Search results for "Literal and figurative language"
showing 10 items of 37 documents
The language game of lost meaning: Using literal meaning as a metalinguistic resource
2019
AbstractBy literal meaning (LM) we usually refer to a theoretical notion which is at the center of a big debate involving philosophers and linguists with various orientations. At the same time, LM is rooted in a linguistic intuition of the speaker, which we could formulate as follows: words taken in isolation have a meaning. Adopting this general take on LM, we are using a notion of LM that seems incompatible with any research program of a contextualist type; I will show, instead, that in a radically contextualist (and Wittgensteinian) perspective, this notion of LM can have legitimate circulation in particular types of language games. I will propose a recovery of the notion of LM saving th…
Being a good neighbour: developing intercultural understanding through critical dialogue between an Australian and Finnish cross-case study
2020
Language educators in Australia and Finland are expected to foster intercultural understanding within foreign language education. This paper presents findings from a qualitative case study focusing on theoretical and practical intercultural understanding in secondary school language education. The data for this study includes lesson observations as well as student and teachers interviews collected in two secondary schools in Australia and Finland. The findings demonstrate the complex resources teachers and students draw on to develop and share intercultural understanding. The discussion addresses the value of different perspectives and the need for a new metaphor to conceptualise intercultu…
Figurative language and multicultural education: metaphors of language acquisition and retention
2015
Linguistics has long recognised that figurative language in the form of metaphorical expressions structures and communicates attitudes towards the ideas and concepts being expressed and that multilingual students also employ linguistic figures frequently in their writing. In this study, multilingual students use figurative language to both critique and describe experiences related to language acquisition and retention. Faced with the task of using three or more languages, the L3 English language students studied often turn to metaphor to describe the relationships between their languages and the different contexts in which they use the linguistic resources available to them. The following a…
Four Potential Meanings of Double Negation
2016
The figurative use of double negations (not uninteresting, not unhappy) has been described by linguists and rhetoricians with regards to the rhetorical figure litotes. Both mitigation and strengthening have been proposed as aims of litotes (Horn, 1989; Krifka, 2007; van der Wouden, 1996). An analysis of the construction nicht un-adjective (not un-adj.) on the basis of German corpora leads to a coherent system of pragmatic functions for this sort of double negations. The construction can function as denial, potential presumption denial, mitigation or understatement. Nevertheless, litotes exemplifies the “indeterminate nature of figurative meaning” as suggested by Colston/Gibbs (2012: 259) in…
Metaphors in the mirror: The influence of teaching metaphors in a medical education programme
2016
Medical students often face problems in using and understanding metaphors when communicating with a patient or reading a scientific paper. These figures of speech constitute an interpretative problem and students need key strategies to facilitate metaphor comprehension and disambiguation of meaning. This article examines how medical students' strategies of metaphor comprehension could be improved by specific teaching on metaphors using a Cognitive Linguistics approach. Medical students' ability to comprehend mirror neuron metaphors was assessed comparing the performance of students who did not receive any instruction about metaphoric extension strategies after a lesson on mirror neurons wit…
How the Context Matters. Literal and Figurative Meaning in the Embodied Language Paradigm
2014
The involvement of the sensorimotor system in language understanding has been widely demonstrated. However, the role of context in these studies has only recently started to be addressed. Though words are bearers of a semantic potential, meaning is the product of a pragmatic process. It needs to be situated in a context to be disambiguated. The aim of this study was to test the hypothesis that embodied simulation occurring during linguistic processing is contextually modulated to the extent that the same sentence, depending on the context of utterance, leads to the activation of different effector-specific brain motor areas. In order to test this hypothesis, we asked subjects to give a moto…
Understanding metaphors and idioms: A single-case neuropsychological study in a person with Down syndrome
2001
The ability of subject F.F., diagnosed with Down syndrome, to appreciate nonliteral (interpreting metaphors and idioms) and literal (vocabulary knowledge, including highly specific and unusual items) aspects of language was investigated. F.F. was impaired in understanding both metaphors and idioms, while her phonological, syntactic and lexical–semantic skills were largely preserved. By contrast, some aspects of F.F.'s executive functions and many visuospatial abilities were defective. The suggestion is made that the interpretation of metaphors and idioms is largely independent of that of literal language, preserved in F.F., and that some executive aspects of working memory and visuospatial …
Algebra Without Context Is Empty, Visualizations Without Concepts Are Blind
2018
In the acquisition and formalization of mathematical concepts, the transition between algebraic and geometric representations and the use of different modes of representation contextualizes abstract algebra. Regrettably, the role of geometry is often limited to the visualization of algebraic facts and figurative memory aids. Such visualizations are blind for the underlying concepts, since transitions between concepts in different representations assume the existence of symbols, language, rules and operations in both systems. The history of mathematics offers contexts to develop geometrical language and intuition in areas currently being taught in school in a purely algebraic fashion. The ex…
Estela antropomorfa con inscripción ibérica del Mas de Barberán (Nogueruelas, Teruel)
1998
The subject of this paper is a little known Iberian gravestele from Nogueruelas (Teruel). The find-spot, the Mas de Barberán, is close to the boundary with Cortes de Arenoso (Castellón). The piece is one of a class of stele charactised by figurative decoration and an inscription. The discussion focusses on the anthropomorphic shape of the piece, its iconography —the disk-cuirass—, and the inscription.
New media and perennial problems in foreign language learning and teaching
2015
The book concerns the ways in which the new media shape communication along with educational expectations and practices in foreign language classrooms. Although foreign language learners have cheap and easy access to information and ways of communication, they also wrestle with problems that have always accompanied language learning. The focus of the book is two-fold. On the one hand, the authors demonstrate how using social networks, videoconferencing, mobile phones, wikis, and computer-mediated interaction contributes to the development of language skills, negotiated interaction, autonomy, and intercultural competence. On the other, they discuss “old” issues pertaining to the role of voca…