Section Days abstract book 2010.indd - RUB Research School ...

THE RELEVANCE OF METAPHOR TO EVERY FIELD
OF SCIENTIFIC RESEARCH
Corinna Koch
Fakultät für Philologie; Ruhr-Universität Bochum, 44780 Bochum, Germany
e-mail: corinna.koch@rub.de
No matter from what field one approaches metaphor, there is an inevitable connection to other
disciplines such as linguistics, psychology, cognitive and social sciences. These connections
are highly necessary in order to take all the different implications of metaphor into account.
The contribution of a wide range of disciplines is therefore not only an optional consideration
but a must for any scientific work on metaphor. Various tensions arise from this approach,
however, as “[w]hat is metaphorical to the linguist threatens to be not metaphorical to the
psycholinguist” 1 . These tensions need to be resolved within the respective projects but only
by working on and with them can one gain full insight into the phenomenon of metaphoric
transfer.
To the same extent that interdisciplinary work is necessary for scientific research on
metaphor, metaphor is relevant to every scientific discipline as it is omnipresent in human
thinking (constructing analogies and making connections between ideas) and language (to
explain and denote abstract ideas or to find indirect but powerful ways of conveying
opinions). By investigating the use of metaphors, one can reveal how people conceptualize the
world and thereby discover their perspective on a particular topic or object. Disciplines should
therefore reflect upon and critically question the metaphors that occur regularly in their
discourse, often without the user noticing their metaphoric origin. At this point
interdisciplinary collaboration becomes important as an analysis from an external position can
be revealing.
In my PhD project I am working on a way to integrate the work on metaphor into foreign
language classrooms. Metaphors play a particular role in this environment as, for example,
most of the conventional metaphoric expressions of the target language start by being
innovative again. The foreign language students do not only profit from their metaphoric
competence in the context of language learning but take their language awareness into the
discipline they choose for their professional career. Because of its relevance to all fields,
metaphor is thereby a phenomenon that bridges the gap between religion, literature, art,
media, politics, management, law, economics, health, education, and natural sciences.
1 Steen, Gerard (2008): „The Paradox of Metaphor: Why We Need a Three-Dimensional Model of Metaphor”,
in: Metaphor and Symbol 23.4: 220.