The identification of target and source in pictorial metaphors

Abstract

Lakoff and Johnson's dictum that “metaphor is primarily a matter of thought and action and only derivatively a matter of language” (1980: 153) has given rise to numerous studies investigating how metaphors' verbal manifestations relate to their cognitive origins. Curiously, little attention has hitherto been paid to a logical extension of this adage, namely the examination of non-verbal metaphor, for instance pictorial metaphor. In this article, Carroll's (1994, 1996) proposals concerning the nature and identifiability of pictorial metaphors are discussed in terms of the model developed by Forceville (1996). Two theses inherent in Carroll's approach are investigated and rejected: (1) that most prototypical pictorial metaphors, unlike verbal ones, allow a reversibility of their respective targets and sources; and (2) that prototypical pictorial metaphors are ‘homospatially noncompossible’, that is, that they are visual hybrids. The article ends by making suggestions concerning the investigation of cinematic metaphors in line with Forceville (1996).