Dissertation - World Federation of Music Therapy

Ricoeur agrees with Ernst Cassirer in his view of the role of the metaphor, when he
asks: “Can one not say that the strategy of language at work in metaphor consists in
obliterating the logical and establishing frontiers of language, in order to bring to light
new resemblances the previous classification kept us from seeing? In other words, the
power of metaphor would be to break an old categorization, in order to establish new
logical frontiers on the ruins of their forerunners?” (Ricoeur 1977, p. 197)
For Aristotle the metaphor was an operation of analogy, and he did not give it a high
status in the world of thought and (re)cognition. Ricoeur is of a different opinion. Like
the pioneers of cognitive semantics he gives the metaphor a basic – even 'subversive'–
function in human existence and thinking.
The innovative functions of the narrative will be explained later. Ricoeur’s theory of
metaphor and metaphoric statements links the potential of innovation – the ‘breaking
of old categorizations’ – to semantic tension, ambiguity, conflicts and contradictions
violating the framework of traditional cognition: ‘The living metaphor’ is a
‘meaningful contradiction’, a ‘difference that makes a difference’.
Ricoeur (1977, p. 247) presents three applications to the idea of tension:
• (a) tension within the statement: tension is created between the principle and the
secondary subject of the metaphoric statement. In Lakoff and Johnson’s
terminology the two subjects correspond to 'source domain' and 'target domain'.
(Ricoeur mentions two other sets of concepts: tenor and vehicle, focus and
frame).
An example from a BMGIM session may serve as illustration (from Bonde
1999): A female client reconstructed her imagery in the following metaphoric
statement: “My life attitude is a one-legged woman, doing nothing”. (In the
imagery the client lost one leg and searched for a new (second) leg in order to
stand better) 11 .
• (b) “tension between two interpretations: between a literal interpretation that
perishes at the hands of semantic impertinence and a metaphorical interpretation
whose sense emerges through non-sense”.
11 This clincial example is expanded in section 3.7.4
47