Explanatory Metaphors Research Articles

The Perception and Treatment of People about Abscesses in the Song Period: Focus on Hongmai Yijianzhi.

During the Song period, abscesses were a disease that could affect anyone regardless of their class. This study examines how people at that time explained the cause of abscesses and their efforts to treat them, focusing on the experiences of those who suffered from abscesses and their families. Previous research on disease history during the Song period primarily focused on ailments like colds and infectious diseases , or plagues prevalent in the southern regions of China. On the other hand, examining abscesses as a common everyday illness that could affect anyone and considering them from the perspective of patients' experiences has remained unexplored in previous studies. To reconstruct the experiences of Song period patients, this study analyzes over sixty anecdotes related to abscesses found in Yi Jian Zhi written by Hong Mai. These cases span across the mid to late 12th century, with a majority of the patients being from the literati () class or connected to the literati. These anecdotes exhibit two distinct trends. One focuses on narratives surrounding the onset of abscesses, attributing their cause primarily to the patients' lifestyle. When the cause of the abscesses was unknown, people metaphorically attributed its onset to perceived blasphemy against God, an act of killing, negligence in duties, or other wrongdoings. This trend is evident among the literati class in particular, where abscesses were often linked to factors such as excessive legal executions or exploitation, and even acts of killing people. Except for those cases, in explaining the cause of abscesses in commoners, there were instances caused by a pediculus infestation, while in case of literati, Dansha () poisoning was a common cause. It is interesting to note that the narrative tradition, prevalent in official history biographies, which attributes the onset of abscesses to worries and resentment, was not evident in written records such as Yi Jian Zhi. Furthermore, the detailed description of external similarities, portraying abscesses as traces of punishment from the underground realm, is a narrative characteristic that solidified such stereotypical perceptions. The literati's notion that they should alert people through these related anecdotes contributed to the spread of this perception. Another trend in these anecdotes was centered around narratives of abscess treatment, where the focus shifted primarily to seeking "doctors," unlike the metaphorical explanations of abscess onset causes and processes. When afflicted with abscesses, people generally sought out those renowned surgeons, known as Yang-yi , and those famous for treating abscesses. In local communities, individuals who had "received the divine secrets of abscesses," those possessing their own mysterious abscesses cures, and those famous for generations for treating abscesses by using stone acupuncture were active. Such information about them was shared within the local societies. Their treatment predominantly consisted of surgical procedures to lance abscesses and drain pus, which often led patients to endure significant pain during the treatment process. In many cases, such patients sought treatment from well-known local surgeons and abscess specialists who surgically treated them. The literati, who are said to have influenced the development of pulse-centered medical and academic medicine in China, also sought out surgeons for abscess treatment. Medical formularies compiled by the court as well as privately published ones rarely mentioned surgical methods utilizing tools. The fact that surgical techniques were utilized in local regions at that time indicates a disparity between the official medical practices documented in texts and the practical methods employed in local communities. An analysis of approximately sixty anecdotes related to abscesses shows that abscesses were characterized by unknown causes and excruciating pain. Their onset was often attributed to the patient's lifestyle and wrongdoings, and they were also perceived as punishment for one's wrongdoings. However, as it was a disease where treatment effects could be relatively easily observed through surgical procedures, there was a proactive utilization of the locally formed treatment environment, preferring surgical interventions over relying on religious powers. Contrary to the medical trends and methods outlined in medical literature, surgical treatments were prevalent as the chosen method of treatment among the population in local communities. It appears that the realities experienced, reasoned, and shared by people in the Song period regarding the perception and response to abscesses did not necessarily align with those of mainstream medical practices. Moreover, despite attributing the onset of abscesses to one's wrongdoing, there was a preference for seeking surgeons or Yang-yi over religious methods in their treatment, reflecting a characteristic of the local medical culture surrounding abscesses during the Song period.

Metaphors or mechanism? Predictive coding and a (brief) history of empirical study of the arts.

Predictive processing (PP) offers an intriguing approach to perception, cognition, but also to appreciation of the arts. It does this by positing both a theoretical basis-one might say a 'metaphor'-for how we engage and respond, placing emphasis on mismatches rather than fluent overlap between schema and environment. Even more, it holds the promise for translating metaphor into neurobiological bases, suggesting a means for considering mechanisms-from basic perceptions to possibly even our complex, aesthetic experiences. However, while we share the excitement of this promise, the history of empirical or psychological aesthetics is also permeated by metaphors that have progressed our understanding but which also tend to elude translation into concrete, mechanistic operationalization-a challenge that can also be made to PP. We briefly consider this difficulty of convincing implementation of PP via a brief historical outline of some developments in the psychological study of aesthetics and art in order to show how these ideas have often anticipated PP but also how they have remained at the level of rather metaphorical and difficult-to-measure concepts. Although theoretical in scope, we hope that this commentary will spur researchers to reflect on PP with the aim of translating metaphorical explanations into well-defined mechanisms in future empirical study. This article is part of the theme issue 'Art, aesthetics and predictive processing: theoretical and empirical perspectives'.

The relationship between metaphor skills and Theory of Mind in middle childhood: Task and developmental effects

Theoretical pragmatics in the post-Gricean tradition argued that metaphor requires understanding of how another person sees the world. Yet, it is unclear what role mindreading plays in developing metaphor skills. Here we examined the relationship between metaphor and Theory of Mind (ToM) in middle childhood by using two different tasks. In addition to the Physical and Mental Metaphors task (PMM), based on the verbal explanation of physical and mental metaphors, we revived the Referential Metaphors task for children (Noveck, Bianco, & Castry, 2001), where metaphorical and literal referents are presented in a narrative context. The sample included 169 8-, 9-, and 10-year-old children, assessed also for ToM (via the Strange Stories) and other linguistic and cognitive skills as control variables. In the PMM, ToM supported the understanding of mental (but not physical) metaphors in 9-year-olds only, whereas in the Referential Metaphors task ToM supported accuracy of understanding metaphors (but not literal items) in younger children as well. At age 10, ToM effects were negligible in both tasks. These findings suggest that ToM has a task-specific role in metaphor, linked to the characteristics of the items in the task at stake, being for instance greater for metaphors with mental (compared to physical) content and for non-literal (compared to literal) referents. The findings also suggest that the relationship between ToM and metaphor skills is developmental sensitive, as children start to capitalize on ToM earlier in development when the metaphor context is richer, and these effects fade with age. Theoretically, these data argue in favor of the relevance-theoretic account of metaphor, spelling out different ways in which ToM might support metaphor resolution across tasks, for instance by providing better access to the psychological lexicon (i.e., terms referring to mental states) and better context processing, serving as a springboard to achieve sophisticated pragmatic skills in middle childhood.

An Epidemic of Apathy: Abulia and the Language of Pathology in Baroja’s Early Fiction

ABSTRACT: The literary exposition of abulia in Pío Baroja’s early novels, especially La lucha por la vida trilogy, illuminates the ways in which diagnostic language from psychopathology was adapted, assimilated, and disseminated through the trajectories of fictional characters who suffer from a loss of volition. This article analyzes cultural narratives about abulia in Baroja’s early fiction, demonstrating that they constitute a resonant pathological metaphor during a period in Spain’s history defined by national introspection and regenerationist debates. By tracing metaphorical explanations for social, political, and economic circumstances conveyed through the literary appropriation of medical terminology, this study explores comparisons between abulia and the gendered and class-based associations of neurasthenia at the turn of the twentieth century. Although the assumed causes of each condition are different, this process of transposition between medicine and metaphor anticipates the contemporary social, cultural, and ideological shaping of concepts such as stress and burnout.

A Comparative Study of the Evaluation Function of War Metaphors in the Perspective of Critical Metaphors

This paper analyzed the differences of China’s political stance and attitude in response to the recent China-US trade war and China-US epidemic war, provoked by the United States, through comparing the distribution differences of war metaphors as attitudinal resources in regular speeches relevant to these two events on the official website of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs within the framework of conceptual metaphor and evaluation theory. Through the analysis of metaphorical interpretation and metaphor explanation, the study found that in the diplomatic discourse of the China-US epidemic war, the confrontational willingness is stronger and the signal of willing to ease the China-US relationship is significantly weakened, further more, the proportion of judgement resources, especially negative social constraint in the speeches relevant to the China-US epidemic war is the highest, which indicates that China’s opposing attitude on this event is more resolute. It is hoped that the results of this study will help to explore the application potential of evaluative function of war metaphor discourse strategy in facilitating the enhancement of China’s diplomatic discourse power.

팔하 서석지 『筆鑑』의 서학론 분석

This paper examines Pal Ha's calligraphy theory and calligraphic spirit as portrayed in his work featured in 『Pilgam』. I would like to replace the conclusion by synthesizing what was discussed in the main body.
 First of all, as a professional calligrapher who worked in the Daegu calligraphy circle, he learned calligraphy from Changam in his youth, and was also an early teacher of Seokjae Seo Byeong-oh who is the renovation of Daegu literary painting, and is considered the origin of Daegu calligraphy in the 20th century.
 Pilgam was compiled to convey to his son Gyeong-soon, and is a rare professional calligraphy theory book in the late Joseon Dynasty. It comprehensively covers Palha’s calligraphic theories from basic techniques of one-stroke technique and Eight Principles of Yong (永字八法) to writing method, brushstroke method, letter closing method, ink usage, theory on copying practice with classics, theory on calligraphic font and the like along with appendices of Seobeopwonin (書琺原因), Jegapumpyeong (諸家品評, criticism on calligraphic masters) and his copying practice of 「Jinchocheonmun (眞草千文)」.
 The theory on calligraphic technique on 『Pilgam』 classified and examined one-stroke technique, Eight Principles of Yong, writing method, brushstroke method and letter closing method and the gist is as follows. The one-stroke technique and Eight Principles of Yong facilitated studying calligraphy (學書) with illustrations and metaphorical explanations with natural objects. The writing method stressed control of five fingers (指實), space given to the palm (掌虛), lifting the elbow (縣腕) and standing of a brush (管直). The brushstroke method placed much value on hiding of brush tip (藏鋒) and the principles of ‘movement inevitably followed by halt (無垂不縮)’ and ‘coordination of the top and the bottom (承上接下).’ The letter closing method put emphasis on harmony of sparseness and denseness (疏密) and untrimmedness (參差).
 The calligraphic view on 『Pilgam』 classified and examined theory on copying practice with classics, theory on calligraphic font and theory on criticism and the gist is as follows. The copying practice with classics emphasized academic attitude of learning strong points and supplementing weak points (取長補短) along with notions that one should establish a system for Lishu by using Zhuanshu; that for Xingshu by using Kaishu and; that for Caoshu through Caoshu written by Zhangzhi.
 As demonstrated above, 『Pilgam』 pursued the theory on calligraphic technique based on classical theories for learning calligraphy including one-stroke technique, Eight Principles of Yong and writing method and the calligraphic view of creating new by learning from the past (法古創新) and learning strong points and supplementing weak points (取長補短). Palha’s such calligraphic theory would be a proper guideline for calligraphic researchers as the basis for calligraphic study and creation.

“I Am Your Partner, Am I Not?” An inquiry into stakeholder inclusion in platform organizations in times of crisis

In this paper we contribute to the understanding of how failed stakeholder inclusion in times of crisis can lead to distrust of platform organizations. Drawing on the revelatory case of Airbnb, we explore how stakeholder inclusion was practiced when the platform was confronted with the COVID-19 pandemic, a severe context in which its business practices were disrupted and social interactions uprooted. Our qualitative analysis suggests that platform leaders failed to notice a dissonance between articulated stakeholder meaning and understanding (i.e., what they said) and the crisis response practices implemented (i.e., what they did and did not do). This ultimately fostered distrust and selective disengagement as stakeholders re-interpreted Airbnb’s claims about their role and how stakeholders were given voice in times of crisis. Drawing on research in psychology, we utilize the concept of inattentional blindness as a novel metaphorical explanation for failed stakeholder inclusion in platform organizations in times of crisis.

대중적 의사소통 속에서 나타나는 은유의 사용과 구현

The purpose of this paper is to build up a pragmatic account of using and realising metaphor, particularly shown in public communication such as commercial advertisements. According to the traditional point of view, metaphor is a “figure of speech in which a linguistic expression normally belonging to one field of reference is extended analogously to another”(Huang 2012: 191-192). Beyond this way of rhetorical perspective on metaphor, however, this paper pursues to re-recognition of the linguistic nature of metaphor with a more active insight(e.g., from a viewpoint based on experientialist epistemology) and seeks the rational explanation of metaphor in accordance with it. Especially, in some influential studies of cognitive pragmatics(i.e., Relevance Theory: RT) such as Sperber and Wilson(1995, 2006), Yus(2009) and Carston(2000, 2002, 2010), metaphor has been evaluated as a linguistic mechanism which shows ordinary language users’ cognitive reasoning and conceptualization abilities, not just as a method of expression. Based on the RT approach to metaphor, this paper presents an alternative way of explaining metaphor used in public communication, the goal of which is to perform argumentation for persuading consumers to purchase an advertiser’s products, services and ideas.

The Paintgrinder: Ralph Waldo Emerson and Karl Marx on a Horizon of Thought

This article undertakes a radical rereading of capitalist ideas in the work of Ralph Waldo Emerson (1803–1882). In both popular and academic appraisals, Emerson is an exponent of mainstream American values, moral and economic. We challenge such appraisals through a novel analysis of Emerson's brief contact with the work of Karl Marx and proceed to illustrate the subtlety of Emerson's engagement with the structure of capitalist labor. Using explanatory metaphors based on painterly labor, Emerson demonstrates how labor structures that are assumed to be products of capitalism were also discernable in cultural settings in the mid-nineteenth century, and that neglected lines of affinity exist between cultural and capitalist production. The result is a speculative new purview for the analysis of the social forms of the capitalist era, which indicates the shortcomings of what Michel Foucault termed a Marxian "horizon of thought" that governs the critical outlook of the humanities.

Between No Longer at Ease and A Man of the People: problematizing the analytical methods

This article interrogates those analytical approaches to Chinua Achebe’s No Longer at Ease and A Man of the People, which evaluate the worth of the texts based on assumptions, on one hand, and on the structures, on the other. The study posits that these kinds of analyses are insular and reductionist because they hinder the discovery of the potential hidden in the depths of the works. Using Paul Ricoeur’s hermeneutics depth semantics theory with its systematic and rigorous methodology of explanation and interpretation of poetic metaphor in the text, the texts’ structures and references are explained and the existential issues they raise exposed.

Whewell’s Hylomorphism as a Metaphorical Explanation for How Mind and World Merge

William Whewell’s nineteenth century philosophy of science is sometimes glossed over as a footnote to Kant. There is however a key feature of Whewell’s account worth noting. This is his appeal to Aristotle’s form/matter hylomorphism as a metaphor to explain how mind and world merge in successful scientific inquiry. Whewell’s hylomorphism suggests a middle way between rationalism and empiricism reminiscent of experience pragmatists like Steven Levine’s view that mind and world are entwined in experience. I argue however that Levine does not adequately explain exactly how mind and world entwine. He could nonetheless do so if he appealed to Whewell’s hylomorphic metaphor. We may prefer a reductive metaphysical explanation, but I suggest that pragmatists only have recourse to metaphor in this case. Both reductive and metaphorical explanations can enjoy great explanatory power if they exhibit a suitable measure of what I will call semantic distance. Semantic distance measures how close or how far apart explanandum and explanans are from each other in meaning. Metaphorical explanation, as evident in Whewell’s hylomorphism and as detailed via the notion of semantic distance, presents a valuable new explanatory tool to those who hold that mind and world are entwined sans recourse to metaphysics.

Novel Relations: Victorian Fiction and British Psychoanalysis, by Alicia Mireles Christoff

Reviewed by: Novel Relations: Victorian Fiction and British Psychoanalysis by Alicia Mireles Christoff Gregory Tate (bio) Novel Relations: Victorian Fiction and British Psychoanalysis, by Alicia Mireles Christoff; pp. xiv + 271. Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2019, $39.95, $27.95 paper, £30.00, £22.00 paper. The scope of Novel Relations: Victorian Fiction and British Psychoanalysis exceeds the remit of its subtitle. Alicia Mireles Christoff writes that her "goal is not to 'apply' psychoanalytic ideas to novels nor to make a one-way historical argument that proves that the novels had a direct impact on later psychoanalytic theory." Instead, she "want[s] to allow the novels and the psychoanalytic texts to mutually illuminate one another" (5). This approach is founded on a key theory of twentieth-century British psychoanalysis: that subjectivity is built on "object relations," mental representations of the other people about whom one thinks, feels, and fantasizes (3). Throughout the book, Christoff deftly shows how the writings of psychoanalysts such as W. R. Bion and D. W. Winnicott can help readers to rethink how they interpret and internalize canonical Victorian novels. But the book's ambitions are broader than this, and its rereadings of the fiction of George Eliot and Thomas Hardy are informed by a wide range of theoretical perspectives. Chapter 2, for example, uses José Esteban Muñoz's notion of disidentification to suggest how readers might be moved by Victorian fiction while also remaining alert to issues, particularly concerning race and sexuality, which it habitually occludes. And this example highlights another way in which Novel Relations exceeds the Victorian fiction/British psychoanalysis binary. The book consistently deploys its impressively detailed close readings of its primary texts in the service of two wider projects: the task of undisciplining Victorian studies—which Christoff and her coeditors set out to do in the Spring 2020 issue of this journal—and a comprehensive rethinking of what it means to read and write as a literary scholar. Novel Relations is an important contribution to the presentist mode of criticism that has been prominent in Victorian studies in recent years. Christoff observes that "we have for the most part confined Victorian novels, geographically and temporally, to the single historical context of their scenes of production," and the book does valuable work in diversifying the contexts of Victorian literature by demonstrating how the writings of twentieth- and twenty-first-century theorists can offer new ways of understanding these novels (2). To undiscipline Victorian studies, to reimagine its "disciplinary boundaries," scholars must be willing to "learn to think and write using a wider range of knowledges [End Page 351] and methodological approaches" (193). Or, as Christoff puts it in her discussion of The Mill on the Floss (1860), "part of the power of the novel is that it allows for us to wish for things that are not there" (107). But the wide-ranging theoretical arguments of Novel Relations are firmly grounded on what is there in the novels. Christoff educes the "formal implications" of object relations theory, showing how the language of Victorian fiction offers a model for the expansion of possible relations both in the minds of readers and in Victorian studies as a field (10). Her detailed analysis of Eliot's representations of reading in The Mill on the Floss in chapter 2, for instance, and her discussion in chapter 4 of the narrator's rapid switches between different explanatory metaphors in Middlemarch (1871–2), skillfully remind us that Victorian fiction is concerned with the forging of relations between individuals and new frameworks of meaning. The work of the critic thus becomes a continuation of that of the text. The titles that Christoff assigns to her discussions of Eliot's novels—"Wishfulness" in chapter 2 and "Aliveness" in chapter 4—helpfully summarize the revivifying and expansive impetus which, she argues, British psychoanalysis can bring to the study of Victorian fiction. In chapter 3, though, which focuses on Hardy's The Return of the Native (1878), the connection between the theory and the fiction is less clearly articulated; this chapter also highlights the limitations of Christoff's presentist focus. Although its title is "Restlessness," the chapter's keyword is "atmosphere...

A Metaphorical View Regarding the Career and Sports Perceptions of University Students

A career is a process in which people prepare themselves for a higher level in their professional life by gaining certain experiences and knowledge in their professional life and direct proportion to the increase in their knowledge. Sports are activities that socialize people through certain physical activities, reveal their performance and contribute to the development of people emotionally. This study aimed to reveal the perceptions of the faculty of sports sciences students about the concept of career and sports through metaphors. The study group of the research consisted of 61 students studying at Bandırma Onyedi Eylül University Faculty of Sports Sciences, physical education and sports teaching department. In the study, the metaphorical perceptions of the 1. grade students studying in the department of physical education and sports teaching, and coaching education in the fall semester of the 2021-2022 academic year regarding the concept of "Career and Sports" were examined by qualitative data collection method. In the study, data were collected after the participants completed the statements “Career is like … because…” and “Sport is like … because…”. By using the word "like" in the metaphor, an attempt was made to establish a connection between the subject and the source, and the phrase "because" was asked to be completed to obtain other information. In the study, phenomenological design and qualitative research techniques were used. For the solution and explanation of metaphors, the study was performed by revealing the metaphors, classifying the metaphors, categorizing them, and determining their validity and reliability. As a result of the information gathered, the participants wrote 42 metaphors in 7 categories following 60 themes related to the concept of career, and they wrote 43 metaphors in 5 categories following 60 themes for the concept of sports. As a result, when the metaphorical perceptions of university students towards the concepts of career and sports were investigated, it was seen that the students had the most variability category for the concept of "career" and the psychological impact categories for the concept of "sports."

Изображения как субституты: от Гомбриха до визуальных исследований

This article is devoted to reconstruction, analysis and contextualization of a relatively lit­tle-known issue in history of interdisciplinary debates on the pictorial and the visual. Ac­cording to some theories, pictorial representation is described through the model where the image substitutes its subject. It turns out that this idea, which at first glance seems to be nothing more than a convenient explanatory metaphor, contains a number of unex­pected philosophical implications and directions for further development of this same idea. This is due to the fact that the concept of substitution allows one to step back from the usual idea of representation viewed as a similarity or a reference. Thus, the art histo­rian Ernst Gombrich came to the methodologically productive idea of dominance of the visual function over form, using substitution as the framework of a polemic against more traditional theories of images. For his part, the analytical philosopher Kendall Walton ex­tended Gombrich’s observations to the original theory of art, in which representation is explained through the concepts of fiction, imagination and participation; in turn, the philosopher of perception Alva Noë proposed a concept that clarifies relationships be­tween visual substitution, perceptual experience, and human cognitive abilities. This arti­cle also demonstrates that the concept of substitution is gaining special theoretical rele­vance due to its thematic proximity to the studies of recents decades, including those within the framework of visual studies, image theory and Bildwissenschaft. The author considers the most prominent examples of this proximity: discussions on the problems of pictorial presence, affective and irrational responses to images, as well as Horst Bre­dekamp’s concept in which substitution is treated as one of the forms of image acts. It is demonstrated that the concept of visual representation as substitution turns out to be a rather productive theoretical tool that makes it possible to consider the factors, which are rarely mentioned side by side, that can be significant for the studies of visual imagery. The paper also reveals the features of considered account due to which it may be applied as complementary to other theories of depiction.

Shattering crystal with crystal: Galileo's rhetoric, lenses, and the epistemology of metaphor.

The terms that Galileo's contemporaries used for lenses (cristallo/i, lente/i, and vetro/i) have often been treated, and even translated, interchangeably. In this article, we argue that Galileo used references to crystals as lenses to embed epistemological and cosmological arguments in the material object of the telescope. Across Galileo's correspondence and letters, the term crystal had many uses and meanings. As a substance, crystal was a form of raw material, but crystal was also a substance that was central to scholastic cosmology and an explanatory device on which scholastics relied to explain first the appearance of the new star of 1604 and then Galileo's new telescopic discoveries. When Galileo began using the word crystals as a synonym for lenses, he endowed the material of his instrument with cosmological arguments. Galileo's choice of language was deliberate and polemical, serving as a joke at the expense of scholastics and as a linguistic marker of social proximity to Galileo and his intellectual agenda, especially among the members of the Academy of the Lincei. Rhetorically and linguistically, Galileo chose to refer to his lenses as crystals both because of the material from which they were made and because in so doing he signaled the epistemological work that the lenses would perform. Ultimately, the crystal lenses in Galileo's telescope and writings shattered the crystalline spheres, replacing explanatory metaphors with a polemical emphasis on the material and empirical realities of objects.

Music, discourse and intuitive technology

This paper proposes that intuitive technologies play a vital role in cognition and cultural reception. The case of music is considered in particular. The perceived temporality of contemporary technology is shown to be an artificial barrier to the acknowledgement of longer-term dynamics. The increased role of explanatory metaphors from technology is traced across various fields of study. Processes of sense-making—conscious or otherwise—are seen as an informal, unreflected repertory of mechanisms ranging from predictive models to instrumental metaphors. It is suggested that these derive by assimilation and induction from the technological milieu within which the subject develops and operates. The acquisition of these models and metaphors is itself an imaginative process, based on experience ranging from partial expertise to fantastical extrapolation.

Playful Letters: A Study in Early Modern Alphabetics by Erika Mary Boeckeler

Reviewed by: Playful Letters: A Study in Early Modern Alphabetics by Erika Mary Boeckeler Adam Hembree Boeckeler, Erika Mary, Playful Letters: A Study in Early Modern Alphabetics, Iowa City, University of Iowa Press, 2017; paperback; pp. 308; 8 colour plates; R.R.P. US $75.00; ISBN 9781609384746. Playful Letters offers a compelling reading of early modern alphabetics, navigating a diverse set of primers, prints, and images spanning from western Europe to Russia. Boeckeler's driving premise—that letters are material bodies with pluripotent histories—provides a persuasive framework for understanding how teachers, artists, and religious or political authorities could wield them. The first chapter engages with French engraver Geofroy Tory, whose seminal work Champ Fleury (1529) anatomizes each letter as a body on a grid, reading each according to didactic humanist principles. Scholars interested in Jeffrey Masten's work on this subject in Queer Philology (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2016) can find a complementary but divergent reading on Fleury's naughty letter 'Q', which Boeckeler takes as a rule rather than an exception to the logic of the cross row. She contends that Q's oddness reflects similar idiosyncrasies across the Fleury alphabet, and that many letters have the potential for disrupting his apparent project of language standardization. This is precisely what renders these letters as 'playful' in Boeckeler's view. From Fleury in France, we move to Peter Flötner's Menschenalphabet in Germany and I. Paulini's Ovidian Alphabet in Italy. In these and comparable examples, Boeckeler encourages readers to perform complementary but inverted practices: read printed text as a kind of image, and read images (for example, Flötner's human bodies posed as letters) as text. Chapter 3 follows this train of thought in using signatures and typography to interpret Albrecht Dürer's self-portrait by superimposition. The relationships between letters on Flötner's page, as well as the visual echoes across these alphabets and prints, are all extremely intriguing. In these two chapters more than most, however, Boeckeler shows a habit of stretching explanatory metaphors beyond their tension limits, which can at times obscure opportunities for clear conclusions. Shakespeare's Richard III presents a prophesy in which a certain 'G' that is plucked from the cross row will disinherit a king. In her fourth chapter, Boeckeler closely reads the possible valences of this moment on stage, with varying levels of success. Her link between Richard's 'G' and the central 'G' of a cruciform cross row is an exciting one, while the assertions that either the two Gs in the written form of 'George' or Richard's 'G-shaped' body would affect readers or audiences is tenuous. The chapter resolves with the much more compelling [End Page 197] claim that Titus Andronicus centres the Roman alphabet as a site and preserver of imperial violence. Boeckeler's earlier reference to 'onomancy' (the magic of names) contributes to this to build a conclusion that speech act theory has long used as a founding premise: speech is an action. The final chapter of Playful Letters offers a fascinating historical connection between this ostensibly western European history of alphabetics and complementary developments in Russia over the same period. Scholars of early modern letters as pedagogy in England, for example, will no doubt find the history of the premodern Cyrillic letter Az extremely compelling, with its simultaneous roles as first letter and first-person pronoun. Boeckeler guides the reader through the longstanding theological and philosophical resonances possible in an alphabet—az-buka—that literally means 'I am books' or, more pertinently to Boeckeler's premise: 'I am letters'. The Cyrillic alphabet's evolution and historic idiosyncrasies offer a divergent, but familiar, promise of the letter as a lens through which to make, see, and understand the self. Playful Letters offers an excellent point of reference for a range of both touchstone texts and lesser-known works on the early modern Roman and Cyrillic alphabets. It offers a wealth of rigorous research and intriguing intertextual connections to inspire further inquiry on the use of letters. Some of its theoretical framing work—especially the notion of 'letterature' as a term for period discourses on letters—ultimately proves an unnecessary...

L2 learning of opaque Chinese compounds through elaborative encoding

AbstractChinese compounds consist of two to four characters but function as single word. If the compounds are semantically opaque and contain unfamiliar characters, learners will resort to learning them individually by rote. However, given the large number of Chinese compounds, rote learning can place an excessive burden on memory. To facilitate L2 learning of opaque Chinese compounds, the present study proposes a method called elaborative encoding. In this study, L2 learners were given a booklet with 26 two-character opaque compounds. With elaborative encoding, participants learned the English meanings of the compounds through short metaphorical explanations. With rote memorization, participants learned the compounds’ English meanings without any explanation. To test the effects of elaborative encoding, a Chinese-to-English translation task was conducted immediately after training, five days later, and 14 days later. The results showed elaborative encoding was superior to rote memorization in retaining the meanings of the opaque compounds.

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

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.

Metaphor Processing Dysfunctions in Schizophrenia Patients With and Without Substance Use Disorders.

BackgroundPatients with schizophrenia have difficulties comprehending metaphors, which significantly impedes communication. However, this topic has not been thoroughly studied in people with a dual diagnosis. On this basis, we formulated two research aims: a) to compare the ability to comprehend metaphors in schizophrenia patients without (SZ) and with substance use disorder (SZ-SUD) and b) to determine the relationship between the processing of metaphorical content and the severity of psychopathological symptoms in both clinical groups.MethodsA total of 40 individuals with SZ and 40 individuals with SZ-SUD took part in the study. The control group was composed of 40 individuals without a psychiatric or neurological diagnosis. Four subtests from the Right Hemisphere Language Battery (Picture Metaphor Test, Written Metaphor Test, Picture Metaphor Explanation Test, Written Metaphor Explanation Test) were used to measure the ability to understand and explain metaphors.ResultsBoth groups of individuals with schizophrenia (SZ and SZ-SUD) scored lower than individuals from the control group on all tests of metaphor processing. However, no differences were observed between the two clinical groups. SZ-SUD patients had better results for Picture Metaphor Explanation than for Written Metaphor Explanation. Negative symptoms were found to be significant predictors of difficulties with understanding and explaining metaphors.ConclusionIndividuals with schizophrenia, regardless of their substance use disorder (SUD) status, exhibit impaired metaphorical content processing. SUD in schizophrenia is not associated with significant impairments in understanding and explaining metaphorical content. Moreover, impairments in processing metaphorical content are associated with more severe negative symptoms of schizophrenia.