This paper summarizes major views of metaphor in the light of traditional linguistics and cognitive linguistics. Also, the paper investigates the representations of the cognitive metaphor “Love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese, discussing what mechanism helps language users to metaphorize an abstract concept (love) on the basis of another concept (journey). | VNU Journal of Science, Foreign Languages 27 (2011) 176-184 The metaphor “love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese Phan Thi Huong* Department of Foreign Languages, Vinh University, 182 Le Duan Street, Vinh, Nghe An, Vietnam Received 15 September 2011 Abstract. Metaphor has been studied for a long time by many linguists. For traditional schools of linguistics, metaphor is merely a figure of speech used in literature. However, cognitive linguistics presents a different view of metaphor stating that metaphor is not only in literature but also pervasive in daily life language, and that it serves as a means of expressing thoughts as well as a vehicle of cognition that helps human beings recognize the world. This paper summarizes major views of metaphor in the light of traditional linguistics and cognitive linguistics. Also, the paper investigates the representations of the cognitive metaphor “Love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese, discussing what mechanism helps language users to metaphorize an abstract concept (love) on the basis of another concept (journey). Keywords: Cognitive linguistics, conceptual metaphor, love, journey, conceptual domain, experience, metaphorical concept, metaphorical expressions, source-to-target mapping. Metaphor is an interesting linguistic phenomenon which has attracted the attention of many linguists. It has been subject to a great deal of research. There have been proposed various definitions about metaphor by different linguists as it has been viewed differently from various perspectives. In this article, the author attempts first to have a brief view of metaphor from traditional views as compared to that in the light of cognitive linguistics, and second to probe into the metaphor “Love is a journey” in English and Vietnamese from the perspective of cognitive linguistics.* or a stylistic device used in literature to achieve an aesthetic effect (Radden & Divren, Lakoff & Johnson). According to Lakoff & Johnson [1: 5], .
