Metaphors as Models - Interdisciplinary Dialogues
Organised to coincide with Professor Zoltán Kövecses' tenure of a Distinguished Fellowship at the Durham Institute of Advanced Study during Epiphany Term 2008, this series of seven interdisciplinary dialogues explored the modelling role of metaphor, understood in terms of cognitive metaphor theory (or a response to it), in written and spoken discourse. Each dialogue featured an expert external speaker and a respondent who led a two-hour discussion arising from (but not limited to) the contents of the speaker's presentation. Topics ranged from the use of metaphor as a model for the emotions to the role of metaphor as a model for political power and political leadership in the contemporary world; other dialogues concerned the therapeutic value of metaphor in creative writing exercises, its use and abuse in the mediation of scientific research to the public, its strategic function in focus group discourse on socio-political topics, and its role in the formulation of the idea of the ‘monster’ in early modern Europe. All dialogues shared a set of common core questions: to what extent are metaphorical models universal, as opposed to culturally and chronologically determined? To what extent can we speak of the discourse histories of individual metaphors? And to what extent are speakers consciously aware of metaphor use in their own and others’ discourse? Each dialogue brought a differently nuanced set of responses to these questions; all shared a common recognition that metaphor is both constitutive of thought and closely implicated in the generation of discourse.
By following the links on this page, you can find a full set of resources for each dialogue event: the speaker's paper, handout and, where applicable, PowerPoint presentation, and a full-length recording of the dialogue in mp3 format. (Please note: the mp3 files are all over 200MB in size.) We are grateful to the IAS for their generous financial and material support of the series.
IMPORTANT NOTE: the copyright for materials posted here rests with the individual speakers.
21 January 2008:
Professor Zoltán Kövecses (Eötvös Loránd University, Budapest) in dialogue with Dr Boris Wiseman (MLAC):
Metaphors as Models for Emotions.
28 January 2008:
Dr Joerg Zinken (University of Portsmouth) in dialogue with Professor David Cowling (MLAC):
Metaphor and Discourse: How Metaphor Models Structure Domains of Activity.
11 February 2008:
Professor Brigitte Nerlich (University of Nottingham) in dialogue with Professor Andreas Musolff (MLAC):
Metaphors as Models of Mediation between Science and the Public: Newspaper Reporting of the 2001 Foot and Mouth Outbreak.
Abstract | Paper | PowerPoint | mp3
25 February 2008:
Professor Lynne Cameron (The Open University) in dialogue with Professor Andreas Musolff (MLAC):
Metaphors in Real Time: Evidence for 'Affective Models'
Abstract | Paper | Handout | PowerPoint | mp3
3 March 2008:
Professor Paul Chilton (Lancaster University) in dialogue with Professor David Cowling (MLAC):
Metaphors, Models, and Political Discourse.
Abstract | PowerPoint | mp3
10 March 2008:
Dr Wes Williams (University of Oxford) in dialogue with Dr Kathryn Banks (MLAC):
Monsters as Metaphorical Models.
Abstract | Paper | Handout | mp3
12 May 2008:
Professor Jonathan Charteris-Black (University of the West of England) in dialogue with Professor Andreas Musolff (MLAC):
Metaphors as Models of Political Leadership