Good Use of a ‘Bad’ Metaphor

Entropy is often introduced to students through the use of the disorder metaphor. However, many weaknesses and limitations of this metaphor have been identified, and it has therefore been argued that it is more harmful than useful in teaching. For instance, under the influence of the disorder metaphor, students tend to focus on spatial configuration with regard to entropy but disregard the role of energy, which may lead their intuition astray in problem solving. Albeit so, a review of research of students’ ideas about entropy in relation to the disorder metaphor shows that students can use the metaphor in developing a more nuanced, complex view of the concept, by connecting entropy as disorder to other concepts such as microstates and spreading. The disorder metaphor—in combination with other explanatory approaches—can be used as a resource for learning, in giving students an early flavour of what entropy means, so long as we acknowledge its limitations; we can put this “bad” metaphor to good use in teaching.     

隐喻认知理论对汉语词汇教学的启发

隐喻是一种普遍的认知方式,它使我们的认知过程具有想象的色彩,并让想象力帮助我们去理解语言和世界,我们同样也可以把它用于教学中。日常语言中大约70%的表达是源于隐喻慨念,分析探讨隐喻对词汇教学的影响具有典型性和实用性。     

浅谈概念隐喻理论与外语教学

该研究从解读概念隐喻理论的主要内容入手,探讨了概念隐喻理论对外语教学的启示：运用概念隐喻理论进行词汇教学,可以培养学生的隐喻思维能力;借助概念隐喻理论进行文化教学,能够提高学生的跨文化交际能力,最终实现学习者语言能力的全面提升。     

浅谈概念隐喻——以“嚼”、“吞”、“消化”为例

隐喻是一种用来增强语言表达效果的语言现象,但是从认知的角度说来,隐喻是一种认知模式,这种模式能影响人类的思维和行为,能帮助我们认识和理解世界。国内外认知语言学对饮食范畴类的隐喻的研究不少。饮食活动是人类最重要的活动,因此饮食类词语相关的隐喻也是人们最容易接受和理解隐喻概念的方式之一。该文仅以与"嚼"、"吞"、"消化"四个词相关的例子来探讨概念隐喻。     

Understanding Starts in the Mesocosm: Conceptual metaphor as a framework for external representations in science teaching

In recent years, researchers have become aware of the experiential grounding of scientific thought. Accordingly, research has shown that metaphorical mappings between experience-based source domains and abstract target domains are omnipresent in everyday and scientific language. The theory of conceptual metaphor explains these findings based on the assumption that understanding is embodied. Embodied understanding arises from recurrent bodily and social experience with our environment. As our perception is adapted to a medium-scale dimension, our embodied conceptions originate from this mesocosmic scale. With respect to this epistemological principle, we distinguish between micro-, meso- and macrocosmic phenomena. We use these insights to analyse how external representations of phenomena in the micro- and macrocosm can foster learning when they (a) address the students’ learning demand by affording a mesocosmic experience or (b) assist reflection on embodied conceptions by representing their image schematic structure. We base our considerations on empirical evidence from teaching experiments on phenomena from the microcosm (microbial growth and signal conduction in neurons) and the macrocosm (greenhouse effect and carbon cycle). We discuss how the theory of conceptual metaphor can inform the development of external representations.     

英汉"人是物体"概念隐喻的对比分析

认知语言学认为,隐喻是普遍存在的,是人类的一种认知工具。语言中遍布的隐喻表达是由于人类概念系统中存在着概念隐喻,但不同文化中的概念隐喻是否相同需要跨文化的研究。语料表明在英汉中都存在"人是物体"这个概念隐喻,而对比由此衍生出来的隐喻表达,可以为概念隐喻提供跨文化方面的依据,并为一词多义现象提供了合理的解释,这对语言的教与学都有帮助。     

利用文献资料获得隐喻选题

当前语言学界对隐喻的研究有浓厚的兴趣,对隐喻的研究呈多学科、多角度发展的趋势,本文主要研究有关隐喻选题的方法。选题是科学研究的起点,利用文献资料获得隐喻选题是重要途径。隐喻选题要遵循价值性、创新性、科学性原则,可通过阅读隐喻方面的权威专家图书资料直接选题,也可研究权威专家的学术论文,针对有关隐喻的同一问题了解多个研究者的不同观点,从中选择有关隐喻的研究题目。     

Collegial reflection on the meaning of metaphors in learning: emerging theory and practice

As educators and lifelong learners, we were drawn together by the question: How have we fostered our own capacity for agency, self-efficacy and risk-taking in the research practices we utilize? This paper reveals a connectivity and enabling thread that has enriched our experiences within and across our disciplinary areas. In particular this paper articulates the value of metaphor as a conceptual tool as well as sharing insights and reflections on the workings of progressive integration into communities of practice.     

基于商务英语语料库的隐喻性特征研究的探讨

目前,隐喻研究和国内外学者对商务英语的隐喻特征所进行的研究缺乏基础性、延续性和系统性,可以运用语料库对商务英语中隐喻性特征进行研究。     

Dialectic dialogue: reflections on adopting a dialectic stance

ABSTRACT

A multiplicity of perspectives and methods are necessary to investigate the complexities of human development and educational institutions. However, many would-be MM researchers still have questions about how to conceptualize and conduct MM research. Taking a dialectic stance, or mixing research approaches to suit the demands of a research problem, is one way to integrate multiple perspectives from conception to conclusions in a MM research study. In this spirit, we engage in a meta-dialogue focused on our use of the dialectic stance in our dissertations. Using an autoethnographic approach we now call ‘dialectic dialogue’, we analytically and reflectively reexamine our respective research processes to investigate, individually and collaboratively, how taking a dialectic stance influenced the paradigms, methodologies, and methods of our MM dissertations. Three verbal and artistic metaphors for our experience emerged from our discussion: feeling boxed in, getting lucky, and radical commitment. Each metaphor is discussed from our individual and shared perspectives. Our goal is to open our dialogue to a field-wide conversation about the dialectic stance; thus, we conclude with questions for the MM field to consider. This article will be of particular interest to newcomers to the field of MM and their mentors.     

Mapping research journeys across complex terrain with heavy baggage

In this article we review our experience of collaborating in the design and delivery of multidisciplinary training and support programmes for doctoral students and our attempts to locate models and metaphors for research planning and implementation which travel well across disciplines. We extend the metaphor of the journey to conceptualize a mapping of the Ph.D. process and examine the extent to which research students from widely divergent backgrounds may travel together and help each other navigate towards their destinations. We explore some issues of culture and communication involved in working in an interdisciplinary context, showing how we have been provoked to reflect critically on our own research identities and locations in the process of working together. We also identify some tensions between the assumptions about research development embodied in recent government policy documents and the lived experience of the research students with whom we work.     

‘Don't talk about what you don't know’: on (not) conducting research with/in Indigenous contexts

This article raises the recurrent question whether non-indigenous researchers should attempt to research with/in Indigenous communities. If research is indeed a metaphor of colonization, then we have two choices: we have to learn to conduct research in ways that meet the needs of Indigenous communities and are non-exploitative, culturally appropriate and inclusive, or we need to relinquish our roles as researchers within Indigenous contexts and make way for Indigenous researchers. Both of these alternatives are complex. Hence in this article I trace my learning journey; a journey that has culminated in the realization that it is not my place to conduct research within Indigenous contexts, but that I can use ‘what I know’ – rather than imagining that I know about Indigenous epistemologies or Indigenous experiences under colonialism – to work as an ally with Indigenous researchers. Coming as I do, from a position of relative power, I can also contribute in some small way to the project of decolonizing methodologies by speaking ‘to my own mob’.     

Jigsaw Puzzles and River Banks: Two Ways of Picturing Our Future

The papers presented at the 2004 Academy meetings can be thought of as pieces from jigsaw puzzles. While the employment of this metaphor over the years has been useful, we may be ready for a new image, one that is both more accurate and inspiring. We can picture ourselves working at different locations along a river bank. Some of us work upstream, near the headwaters, at the molecular and genetic level. Others work on anatomy, physiology, culture, psychological well-being, ethics, and even spirituality—all different places along the shore as we move down the river toward the broad and deep waters by the bay. But no matter what our location, we all work on water in one form or another. This forces us to come to grips with our interdependence as researchers and with far more complex notions of causation that have been popular heretofore. The riverbank metaphor promises a kind of cooperation, unity, and mutual appreciation that cannot be gained when we come to interdisciplinary meetings carrying our independently produced and prized puzzle pieces.     

探究主题隐喻在语篇中的连贯性

通过对语篇的衔接与连贯的认识,对隐喻的概念界定,和对连贯与语篇话题的认识,探究隐喻作为主题句在语篇中是如何实现连贯性的。并且通过分析具体的语篇证明主题隐喻的语篇连贯性。     

Reconsidering Teamwork

Teamwork is often seen as an inseparable part of sport. Other than work done by sport psychologists, however, the topic has received scant attention. The broad aim of this article is to stimulate discussion on the topic. Specifically, I examine how we can think about and “do” teamwork in an alternative way to that presented in current psychological literature. I illustrate how a psychologistic model of teamwork—teamwork as cohesion—is based on a positivist metaphor and argue that this is simply one possible interpretation. I then propose a different metaphor that has its roots in constructionist thought. I suggest that this constructionist metaphor leads to alternative research questions and methodologies and helps us to understand teamwork more wholly.     

对概念隐喻理论的理性思考

概念隐喻理论从20世纪80年代起就一直是认知语言学领域研究的热点。但任何理论都不是完美无缺的,因此我们应该辩证地看待该理论的优缺点,从而促进其发展。从经验基础、双域映射模式、认知解释力等方面剖析概念隐喻理论,探讨该理论可能存在的问题,有助于概念隐喻理论以后的研究。     

外来词汉译的认知理据研究

外来词的翻译应该顺应一定的认知规律。感官感知是认知的起点和基础,它在认知中的基础性作用同样体现在外来词的翻译过程中。根植于人类认知体系的隐喻是重要的思维方式和认知机制,它对外来词的汉译可起到很强的理据性作用。感官感知和隐喻是认知语义学的重要内容,对外来词的翻译有很强的解释力,以此二者为认知理据翻译外来词,译者可选择更易于理解和传播的译法。     

Moving beyond the metaphor of transfer of learning

This paper argues that much contemporary educational policy makes assumptions about learning that are directly contradicted by the best research and theorising of learning that has occurred over the last decade and more. This worrying mismatch is largely attributable to adherence by policy makers (and other key stakeholders such as employers), to ‘common sense’ notions of learning transfer. In fact, these ‘common sense’ notions of transfer have increasingly been discarded even in the learning transfer literature. However, we go further in arguing that transfer is a totally inappropriate metaphor for thinking about most learning, but especially for vocational learning. Accepting that thought about learning inevitably involves metaphors, we consider the merits and otherwise of various other learning metaphors including participation and construction. We conclude that the conceptual flaws of transfer can be avoided by employing alternative metaphors. The value of our recommended alternative is illustrated by its power to illuminate data on learning collected from various research projects.     

浅析现代隐喻认知理论对英语词汇研究的影响

现代隐喻理论突破了传统修辞学的限制,从崭新的认知角度为英语研究提供了新方向。根据现代隐喻理论学者Lakoff和Tohnson的观点,将隐喻理论引入词汇研究中,能够充分解释英语词汇中的诸多语言表达习惯,深化学习研究者对具体话语中潜在概念的理解,帮助他们从一个已知领域通向一个新的认知领域。因此,以现代隐喻认知理论指导英语词汇研究是一条值得语言工作者探索的途径。     

汉语品牌名称的隐喻研究——以汽车、化妆品、白酒品牌为例

隐喻作为语言的常态,在日常生活中运用相当普遍。隐喻思维在商品命名过程中同样发挥了重要的作用。选取汽车、化妆品、白酒三类商品进行考察,探讨了普遍存在于商品命名中的隐喻思维。