Ma thesis in English language: Conceptual metaphors of love in lyrics by ED Sheeran

ĐẶNG THỊ TUYẾT NHUNG

VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Đặng Thị Tuyết Nhung

ENGLISH LANGUAGE

CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN
LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN

MA2 THESIS IN ENGLISH LANGUAGE
COVER PAGE

COURSE: 2016 -2018

HANOI, 2018


VIETNAM ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES
GRADUATE ACADEMY OF SOCIAL SCIENCES

Đặng Thị Tuyết Nhung

CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN
LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN

Field: English Linguistics
Code: 8220201
Supervisor: Phạm Hiển, Ph. D.

HANOI, 2018


DECLARATION BY AUTHOR
I declare that this thesis “Conceptual Metaphors of Love in Lyrics by
Ed Sheeran” is created by my own findings and I am the sole author of this
thesis. To the best of my knowledge, with the exception of the indication of
reference, this thesis is carried out without using any other author’s work and
is submitted after a carefully checking progress in order to fulfill the
requirements of the M.A degree.

Author’s signature

Đặng Thị Tuyết Nhung

Approved by
SUPERVISOR

Phạm Hiển, Ph.D.
Date: __________________

i


ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS

This thesis is completed with lots of working hours and is contributed
by a large amount of enthusiasm, effort and assistance from many people.
Firstly, I would like to express my sincere gratitude to my advisor

Phạm Hiển, Ph.D. for the all support of my research, for his patience,
motivation, and immense knowledge. His guidance helped me in all the time
of research and writing of this thesis.
I also would like to send my special thanks to Đặng Nguyên Giang,
Ph.D. who gave me important help with some ideas and documents.
Additionally, I am so grateful for Ed Sheeran who wrote wonderful
songs which is loved by fans all over the world and me too. His lyrics are
filled by deep feelings in the different ups and downs motions, especially in
Love. It is the source of inspirations for me to do this thesis, giving data for
this work.
Finally, I want to grateful to my family for all, who are always
supportive and enthusiastic to me during the progress of making this thesis.

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ABSTRACT
This thesis studies on the Conceptual Metaphor of Love in the song’s
lyrics of Ed Sheeran in the framework theory of Lakoff and Johnson
(1980/2003), Kovecses (2002). Who also claimed that Love is an abstract
concept which is often understood via conceptual metaphors to find out the
meaningful, not just being meaning. First of all, I want to show some main
views of Cognitive Linguistics which is basic theory to understand the
concept of conceptual metaphor. From that I want to research classifications
of conceptual metaphors, each kinds of these are understood following the
points of conceptual metaphor of Lakoff & Johnson and Kovesces, and then
looking at their examples, throughout to get comprehension about them.
Second, I want to mention to classical metaphor and its history’s definition in
order time to be defined by famous researchers in this time, this work is to
improve that the difference between classical metaphor and conceptual

metaphor, which is, makes us not misunderstand between conceptual
metaphor and metaphor. Third, I study the lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s songs to
find out how Ed SHeeran used metaphors through fifteen songs which I chose
to research. Finally, I found that conceptual metaphor is not just classical
metaphor and it is not feared, like we have thought. Following Lakoff and
Johnson in Metaphors We Live By, metaphor is being in everyday life. Thus,
we are not difficult to meet somewhere in life without metaphor. Studying
conceptual metaphor or conceptualization and using it in life is important with
English learners, especially with us who learn English as foreign language in
get knowledge.

iii


LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS USED IN THE THESIS
S: Fifteen songs of Ed Sheeran in ordered number (following Table 1)
SM: Structural Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs (following
number sections of chapter 3)
OM: Ontological Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs (following
number sections of chapter 4)
: having metaphor

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LIST OF TABLES
Table 1: Fifteen songs of Ed Sheeran in ordered number ……………...…04
Table 2: List of Structural Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs
……………………………………………………………………………….41
Table 3: Structural Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs ……. 43

Table 4: List of Ontological Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs
……………………………………………………………………………… 54
Table 5: Ontological Metaphors in lyrics of Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs...… 56

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TABLE OF CONTENTS
conceptual metaphor of love in lyrics by ed sheeran ( ĐÃ SỬA 1).doc - _Toc526894934

DECLARATION BY AUTHOR ....................................................................... i
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS .............................................................................. ii
ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................... iii
LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS AND SYMBOLS USED IN THE THESIS .... iv
LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................................ v
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION .................................................................. 1
1.1. Rationale ............................................................................................ 1
1.2. Aims of the Study .............................................................................. 2
1.3. Research Questions ........................................................................... 3
1.4. Scope of the Study ............................................................................. 3
1.5. Significance of the Study .................................................................. 5
1.6. Methodology...................................................................................... 6
1.7. Structure of the Study ........................................................................ 6
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW ....................................................... 8
2.1. Cognitive Linguistics ........................................................................ 8
2.2. Metaphor Theory ............................................................................... 9
2.3. Conceptual Metaphors ..................................................................... 10
2.3.1. Conceptual Metaphor Theory ................................................... 10
2.3.2. Conceptual Metaphor Domain ................................................. 13
2.3.3. Classifications of Conceptual Metaphors ................................. 15

2.3.3.1. Orientational Metaphors ........................................................ 16
2.3.3.2. Structural Metaphors .............................................................. 18
2.3.3.3. Ontological Metaphors........................................................... 19
2.4. Love ................................................................................................. 21
2.4.1. What is Love? ............................................................................ 21

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2.4.2. Conceptual Metaphor of LOVE ................................................ 22
2.5. Ed Sheeran and His Song Lyrics ..................................................... 23
2.6. Chapter Summary ............................................................................ 24
CHAPTER 3: STRUCTURAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN THE
SELECTED LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN .................................................. 26
3.1. LOVE IS A JOURNEY ................................................................... 26
3.2. LOVE IS FIRE ................................................................................ 29
3.3. LOVE IS PAIN................................................................................ 31
3.4. LOVE IS WAR................................................................................ 32
3.5. LOVE IS POSSESSION ................................................................. 33
3.6. LOVE IS MADNESS ...................................................................... 34
3.7. LOVE IS FUTURE ......................................................................... 34
3.8. LOVE IS SAFETY .......................................................................... 35
3.9. LOVE IS CLOSENESS .................................................................. 36
3.10.

LOVE IS ECONOMIC ACTIVITY OF TIME ........................... 37

3.11.

LOVE IS HAPPINESS ................................................................ 37

3.12.

LOVE IS AN UNITY .................................................................. 38

3.13.

LOVE IS A DESIRE .................................................................... 39

3.14.

Chapter Summary ......................................................................... 40

CHAPTER 4: ONTOLOGICAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN THE
SELECTED LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN .................................................. 44
4.1. LOVE IS AN OBJECT ................................................................... 44
4.2. LOVE IS A PERSON (GIRL, WOMAN, DOCTOR) .................... 46
4.3. LOVE IS A CONTAINER .............................................................. 48
4.4. LOVE IS FLUID (IN A CONTAINER) ......................................... 50
4.5. LOVE IS A SOURCE OF WARMTH ............................................ 51
4.6. LOVE IS FOOD .............................................................................. 52
4.7. Chapter Summary ............................................................................ 54

vii


CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION .................................................................... 57
5.1. Recapitulation .................................................................................. 57
5.2. Concluding Remarks ....................................................................... 58
5.3. Implications ..................................................................................... 59

5.4. Limitations and Suggestions for Further Studies ............................ 61
REFERENCES............................................................................................. 63
SOURCES OF MATERIALS USED ............................................................. 66
APPENDIX 1: CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS SELECTED FROM ED
SHEERAN’S SONGS ........................................................................................ I
APPENDIX 2: ED SHEERAN’S FIFTEEN SONGS USED IN THE THESIS
.......................................................................................................................... X

viii


CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
1.1.

Rationale
Nowadays, English becomes the most popular and universal language

to be used in different countries. Because they said that English is easy for
people to learn, it is also proper flexible, has concern with numerous
languages and you can say an affair by about hundred ways, although in each
country English is different. Furthermore, change is often going on the trend
of developing global language in the world. As the result, they learn and use
English everywhere of the world such as: business, film, etc.
Metaphor is an infinite enjoyable phenomenon of linguistic, in
particular: literature and poetry, where metaphor is to be used as
indispensable tool, so it is not astonished at figurative language is regarded as
literature and poetry language. However, it is extensively, universally and
automatically used in social life today. Together with developing change of
English, metaphor also has tendency at profoundly. Not only it is compare,
transfer (which is transferred unknown thing into known thing) but also it is

regarded as the mode of thought helping human to have cognition about the
world by the way, which moves concept from a morpheme domain to another,
it is so called: conceptual metaphor.
Love is the topic for all time, not only in literature and poetry but also
in social life. How many colors are in life then how many colors are in love,
Love is multivarious and it has much different levels of human emotion,
which musicians always try to transmit to the hearers. On another hand, it is
said that the concept of Love is difficult for understanding but via metaphor.
So understanding the metaphor of love this means that understands the
meaningfulness of concept “Love”.

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Ed Sheeran is a success in English music. As other songwriters, love is
the indispensable subject, being endless inspiration to bring succeeding for his
songs. To wind out the motion into the songs, Ed Sheeran makes listeners feel
his emotion following the way that: each audience has different feelings when
they listen the same song by using a lot of metaphor in his work.
With all these reasons, author of this thesis hopes to find out the
conceptual metaphors to be use in Ed Sheeran songs’ lyrics to help the
audiences and English learners can firstly understand, then they can
comprehend abstract meaning in English song. Thereby, we can understand
more about English thought, language, mind in common and Ed Sheeran in
particular. Besides, to some extent we can see how is metaphor used flexible
so that we can apply these in learning and using English language in life? It
may be not bored if English learner would like study English by music.
1.2.

Aims of the Study

To answer for the research question “How are conceptual metaphors of

LOVE described in Ed Sheeran’s song lyrics?”
First, I want to study some of theories such as: Cognitive Linguistics,
Metaphor, Conceptual metaphors, Love, Conceptual Metaphors of LOVE,
etc. which help me have accurate knowledge of conceptual metaphors, and to
find out the difficulties between classical metaphor and conceptual metaphor,
these help me understand metaphor precisely.
Second, I want to study fifteen songs of Ed Sheeran (one of the best
famous song writer) for my greatest purpose: to find out the way he used
conceptual metaphors in his lyrics: what kind of metaphors he used in his
songs, how and why he used; combined them to show his feelings. Here is
also the most important target of this research. From that, we view flexible
method of using metaphor to emerge the beauty in English culture, language,

2


motion to help audiences accessing to English cognitive linguistic or
cognition such as: culture, thinking, etc. via music.
1.3.

Research Questions
To be completed these aims of this research work the thesis has to

answer following question:
- How are conceptual metaphors of LOVE described in Ed Sheeran’s
song lyrics?
1.4.

Scope of the Study
Metaphor in cognitive linguistic is regarded as new in recent. But it is

studied by multiple researchers in various perspectives. Because of a large
studying scope to be researched by researchers in the past that is over my time
so this thesis concentrate on the conceptual metaphor of cognition which grew
out of George Lakoff & Mark Johnson’s theory in the points of Metaphors
We Live By (1980/ 2003) and Kovecses (2002) in Metaphor A Practical
Introduction. Basically, the view of conceptual metaphor of LOVE is written
by them having the same ideal, so study all of authors made me have more
examples and knowledge of conceptual metaphor of LOVE.
The scope of the research is mainly viewed on two kinds of conceptual
metaphor of LOVE in Ed Sheeran’s song lyrics which is classified by Lakoff
and Johnson (1980/ 2003) and Kovecses (2002). These kinds of conceptual
metaphors are: Structural Metaphor and Ontological Metaphor.
Ed Sheeran has numerous songs until now, and Love is main theme of
his works. But in this research only studies his fifteen songs (see Table 1)
which belong to three albums of Ed Sheeran: Plus (+), Multiply (x), Divide
(÷) (getting more in the 2.5. Ed Sheeran and His Song Lyrics)

3


Number

Name of Songs

Album

Released

Perfect

÷ (Divide)

03/03 2017

÷(Divide)

03/03/ 2017

Recorded

of Songs
1

Hearts

Don’t

2

Around Here

3

Drunk

4

5

Break

I’m A Mess

Sing

2016

2016
+ (Plus)
X
(Multiply)
X
(Multiply)

17/02/ 2012
22/06/ 2016

07/04/ 2014

2011

2014

2013

6

Shape Of You

÷ (Divide)

06/01/ 2017

2016

7

UNI

+ (Plus)

25/05/ 2011

2011

8

Little Bird

+ (Plus)

2011

2011

9

Give Me Love

+ (Plus)

21/11/ 2012

2012

10

Kiss Me

+ (Plus)

2011

2011

11

How Would You Feel

÷ (Divide)

17/02/ 2016

2016

12

Thinking Out Loud

X
(Multiply)

24/09/2016

2014

13

Happier

÷ (Divide)

27/04/ 2017

2016

14

Small Bump

+ (Plus)

25/05/ 2012

2011

15

Shirtsleeves

X
(Multiply)

20/06/ 2014

Table 1: Fifteen songs of Ed Sheeran in ordered number

4

2014


Because of structure of song, there are repetitious words and line in
songs many a time such as: chorus, breakdown, melody, etc. therefore, in case
of LOVE metaphors presented in the thesis do not include every single
occurrence, for example: different conceptual metaphors are only counted
once even though the same group of words or line many times in the same
song text. Furthermore each line of one song can has more than one kinds of
conceptual metaphor of LOVE, so in this research I will view a part of them
so that I can get all perspectives of this metaphor complexly.
1.5.

Significance of the Study
Studying this thesis, that gets a lot of knowledge to understand more

about the items of cognitive linguistics. Studying, applying, using cognitive
linguistics is of large significance with us in dealing with numerous problems

of linguistics that was not explained by classic theory. Especially with foreign
language learners like me, cognitive linguistics opened a new view so that
they can approach foreign language easier.
Studying conceptual metaphor to help us to understand our mind and
thought in the matter of conceptualization. Conceptual metaphor is defined by
Lakoff and Johnson; Kovecses in cognitive linguistics which give us openminded comprehend about the matter of conceptualization. Knowledge of
metaphor and metaphor’s role in linguistics are important, the way it is being
in life, how it is used to help us to evaluate right conceptual metaphor in
linguistics commonly, in life especially.
Summary, this thesis has important significance to learn how metaphor
is used in everyday language. Lyric is one of ways that people are often used
language in life. To find out how Ed Sheeran used metaphor in his fifteen
selected songs’ lyrics, when you find out the ways metaphors are used in life.

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1.6.

Methodology
This study is a qualitative analysis of conceptual metaphors of love in

Ed Sheeran’s fifteen songs, and Lyrics in these songs which used conceptual
metaphors are used to make the data of this research.
This thesis is belonged to Linguistic field so it depending on empirical
experiences, so this thesis uses qualitative method mostly to choose the data
for Conceptual Metaphors of LOVE. Besides, in the chapter 3 and chapter 4
use quantitative analysis for studying this data to show frequency of using
metaphors and how many times Ed Sheeran used in his songs.
1.7.

Structure of the Study

 The thesis begins with Declaration by Author, Acknowledgements,
Abstract, List of abbreviations and symbols used in the thesis and Table of
Contents.
 The main body of this research paper is divided into five chapters:
CHAPTER 1: INTRODUCTION
In this chapter includes:
Rationale
Research questions,
Aims of the Study
Scope of the Study
Significance of study
Methodology
Structure of the study
CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
This chapter is all basic theory: consisting of five parts:

6


 Part one: cognitive linguistic. This part mainly introduces about
Cognitive Linguistics which is defined by some researchers in different
aspects of Cognitive Linguistics.
 Part two: Metaphor. This part has studied about classical metaphor by
Aristotle and some researchers in order of time.
 Part

three:

Conceptual

Metaphor

and

conceptual

metaphor

classifications, in this part the research want to study conceptual
metaphor definition, domain, and classification.
 Part four: Love. This part is study: meaning of Love in common and
conceptual metaphors of Love.
 Part five: Ed Sheeran and his song lyrics, this part gives several main
points of view of Ed Sheeran and his three albums.
CHAPTER 3: STRUCTUAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN THE SELECTED
LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN
In this chapter is the study of Structural Metaphors of love which is
used in fifteen songs of Ed Sheeran.
CHAPTER 4: ONTOLOGICAL METAPHORS OF LOVE IN THE
SELECTED LYRICS BY ED SHEERAN
This chapter studies Ontological Metaphors of love in fifteen song’s
lyrics of Ed Sheeran.
CHAPTER 5: CONCLUSION
This

chapter

consists

of:

Recapitulation,

Concluding

remarks,

Implications, Limitations and suggestions for further studies
 REFERENCES, SOURCES OF MATERIALS USED and APPENDIX are
at the end.

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CHAPTER 2: LITERATURE REVIEW
2.1.

Cognitive Linguistics
The term of Cognitive Linguistics maybe came from the term of

Linguistics and Cognitive Science (which Lakoff said in Woman, Fire and
Dangerous Things, 1987, pp.270-271) was regarded as including many
academic disciplines: psychology, linguistics, anthropology, philosophy). In
Metaphors We Live By, Lakoff and Johnson (1980/2003) said that Cognitive
Linguistics was, included central subdisciplines of the field of cognitive
linguistics: Metaphor Theory, the semantics of closed-class elements such as
spatial relations (Talmy 2000), studies of category structure, including basic

level categories, prototypes, and radial categories (Lakoff 1987), mental
spaces (Fauconnier 1985; Fauconnier and Sweetser 1996), frame semantics
(Fillmore 1982, 1985; Sweetser 1990), blended spaces (Fauconnier and
Turner 1998, 2002), cognitive grammar (Langacker 1986, 1990, 1991),
cognitive construction grammar (Goldberg 1995; Lakoff 1987, Case Study 3).
Langacker (2008, p.7) said about Cognitive Linguistics: “Cognitive
Grammar belongs to the wider movement known as cognitive linguistics”. He
also claimed that, important strands of cognitive linguistics include
construction grammar, metaphor theory, the study of blends and mental
spaces, and various efforts to develop conceptualist semantics. Evans and
Green (2006, p.5) considered cognitive linguistics as one of the most
innovative and exciting approaches to the study of language and thought.
Talmy (2000, p.4) referred the term “cognitive linguistics” as his own body of
work as “cognitive semantics”. So we see there are many definitions of
cognitive linguistics, it depends on what aspects of linguistics that researchers
want to study on the cognitive perspective.

8


Commonly, cognitive linguistics is a branch of linguistics. It is the
studying linguistics on the cognitive perspective, the way language interacts
with cognition and how language forms our thoughts. In other words, it is the
studying of relationship of human language and the mind, socio-physical
experience.
2.2.

Metaphor Theory
They said that Metaphor is origin of Greek and starting by Aristotle,

who had seen Metaphor as powerful rhetorical and poetic devices of
language, conspicuously it is used of ornate and flowery words by the poet,
literature for a long time. In Aristotle’s time, some people Metaphors are most
regularly compared with similes (Similes is most famous by Homer, who
sometimes calls metaphor side by side with similes), but as Aristotle is
considered simile as a specific type of metaphor, simile uses the words "like"
or "as" in comparing two objects. While a metaphor is identical on the point
of comparison, simile merely is a similarity.
In this classical tradition view, Quitilian (was born in c.35 and died in
95/6 C.E.) is considered metaphor as a member of tropes, then inheriting this
view Augustine (was born in 354 and died in 430) is regarded metaphor as
trope. For a long time, the term of trope had been together with Metaphor
until Locker (was born in 163 and died in 1704), he found the term Ideal in
language which is evoked by tropes and figures, and Nietzsche (was born in
1844 and died in 1900) who viewed Metaphor and reality are so entwined as
to be synonymous. The appearance of Lakoff and Johnson's "Metaphors We
Live By" in 1980 also marked an important development of metaphor. In this
work they found that Metaphor is in everyday life, not only in language but
also in thought and action. Thought and act are metaphor in natural, and it is
in our ordinary conceptual system (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980/2003, p.3). By

9


the proofs of fact in everyday life they have had the view of metaphor in the
cognitive linguistics and they called conceptual metaphor.
From Aristotle’s, through the centuries Metaphor always has been a
matter of argument by scholars, researchers, who studied language, poets,
writers and event philosophers, politicians, scientists and so on. Metaphor had
been defined as comparison by Aristotle firstly, then for a long time Metaphor

is considered as trope and it is used in poetry, art, teaching Christ, etc.,
together with the developing of social life, Metaphor changed little by little, it
was not only language but also concerned with Ideal, and then the thought,
act. Thus, metaphor associates with language, not only “poetic imagination
and the rhetorical flourish-a matter of extraordinary” (Lakoff and Johnson,
1980/2003, p.4) but also other disciplines in everyday life. So which
discipline has language more or less it has metaphor too, simply metaphor is
perhaps: using one word to refer other word, profoundly metaphor can be:
using word to refer non-word (the things that cannot be describe, and having
no word to describe this, it is often abstract); using limited thing to refer
unlimited thing.
2.3.

Conceptual Metaphors

2.3.1. Conceptual Metaphor Theory
The term “conceptual metaphor” was arguably mentioned the first time
in 1980 by Lakoff and Johnson in Metaphors We Live By, as they shared with
each other about the views on “meaning” in western philosophy and
linguistics and the “meaningful” in life (see more in the Preface of this book).
Here metaphor is named and writing them in capital letters, examples:
ARGUMENT IS WAS, HAPPY IS UP, INFLATION IS AN ADVERSARY,
etc., on their view, Metaphor is not just a matter of language, it is being in
“the way we think, what we experience, and what we do every day” (Lakoff
10


and Johnson, 1980/2003, p.3). In other words, Conceptual metaphor is the
studying metaphor in cognitive linguistics. In this case, Metaphor is: one
concept is understood by other concepts or we are understood one domain of

experience by others’ (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980/2003, p.117). So conceptual
metaphor is not only the means for poetry, it can be used in everyday
language. We still use conceptual metaphor every day and everywhere but we
perhaps don’t realize that. Conceptual metaphor is not comparison or trope
because conceptual metaphor is not only the matter of language it is also
matter of our thought, mind, etc. (which belong to cognition) or we can say
that our thought and action is the matter of conceptualization.
Kövecses , one of the famous researcher on metaphor, he defined the
term of “conceptual metaphor” in the Metaphor: A Practical Introduction
(2002): “A convenient shorthand way of capturing this view of metaphor is
the following: CONCEPTUAL DOMAIN A IS CONCEPTUAL DOMAIN B,
which is what is called a conceptual metaphor”, “A conceptual metaphor
consists of two conceptual domains, in which one domain is understood in
terms of another” (Kovesces, 2002, p.4).
Following Lakoff and Johnson (1980/2003), Kovecses (2002), studying
metaphor need do in cognitive science because the matter of metaphor not just
linguistics, but in cognition or cognitive linguistic science. In other words,
conceptual metaphor is the transference of meaning from one domain to other
domain, or in the way that we concetptualize one mental domain in term of
another. Like as when we learn conceptual metaphor, we can understand our
mind and thought in the matter of conceptualization. These are, Target
Domain and Source Domain, the process of understanding target domain
through source domain is called conceptual metaphor.

11


We can understand more following Figure 1. Each target domain can be
understood by many source domains it depends on the experiences of each
person. And following Lakoff and Johnson (1980/2003) one target domain is

not understood by one source domain only, at least having two or more source
domains are mapped.

Conceptual
metaphor A

is

Conceptual
metaphor B

To refer to

Target domain

Source domain
To try to understand

understanding

Is understood

To understand
Concrete
concepts:
JOURNEYS,
WAR, ECT.

Abstract
concepts:

LOVE
Figure 1: process of conceptual metaphor

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2.3.2. Conceptual Metaphor Domain
As above, to define conceptual metaphor depending on the transfer of
conceptual domain, so how is conceptual domain defined by Lakoff and
Johnson? According to the view of conceptual metaphor in Metaphors we live
by (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980/2003), Metaphor in cognitive linguistics is a
process of cognition that allows us to comprehend one domain of experience
(the target domain) in the term of another (the source domain). Two domains
both participate in conceptual metaphor as Lakoff & Johnson’ view, the same
as Koveses (2002) asserted that the domain understands another is called the
source domain, vice versa the domain is understood that is called the target
domain.
Domain was defined by Kovecses (2002, p.4) “a conceptual domain is
any coherent organization of experience”, the coherent organization of
experience depends on organized knowledge of human beings of the field that
metaphor refers to, it is conceptualized by concepts. He believed that if we
have coherently organized knowledge about one thing, we would see that,
there are some definitions or concepts in dictionaries so it has characteristic
linguistics. Besides, they have features of psychology, chemistry, etc., which
belongs to nature, then they are also experienced by human feelings, all of
these must be coherently organization knowledge to become “domain”.
Lakoff and Johnson (1980/2003, p.117) suggested that: “understanding
takes place in terms of entire domains of experience and not in terms of
isolated concepts”. So “concepts arising from our experience are openedended” (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980/2003, p.125), domain of experience of
concepts are opened-ended too and this infers that domains are opened-ended.

Domain in process of conceptual metaphor is called domain of experience,
which conceptualized and defined as basic domain of experience. They

13


seemed to call domains of experience are organized in terms of natural
dimensions to be “natural kinds of experience”, they are also called as
“products of human nature” while others perhaps have changes depending on
culture.
In the process of conceptual metaphor we see that, understanding a
domain A there are some domains which are natural kinds of experiences,
(ex: to try to understand the LOVE (domain A) by some natural kinds of
experience (domain B): A JOURNEY, MADNESS, WAR, POSSESSION,
SAFETY, FIRE, PAIN, UNITY, HAPPINESS, A DESIRE, AN OBJECT, A
PERSON, A CONTAINER, A SOURCE OF WARMTH, FLUID etc.,) Lakoff
and Johnson called it as “interactional properties”, it were regarded as it is
interaction with another and with the world. Thus, each domain is not only
understood by one other domain, but also can be understood by some of other
domains (natural kinds of experience).
Lakoff and Johnson asserted that in a metaphor, there are two domains:
the target domain, and the source domain. Kovecses also believed that domain
A (in Figure 1) is target domain, and domain B is source domain.
Target Domain
Saying about target domain in a conceptual metaphor, Lakoff and
Johnson defined “the target domain, which is constituted by the immediate
subject matter” (Lakoff and Johnson, 2003, p.265), target domain here is a
subject matter which we need to understand or try understand by using source
domain, it were made comparison with “as an initial slide on the projector and
metaphorical projection” (Lakoff and Johnson, 2003, p.253), projection

metaphor starts on the first step: target domain, which is goals of
metaphorical projection too. If metaphor projection is the give and take
process so target domain would considers as an image recipient. They also

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believed that target domains are often abstract subject matters, which are
unintelligible, such as: LOVE, LIFE, ARGUMENTS, etc.
Basically, Kovecses had the same idea, he considered that target
domain is abstract experiences, he wrote: “conceptual domain that is
understood this way is the target domain” (Kovesces, 2002, p.4), conceptual
domain He was regarded as “coherent organization of experience”, so we
infer target domain as coherent organization of experience (experiences) to be
understood via an others.
Source Domain
Source domain, which we are used to understand other concept domain
(target domain), following Kovesces, Lakoff and Johnson. In other words
source domain is conceptual domain which is used in reasoning about others.
Thus, source domains are concept domains (domain of experience) which are
typically a more concrete concepts, such as: JOURNEY, WAR, BUILDINGS,
FOOD, PLANTS, etc. , Lakoff and Johnson (2003) “the source domain, in
which important metaphorical reasoning takes place and that provides the
source concepts used in that reasoning” (Lakoff and Johnson, 2003, p.265).
Source domain roles as image donor in projection metaphor and all of the
source domains should be projected onto the target.
2.3.3. Classifications of Conceptual Metaphors
According to the function Conceptual metaphor can be divided into
three kinds: ontological metaphor, structural metaphor, and orientational
metaphor (Kovesces, 2002, pp.33-34), he had the distinct types of conceptual

metaphor and possibly to classify metaphors in a variety of way but rely on
especially important role of cognitive linguistic view he divided conceptual
metaphor in this ways rely on the “conventionality, function, nature and level
of generality of metaphor” (Kovesces, 2002, p.33). Depending on cognitive

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