Time-moving Metaphors and Ego-moving Metaphors: Which Is Better Comprehended by Taiwanese?

Time-moving Metaphors and Ego-moving Metaphors: Which Is Better Comprehended by Taiwanese?* May, Hsin-mei Huang & Shelley, Ching-yu Hsieh Department /Graduate Institute of Foreign Languages and Literature, National Cheng Kung University, Taxue Road. 1, 70101 Tainan, Taiwan plum0910@yahoo.com.tw, shelley@mail.ncku.edu.tw Abstract. This is a semantic pilot study which concentrates on how people in Taiwan process the temporal metaphors, ego-moving metaphor and time-moving metaphor. Motivated by the research of Gentner, Imai, and Boroditsky (2002) in which the English native speakers comprehend ego-moving metaphors faster than time-moving metaphors, the present study attempts to reexamine whether the faster reaction to ego-moving metaphors is shared by both the Chinese native speakers and EFL learners. To achieve the goals, 25 Chinese/English bilinguals are invited to be examined via the16 Chinese and 16 English test sentences. The recordings of their accuracy on each item are served as the databases used to compare with the study of Gentner, Imai, and Boroditsky (2002). The two finding presented here are: (1) when the subjects tested in their native language, Chinese, they process ego-moving metaphors better. (2) when tested in the foreign language, English, they conceptualize time-moving metaphors much better. Keywords: metaphors, time-moving metaphor, ego-moving metaphor, EFL 1. Introduction This is a semantic study which attempts to explore how Taiwanese process time metaphors. According to Shuell (1990: 102), “If a picture is worth 1,000 words, a metaphor is worth 1,000 pictures!” By breaking literal meanings, metaphors create thousands of possibilities. The way we structure the thousand pictures relies on conceptual metaphor. Conceptual metaphor is people’s underlying cognitive level as the bridge between language and thought. By * Copyright 2007 by May, Hsin-mei Huang & Shelley, Ching-yu Hsieh 173 assimilating the two different domains, conceptual metaphor specifies the concrete idea into abstract entity. In general, conceptual metaphor is the surface structures which make metaphors understandable. (Lakoff and Johnnson, 1980; Goddard, 1998; McGlone, 2007; Charteris-Black & Ennis, 2001). As Lakoff (1993:228) claims, “We do not have detectors for time. Thus, it makes good biological sense that time should be understood in terms of things and motion.” That is, the comprehension of the abstract time understood via space is biologically determined. The two space → time metaphors under examination are time-moving and ego-moving metaphors. Based on the study of Gentner, Imai, and Boroditsky (2002) in which English native speakers conceptualize ego-moving metaphor faster, two research goals are proposed: Chinese native speakers and EFL learners process ego-moving metaphors better. In order to answer the two research questions, this paper is organized as follows, (1) Introduction, (2) the theoretical framework on temporal metaphors, (3) the methodology, (4) results, (5) discussion, and (6) conclusions. 2. Literature review This study examines how English-Chinese bilinguals in Taiwan structure temporal metaphors. The introduction of the two time metaphors, the different perspective that Chinese and English speakers hold, and the study conducted by Gentner, Imai, and Boroditsky (2002) are covered. 2.1. Sequencing time domain The two space → time metaphoric systems are ego-moving and time-moving metaphor. The primary difference is that they …

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