And to cast metonymy as a matter of connections
  within a domain (or some such construct).
• But this requires an independent, appropriate
  account of what domains are (in general) and what
  actual domains exist (or how to determine what
  domains exist).

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Domains in Metaphor Problems(cf. Barcelona
2002, Cameron 1999, Croft 1993, Kittay 1989,
Lemmens 2001, Riemer 2002, Warren 2002,

• Domains can form a hierarchy so any two things
  are within some common domain.
• Domain divisions are context-sensitive and
  arbitrary, and qualitative target/source
  difference can be arbitrarily small, making it
  hard or vacuous to put them in different domains
• Christmas is on the horizon TIME/SPACE
• Peter is a fox
• Thatcher was the British Reagan
• Jill own daughter is our Mary neighbours
  daughter.
• New domains can be set up on the fly in fiction,
  and could serve as sources and targets in
  metaphor.

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Domains in Metaphor contd

• Source and target domains can massively overlap,
  and in particular a mapping can lie within the
  overlap
• e.g. -- Mind Aspects As Persons
• One part of me thinks I should go to the party,
  another part is determined that I should do my
  tax form.

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Complexity or Extent of Mapping?

• Typically, metaphor maps several connected things
  from source to target, and often maps/transfers a
  complex structure over (ORGANIZATION AS SOLAR
  SYSTEM), whereas
• metonymy (allegedly) maps a single S-item to
  something in T as an unanalysed, unconnected
  unit, i.e. without mapping/transferring its
  structure, features or associates
• (cf. going from Bach to his music).
• But
• Matthew is a lion.
• Metaphor, but just a single feature of lion is
  mapped, in typical accounts. No structure, no
  associates.
• And

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Complexity or Extent of Mapping, contd

• Arguably, properties/structure/associates can
  (sometimes, to some extent) be mapped by
  metonymy.
• Mapping of appearance in metonymy
• John washed his car.
• The mapping between appearance of whole car and
  appearance of the bodywork motivates the metonymy
  and helps to highlight the appearance of the
  target.
• NB highlighting of target aspects (as opposed to
  transferring new info from source) is an
  important function of metaphor.
• Mike is to the left of the picture.
• The appearance of Mike and of his image are
  structured, so we have a mapping of structure not
  just of unanalysed units.

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Complexity or Extent of Mapping, contd

• More on mapping of structure in metonymy
• The hand that rocks the cradle rules the world.
• claimed by e.g.Warren 2006 to be metonymy
• It is not just the hand that is the source item
  description it is the hand that rocks the
  cradle this is what motivates the step to the
  mother/carer.
• But this rests on the similarity between the hand
  causing the cradle to rock and the mother/carer
  causing the cradle to rock.

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What I Get From All That

• Its wrong to try to distinguish clearly between
  metaphor and metonymy.
• These notions are just rough ones, not
  corresponding to objectively existing, neat
  categories within linguistic communication.
• Whats actually important and reasonably crisp
  are the underlying dimensions, such as the ones
  above
• Extent and type of similarity or contiguity
• Subjectivity of S/T linkage
• Hypotheticality of S scenario
• Involvement of S/T linkages in the meaning
• Extent of difference between S and T domains
• Complexity/extent of mapping.

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Conclusion Cloud Theory of MM

• Prototypical metaphor and prototypical metonymy
  may well occupy distinctly different regions
  within the space defined by dimensions such as
  the above. E.g.,
• Prototypical metaphor HIGH on complex structure
  mapping and on hypotheticality of source scenario
• Prototypical metonymy LOW on both of these.
• Caveat Not proposing that the dimensions are
  numerical scales.
• But in general metaphor and metonymy are
  (heuristically convenient) labels for rough and
  intersecting clouds within the space

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Dim. Y
Metaphor
Dim. Z
Metonymy
Dimension X