"All my sour-sweet days I will lament and love" – a comparative analysis of metaphors with the basic taste adjectives in Polish and English Cover Image

"All my sour-sweet days I will lament and love" – a comparative analysis of metaphors with the basic taste adjectives in Polish and English
"All my sour-sweet days I will lament and love" – a comparative analysis of metaphors with the basic taste adjectives in Polish and English

Author(s): Marta Helena Falkowska, Magdalena Zawisławska
Subject(s): Language studies, Semantics, Comparative Study of Literature, Polish Literature
Published by: Instytut Slawistyki Polskiej Akademii Nauk
Keywords: metaphor; embodiment; biology; culture; taste;

Summary/Abstract: This paper provides a comparative analysis of verbal synesthetic metaphors with the basic taste adjectives in Polish and English: słodki/sweet, gorzki/bitter, kwaśny/sour, słony/salty. Since taste seems to be an ideal candidate for a universal, biologically determined source of metaphors, the authors seek to verify the hypothesis of metaphor embodiment. The corpus-based analysis of nominal phrases with basic Polish and English taste adjectives indicates that cultural influences on the metaphorical mapping, as well as the importance of the target conceptual domains, must be taken into account.

  • Issue Year: 2018
  • Issue No: 18
  • Page Range: 1-11
  • Page Count: 11
  • Language: Polish