Understanding Metaphor through Corpora: A Case Study of Metaphors in Nineteenth Century Writing presents a unique methodology for the study of metaphor. Based on a corpus-driven lexical analysis of three target keywords – cultivated, flame and grew – identified in a corpus of nineteenth-century writing, this study offers a much-valued exploration into the lexical, grammatical, semantic, and pragmatic characteristics of metaphoric instances of language. Using the framework of Lexical Priming theory (Hoey Reference Hoey2005), Katie J. Patterson provides readers with useful insights into metaphor studies from a psychologically-motivated perspective.
The book consists of eight chapters. Chapter 1 is the introduction, Chapters 2 and 3 present the theoretical issues, Chapter 4 focuses on the methodological illustration, Chapters 5–7 concentrate on the corpus analysis, and Chapter 8 provides a conclusion of the book.
Chapter 1 outlines the themes of the book. The introduction of the corpus-linguistic approach and Lexical Priming theory are highlighted. A quick glimpse at how the study of metaphor has evolved is presented first. Patterson then states that corpus linguistics as a method can ‘unify a variety of approaches and theories by providing transferrable, empirical data’ and thus enables us ‘to attain a more holistic approach to metaphor’ (1). Following this, she demonstrates the feasibility and rationality of applying Lexical Priming theory to the present study. The research aims and organization of the book are also outlined.
Chapter 2 deals with the categorization and identification of metaphor in language. Two critical issues are addressed prior to metaphor categorization: its relation to literal language, and its conventionality in both language and thought. Finally, Patterson demonstrates that metaphor should be viewed as a series of clines rather than a dichotomy to literal language. Thus, metaphor has a dynamic quality, which can better explain ‘its ability to be both creative and conventional and more or less metaphoric, in both thought and language’ (21). These underlying ideas lay the philosophical foundations for the current study. Following this, metaphor identification is investigated from a lexical perspective. Some key terms in relation to metaphoricity (e.g. collocation, colligation and semantic prosody/pragmatic association) are discussed to identify the textual manifestations of metaphoricity for further study. An outline of corpus linguistics and its advantages as a methodological approach to identifying and studying metaphoric language is presented. An account of some problems with both metaphor categorization and identification methods is also outlined, preparing the way for the proposed method in the next chapter.
Adopting a sociolinguistic perspective, Chapter 3 explores how metaphoric meaning in language helps to shape and develop our thought, both consciously and unconsciously. Patterson returns to the notion of conventionality and discusses at which point a novel metaphor becomes a repetitive pattern of use in a community, thereby evoking the psychological priming for meaning from the language users. Subsequently, the theory of Lexical Priming is introduced. This approach is presented as ‘an alternative approach to studying metaphoricity’ (54). When integrated within current theories of metaphor identification, it can help make sense of how and why we understand metaphor from a psychological perspective. Specifically, collocations and colligations and other relationships in language (e.g. pragmatic and textual associations) help us account for how we recognize and understand when a word is being used metaphorically. Chapters 2 and 3 lay the theoretical foundations for the study, which are presented in the remaining chapters of this book.
Chapter 4 elaborates on the methodological process and explains the key theoretical and practical decisions of data collection and analysis. Some of the problematic issues for corpus linguists in identifying and categorizing metaphor are discussed first, one of which is the influence from raters’ intuition on data selection. To resolve this issue, the final decision was to create a ‘middle group’ between the metaphoric and non-metaphoric instances, which helps avoid any unsure or ambiguous metaphors by the raters. Corpus construction, as well as software tools (e.g. WordSmith) and techniques (e.g. keyword function) are also introduced. With reference to the frequency, keyness, and ability to be used metaphorically, three target keywords are identified, namely cultivated, flame and grew. Finally, the analytical methods are demonstrated. This chapter establishes the methodological framework for the analysis in the next three chapters.
Chapters 5 and 6 present the major findings. In Chapter 5, the investigation of the evidence associated with semantic priming of the three target words is conducted. Keywords, as well as frequent lexical collocates in each sub-corpus, are explored to obtain frequent and potential items of interest for an investigation of semantic differences. Through corpus analysis, a range of lexical and semantic features, including prosody, preference, and association were found. Chapter 6 focuses on conventional uses of metaphor and how repetitive use establishes patterns in the use of metaphoric language. A range of structural features are revealed through the corpus investigation. Based on the overall analysis from the two chapters (Chapters 5 and 6), it is confirmed that ‘metaphors become conventionalized in the language as we, as language users, seek to conform to patterns’ (7). Moreover, the corpus analysis shows that if instances of a word or lexical item associated with a metaphoric or non-metaphoric sense differ sufficiently in their lexico-grammatical features, the primings associated with the two senses are also distinct. In this sense, lexical characteristics can help to distinguish between metaphoric and non-metaphoric instances of a word or phrase. The findings have an impact on metaphor identification theories.
The results in Chapter 7 provide an in-depth exploration of the problematic cases of metaphorical forms (i.e., polysemy, simile and metonymy) in the ‘middle group’ in an attempt to reveal, to what extent, the theory of Lexical Priming can account for these less straightforward cases of metaphor usage. Several important implications are drawn. First, metaphoricity must be analysed within its given context and within the language with which it is associated. Second, the results indicate that a language user is able to manipulate metaphoricity or make use of multiple senses or uses simultaneously. Third, metaphorical language can better account for how we understand meaning, since pragmatic association and semantic association are often found to be embedded within a metaphorical form of expression. Chapter 8 summarizes the major findings and sheds light on future directions for metaphor studies with corpus-linguistic techniques.
The intention of the book, as Patterson notes, is to ‘arrive at a better understanding of the phenomenon of metaphor: one that takes a lexical real-world approach whilst, at the same time, is able to offer an explanation for the cognitive processes that help prime us to recognize metaphor’ (2). Indeed, this book fulfils its task. Taken as a whole, this study contributes to our understanding of metaphor through a prudent investigation of the complex web of meaning senses through corpus-linguistic techniques.
This book is a genuine contribution to metaphor studies through the exploitation of corpus techniques. Corpus linguistic data is ‘the propelling force’ (1) and ‘only by focusing on both quantitative and qualitative methods together can one hope to attain a more holistic approach to metaphor’ (ibid.). With corpus techniques, this study offers a full analysis of lexical behaviours and characteristics associated with metaphor. This provides an insight into identifying a metaphor from a lexical perspective. Moreover, taking Lexical Priming theory as a theoretical tool, the present study evokes the attention of recognizing metaphor from a psychological perspective. This approach tackles the issues that other metaphor theories appear to have missed so far, ‘namely that metaphoric uses of language and their non-metaphoric counterparts must be analysed lexically, grammatically, semantically and pragmatically as a consistent whole, in order to differentiate behaviours in patterns and meaning’ (51).
Two further merits of this book can be highlighted. The first is its coherent organization and well-organized structure. Each of the eight chapters has its own introduction, body, conclusion, and references, which makes the logic clear. The second merit is the wide range of quotations from classic works on both metaphor studies and corpus linguistics.
Inevitably, the book bears certain areas of weakness. First, the lack of much-needed examples poses hurdles for readers without specific knowledge of metaphors. It would have been more reader-friendly for examples to be included when key terms are introduced. The second concern is the low resolution of diagrams and figures, which, to some extent, diminishes the reading experience.
However, these are relatively minor flaws in comparison with the contributions of this book. Overall, this book offers both a valuable synthesis of current research and a novel approach to metaphor studies. It is a thought-provoking piece of scholarship for the readers interested in metaphor studies, corpus linguistics and lexicography.
