Abstract

This paper analyzes universalities and variations of LIFE metaphor via qualitative and quantitative analysis of data retrieved from two authoritative, general, and monolingual corpora—Center for Chinese Linguistics (CCL) and Corpus of Contemporary American English (COCA) in Chinese and English. The study aims to explore the universalities and variations of LIFE metaphor in Chinese and English on the one hand, further the hidden reasons for the universalities and variations on the other. Results reveal that source domains like JOURNEY/VOYAGE, FOOD, WAR, DREAM, BOOK are employed to conceptualize LIFE both in Chinese and English justifying the universality of conceptual metaphor, which can be ascribed to Chinese and American people’s common bodily experience, common knowledge and experience about the world, common social and cultural experience. However, the frequency of conceptualizing FOOD, WAR, DREAM, BOOK is different, and the potential universal metaphors like FOOD show differences in their specific details. Besides, unique source domains are used for a particular culture (OPERA in Chinese). Different socio-cultural contexts, differential memory, Chinese and Americans’ different outlooks on life may account for LIFE metaphor’s cross-cultural variation.

Highlights

  • Life, as one of the most important philosophical propositions, has been a hot topic frequently studied by philosophers, historians, and litterateurs since ancient times

  • It can be found that both English and Chinese have a significant number of LIFE metaphors, but the frequency of “人生 rensheng” metaphor in Center for Chinese Linguistics (CCL) is higher than LIFE metaphor in Contemporary American English (COCA)

  • LIFE metaphor is a pervasive phenomenon both in CCL and COCA, but conceptual metaphors denoting LIFE is more pervasive in Chinese than English

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Summary

Introduction

As one of the most important philosophical propositions, has been a hot topic frequently studied by philosophers, historians, and litterateurs since ancient times. Our actions and experiential events can be reasonably accounted for by understanding the “meaning” of life. The concept of life is commonly mentioned in our daily life, the true meaning of life cannot be expressed in a few words. Life as an abstract concept does not have a clear and comprehensive definition. The concept of life can be externalized by means of metaphor in a cognitive approach, such as LIFE IS A JOURNEY. In this way, our understanding of life can be significantly deepened

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