Metaphor
A metaphor is a figure of speech that, for rhetorical effect, directly refers to one thing by mentioning another.[1] It may provide (or obscure) clarity or identify hidden similarities between two different ideas.
Metaphors are often compared with other types of figurative language, such as antithesis, hyperbole, metonymy, and simile.[2]
One of the most commonly cited examples of a metaphor in English literature comes from the "All the world's a stage" monologue from As You Like It:
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His Acts being seven ages. At first, the infant...
—William Shakespeare, As You Like It, 2/7[3]
This quotation expresses a metaphor because the world is not literally a stage, and most humans are not literally actors and actresses playing roles. By asserting that the world is a stage, Shakespeare uses points of comparison between the world and a stage to convey an understanding about the mechanics of the world and the behavior of the people within it.
In the ancient Hebrew psalms (around 1000 B.C.), one finds already vivid and poetic examples of metaphor such as, "The Lord is my rock, my fortress and my deliverer; my God is my rock, in whom I take refuge, my shield and the horn of my salvation, my stronghold" and "The Lord is my shepherd, I shall not want". Some recent linguistic theories view all language in essence as metaphorical.[4]
The word metaphor itself is a metaphor, coming from a Greek term meaning "transference (of ownership)". The user of a metaphor alters the reference of the word, "carrying" it from one semantic "realm" to another. The new meaning of the word might be derived from an analogy between the two semantic realms, but also from other reasons such as the distortion of the semantic realm - for example in sarcasm.
Etymology
The English word metaphor derives from the 16th-century Old French word métaphore, which comes from the Latin metaphora, "carrying over", and in turn from the Greek μεταφορά (metaphorá), "transference (of ownership)",[5] from μεταφέρω (metapherō), "to carry over", "to transfer"[6] and that from μετά (meta), "behind", "along with", "across"[7] + φέρω (pherō), "to bear", "to carry".[8]
Parts of a metaphor
The Philosophy of Rhetoric (1936) by rhetorician I. A. Richards describes a metaphor as having two parts: the tenor and the vehicle. The tenor is the subject to which attributes are ascribed. The vehicle is the object whose attributes are borrowed. In the previous example, "the world" is compared to a stage, describing it with the attributes of "the stage"; "the world" is the tenor, and "a stage" is the vehicle; "men and women" is the secondary tenor, and "players" is the secondary vehicle.
Other writers[which?] employ the general terms 'ground' and 'figure' to denote the tenor and the vehicle. Cognitive linguistics uses the terms 'target' and 'source', respectively.
Psychologist Julian Jaynes coined the terms 'metaphrand' and 'metaphier', plus two new concepts, 'paraphrand' and 'paraphier'.[9] ^[10] 'Metaphrand' is equivalent to the metaphor-theory terms 'tenor', 'target', and 'ground'. 'Metaphier' is equivalent to the metaphor-theory terms 'vehicle', 'figure', and 'source'. In a simple metaphor, an obvious attribute of the metaphier exactly characterizes the metaphrand (e.g. the ship plowed the seas). With an inexact metaphor, however, a metaphier might have associated attributes or nuances – its paraphiers – that enrich the metaphor because they "project back" to the metaphrand, potentially creating new ideas – the paraphrands – associated thereafter with the metaphrand or even leading to a new metaphor. For example, in the metaphor "Pat is a tornado", the metaphrand is "Pat", the metaphier is "tornado". As metaphier, "tornado" carries paraphiers such as power, storm and wind, counterclockwise motion, and danger, threat, destruction, etc. The metaphoric meaning of "tornado" is inexact: one might understand that 'Pat is powerfully destructive' through the paraphrand of physical and emotional destruction; another person might understand the metaphor as 'Pat can spin out of control'. In the latter case, the paraphier of 'spinning motion' has become the paraphrand 'psychological spin', suggesting an entirely new metaphor for emotional unpredictability, a possibly apt description for a human being hardly applicable to a tornado. Based on his analysis, Jaynes claims that metaphors not only enhance description, but "increase enormously our powers of perception...and our understanding of [the world], and literally create new objects".[9]: 50
A political cartoon by illustrator S.D. Ehrhart in an 1894 *Puck* magazine shows a farm woman labeled "Democratic Party" sheltering from a tornado of political change.