1. Theoretical Background and Description of the Current State of Research
The cognitive approach departs most strongly from traditional theories because it does not treat metaphor as an anomaly, a means of poetic imagination, or a mere ornament or embellishment in language, but as a fundamental mechanism of human thought and conceptualization. According to this approach, which underpins this project, the conceptual system that governs our thinking and action is metaphorical in nature, as established by Lakoff and Johnson, the founders of conceptual metaphor theory, in their seminal book Metaphors We Live By (1980).
In the cognitive-linguistic approach, the essence of conceptual metaphor lies in understanding and experiencing one concept through another. Conceptual metaphor theory has become highly influential among philologists, philosophers, cognitive scientists and neuroscientists, psychologists, anthropologists, and others, and has not undergone radical changes to this day—not even in one of its most recent versions, the neural theory of metaphor, which provides the theoretical foundation for developing a metaphor repository within this project.
Within the neural theory of language, thought and language are defined as:
- neural systems based on neural processing rather than manipulation of formal symbols;
- embodied systems reflecting the structure of the human body and the external physical and social environment;
- evolutionary systems (many neural mechanisms used in linguistic and cognitive functions are not unique to humans).
Within the framework of the neural theory of language, a system of formalized annotation has been devised for metaphors, metonymies, frames, image schemas, and grammatical and lexical constructions. The technical term for this annotation system is embodied construction grammar (ECG). A construction is defined as a link between form and meaning, with the semantic part of the construction being directly or metaphorically tied to experience and decomposed into embodied image schemas.
This system was applied in the first metaphor repository within the project MetaNet: A Multilingual Metaphor Repository, carried out by the International Computer Science Institute at the University of California, Berkeley (USA), under the leadership of Prof. Dr. Srini Narayanan. Dr. Kristina Štrkalj Despot was a member of the metaphor linguistic analysis team on that project.
2. Scientific Objectives of the Project and Advances Beyond the Current State
The project is organized into two main modules:
a) expanding and refining the repository of conceptual metaphors in Croatian, and
b) theoretical and applied research on metaphor and metonymy in thought and language.
The first module continues the MetaNet.HR project in both theoretical and methodological terms, with certain methodological modifications and updates. The theoretical foundation is the neural theory of language and thought, while the methods for expanding the database are corpus analyses and manual annotation of corpus sentences. In this module, emphasis will be placed on improving corpus methods for analyzing specific groups of metaphors, creating a more detailed and transparent hierarchy of metaphors, and producing analysis guidelines (with examples), which could serve as a basis for parallel corpus processing in other languages.
The second module involves theoretical and applied research on metaphor and metonymy in thought and language. This part of the project will explore figurative language in:
- grammar (metaphorical and metonymic use of constructions, semantic frames, metaphors in syntax, etc.; cf. Brdar 2015, 2017; Belaj, forthcoming)
- discourse (metaphorical framing, metaphor-driven discourse analysis, metaphor and irony; cf. Semino 2008, Despot & Ostroški Anić 2021)
- psycholinguistics (with focus on empirical studies of the relationship between language, thought, and embodied cognition, e.g. Key & Kempton 1984; Boroditsky 2000, 2001; Boroditsky & Ramscar 2002; Thibodeau & Boroditsky 2011; Zhong & Liljenquist 2006; Zhong & Leonardelli 2008; Williams & Bargh 2008; Harmon-Jones, Gable & Price 2011; Tonković, Brdar & Despot 2020, etc.)
- language acquisition (corpus-based studies)
- language pathologies (e.g. Despot, Sekulić Sović, Vilibić & Mimica 2021)
- forensics
- natural language processing and large language models.
Project outputs will include:
- an improved, modernized, and expanded MetaNet.HR database,
- collections of corpus sentences with marked metaphorical expressions and sentences with marked literal uses of the same expressions, plus corpus excerpts with manually annotated conceptual metaphors and their levels for natural language processing purposes,
- an annotated corpus of children’s language,
- an annotated corpus of metaphors and metonymies,
- an annotated corpus of threatening letters,
- at least eight scientific papers published in Scopus-indexed journals, with at least two in Q1 journals,
- two books published by Croatian publishers,
- one edited volume published by a reputable international publisher.
3. Methodology
The project will conduct theoretical and applied research on conceptual metaphor and metonymy in the Croatian language, both synchronically and diachronically, with the results applied and presented in the form of a database of conceptual and linguistic metaphors, metonymies, image schemas, cogs (cognitive primitives), and semantic frames of the Croatian language.
The database is publicly available at the project’s website: http://ihjj.hr/metafore/.
It includes the following levels:
- list of conceptual metaphors,
- list of image schemas, cognitive primitives, and frames,
- hierarchy of metaphors,
- hierarchy of frames (ontology).
Metaphors are divided and searchable by type and by thematic or conceptual groups.
By type, metaphors are divided into:
- primary metaphors,
- complex metaphors,
- derived metaphors.
By thematic or conceptual groups, metaphors are divided into: event-structure metaphors, mind metaphors, morality metaphors, scalar metaphors, time metaphors, emotion metaphors, economy metaphors, governance metaphors, cascade metaphors, wellbeing metaphors, etc.
Cognitive-linguistic metaphor analysis is carried out in accordance with the principles of the neural theory of language and thought and the neural theory of metaphor. Metaphors, metonymies, frames, image schemas, and grammatical and lexical constructions are formally annotated using the embodied construction grammar system. For each conceptual metaphor, the following are identified: type, hierarchy, level, source frame, target frame, mappings, relations, relation types, derived metaphors, examples of linguistic metaphors and lexical units. Hierarchical relations among metaphors are automatically represented graphically.
For each frame, the following are determined: type, hierarchy, roles, relations with other frames, links, inferences, lexical units, and lexical units from related frames. Relations among frames are automatically represented graphically. The database is searchable across all these features.
The method is described in detail in Despot et al. (2019).
Working methods will include corpus-based, experimental, machine-learning and large-language-model approaches, as well as qualitative and quantitative analyses.
4. Relevance of the Project in a Broader Academic Context
The updated database, together with its developed, replicable, and extensively tested method of enrichment, has the potential to become a model for building similar repositories for other languages. A multilingual database would be an indispensable tool for cross-linguistic and cross-cultural research into the fundamental mechanisms of thought and language, both in terms of universality and cultural specificity.
The construction of a Croatian repository of metaphors and figurative language, along with three figurative-language corpora (general, children’s language, and threatening letters), and theoretical and applied research on figurative language (in grammar, clinical linguistics, discourse, conceptualization, language acquisition, forensics, etc.), are relevant outcomes both in the Croatian and European contexts.
Through already established collaboration with successors of the MetaNet: A Multilingual Metaphor Repository project and the potential to expand by including European partners, this project creates opportunities for long-term international research into language, learning, and even neural modeling—ultimately aiming to understand how people learn, and how they comprehend and use language.
As part of the project, a Mind and Language Lab will be established as its broader framework. This lab will apply for funding under a call for a center of excellence, should one be announced. The laboratory will work closely with an already established network of researchers from across Europe, the USA, China, and Taiwan. Once formalized, the network will prepare a project proposal for external funding.