Abstract
AbstractThis article explores the correlations between linguistic figurative features and their corresponding conceptual representations, by considering their respective continuities and discontinuities in language shift. I compare the figurative encoding of emotions in Kriol, a creole of northern Australia, with those of Dalabon, one of the languages replaced by this creole, with a particular focus on evidence from metaphorical gestures. The conclusions are three-fold. Firstly, the prominent figurative association between the body and the emotions observed in Dalabon is, overall, not matched in Kriol. Secondly, although this association is not prominent in Kriol, it is not entirely absent. It surfaces where speakers are less constrained by linguistic conventions: in non-conventionalized tropes, and gestures in particular. Indeed, some of the verbal emotion metaphors that have disappeared with language shift are preserved as gestural metaphors. Thus, Kriol speakers endorse the conceptual association between emotions and the body, in spite of the lower linguistic incidence of this association. The third conclusion is that therefore, in language shift, conceptual figurative representations and linguistic figurative representations are independent of each other. The former can persist when the latter largely disappear. Conversely, the fact that speakers endorse a certain type of conceptual representation does not entail that they will use corresponding linguistic forms in the new language. The transfer of linguistic figurative representations seems to depend, instead, upon purely linguistic parameters.
Highlights
In Lakoff's classic definition (Lakoff and Johnson 1980; Lakoff 1987), metaphors and other figurative features shape - and reflect - our concepts
Kriol does have a few body-based lexicalized expressions referring to emotions. These expressions result from the influence of Australian Aboriginal languages upon Kriol, and mostly feature the belly, which is much more commonly associated with emotions in Australian languages than in English
Some of these belly-related expressions are metalinguistically salient for speakers, reflecting the conceptual and cultural salience of the belly/emotion association. In spite of their metalinguistic salience, the Kriol expressions that associate the body with emotions are few in number, and are not frequent in actual speech. Apart from these lexicalized expressions, speakers of Kriol create body-based tropes to describe emotions when they are less constrained by linguistic conventions and grammar: namely in non-conventionalized tropes created online by a given speaker, and in metaphorical gestures involving the belly
Summary
In Lakoff's classic definition (Lakoff and Johnson 1980; Lakoff 1987), metaphors and other figurative features shape - and reflect - our concepts. Holm (1988: 1986) and Lefebvre (2004: 183-185, 205) list some idiomatic tropes of Atlantic Creoles that presumably result from substrate influence, and Ameka (2015) offers comparable reports for Ghanaian English Neither of these authors have studied the conceptual representations corresponding to these figurative features. The prominent figurative association between the body and emotions observed in Dalabon (Ponsonnet 2014a) is overall not matched in Kriol This raises questions about figurative features in creoles in general: what influence do they follow? The figurative association between the body and emotions is not as prominent linguistically in Kriol as in Dalabon, it is not entirely absent It surfaces in particular where speakers are less constrained by linguistic conventions: in non-conventionalized tropes and in gestures. The persistence of linguistic figurative representations could depend, instead, upon purely linguistic parameters, such as the dynamics of contact or the typological profile of a given language
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