How do Mandarin speakers conceptualize time? Beyond the horizontal and vertical dimensions

Abstract

Mandarin speakers, similar to speakers of most other languages around the world, tend to conceptualize time in terms of space. However, it has been supposed that Mandarin speakers conceptualize time along both horizontal and vertical axes (i.e., along two mental timelines). This is attributed to two main factors. The first is the availability of both horizontal and vertical spatiotemporal metaphors in their language (in contrast to most other languages which rely predominantly on horizontal metaphors), and the second is the switch from the traditional Chinese vertical (still used occasionally currently) to the Western horizontal writing direction. This paper focuses on the vertical axis, readdressing the issues concerning the use of vertical spatiotemporal metaphors and the representations of time underlying these linguistic devices. Although numerous studies have been conducted on the topic, they have provided investigations only associated with the top-to-bottom mental timeline (i.e., with the past on the top and the future on the bottom). This, however, is not sufficient for understanding how Chinese people conceptualize time in terms of vertical metaphors. This paper proposes an extended theoretical explanation of vertical spatiotemporal metaphors and highlights that there might be a cyclical concept of time underlying the use of these metaphors.