A cognitive linguistic study of food proverbs in English

Abstract EN

Conceptual Metaphor Theory represents the output of a cognitive process by which readers could understand one domain in terms of another.

This study aims at: Investigating the role of metaphor in everyday communication in proverbs of food in English and showing the role of embodiment theory in conceptualizing food proverbs in English.

The hypotheses of this study are: (i) Conceptual metaphor occurs randomly in food and drink proverbs in English and Iraqi Arabic, (ii) The higher level of processing embodiment theory is grounded in the organism sensory and motor experiences in food proverbs in English.

The procedures of this study are presenting a theoretical framework of cognitive linguistics and conceptual metaphor theory in English and making use of the most famous model of the conceptual metaphor theory which is Lakoff and Johnson's'' Metaphor We live by'' (2003) in order to analyze proverbs of food in English.

Another model is used as a support for the first one which is Newman's (1997) ''Eating and Drinking as a Source of Metaphor in English''.

Examine types and functions of metaphor in English.

Concerning the levels of analysis, this study is dealing with the semantic level.

The semantic level is the most important one because it is the core of the subject in analyzing the data.

The data are collected from dictionaries that are associated with food proverbs.

Five samples are chosen for the analysis.

In each sample more than three items have been analyzed metaphorically.

The conclusions arrived at though this study is as follows: (i) Conceptual metaphors do not occur randomly and they have a basis in context, human’s physical experience and cultural experience and they are unconscious process.

They occur unconsciously through conversations.