14 research outputs found
The Metaphor TIME AS SPACE across Languages
The impact of spatial orientation on human thought and, in particular, our understanding of time
has often been noted.1
Lakoff (1993: 218) assumes that our metaphorical understanding of time
in terms of space is biologically determined: “In our visual systems, we have detectors for
motion and detectors for objects/locations. We do not have detectors for time (whatever that
could mean). Thus, it makes good biological sense that time should be understood in terms of
things and motion.” This explanation is not fully convincing because there is empirical evidence
that humans directly perceive and “feel” the passage of time (see Evans, in print). Our direct
experience of time is subjective and may, therefore, be strikingly different from objective time.
Thus, a given duration of time is experienced as lasting longer or shorter depending on our state
of awareness and the amount of information registered. For example, the duration of time in
situations of heightened awareness and high information processing such as during times of
suffering or danger is experienced as passing more slowly, while in situations of low information
processing, such as during routine activities, time appears to pass more quickly. Evans
convincingly argues that our experience of time results from internal, subjective responses to
external sensory stimuli and that by imparting spatio-physical “image content” to a subjective
response concept we are able to “objectify” our temporal experience. According to this view of
time, our spatial understanding of time is not determined by biological needs, but by
intersubjective, or communicative, needs. We need spatio-physical metaphors to speak about
time in the same way that we need concrete metaphors to speak about other internal states such
as emotions or thoughts.
We may, however, consider a third reason why the metaphor TIME AS SPACE is so pervasive.
In Metaphors We Live by, Lakoff and Johnson (1980: Ch. 21) draw attention to the power of
metaphor to create new meaning. Our veridical experience of time is restricted to only a few of
its aspects: simultaneity and duration, and the awareness of the present as the time experienced at
each moment, the past as the time related to remembered events, and the future as time related to
predicted events. In metaphorizing time as space, these notions are typically seen with respect to
a one-dimensional line, the time axis. But the “cognitive topology” of space has more to offer
than a straight, one-dimensional line. Space is, in the first place, three-dimensional. Secondly,
orientation in three-dimensional, earth-based space requires three axes: a longitudinal axis, a
vertical axis, and left-to-right axis. Thirdly, objects in space may come in any shape. Fourthly,
reference to space may be absolute or relative, and relative space may be relative with respect to
things in the world or the observing EGO. Fifthly, things in space may be stationary or in
motion. Sixthly, space is populated with things in the widest sense, which may serve as figures
or reference points and are associated with certain properties and typical behaviors.
In conceptualizing time as space, we may take advantage of the conceptual richness inherent
in the spatial domain as a whole and, in mapping its structural elements onto time, impart new
meanings onto temporal notions. For example, we may think of time as moving up or down,
which we do, or as staggering from left to right, which, under normal circumstances, we do not.
It is to be expected that those aspects of space which best conform to our everyday experience in
the spatial world are preferentially made use of and typically found across languages. But, in lexicalizing notions of time, different languages may also exploit the cognitive topology of space
in different ways. This paper will be concerned with the ways different cultures and their
languages conventionally make use of the pool of spatial meanings in conceptualizing and
expressing notions of time. We will look at the following dimensions of space and their
metaphorical mappings on time: dimensionality of time (Section 2), orientation of the time-line
(Section 3), shape of the time-line (Section 4), position of times relative to the observer (Section
5), sequences of time units (Section 6), and time as motion (Section 7)
226 The Metaphor TIME AS SPACE across Languages 1 The domains of space and time
The impact of spatial orientation on human thought and, in particular, our understanding of time has often been noted. 1 Lakoff (1993: 218) assumes that our metaphorical understanding of time in terms of space is biologically determined: “In our visual systems, we have detectors for motion and detectors for objects/locations. We do not have detectors for time (whatever that could mean). Thus, it makes good biological sense that time should be understood in terms of things and motion. ” This explanation is not fully convincing because there is empirical evidence that humans directly perceive and “feel ” the passage of time (see Evans, in print). Our direct experience of time is subjective and may, therefore, be strikingly different from objective time. Thus, a given duration of time is experienced as lasting longer or shorter depending on our state of awareness and the amount of information registered. For example, the duration of time in situations of heightened awareness and high information processing such as during times of suffering or danger is experienced as passing more slowly, while in situations of low information processing, such as during routine activities, time appears to pass more quickly. Evans convincingly argues that our experience of time results from internal, subjective responses to external sensory stimuli and that by imparting spatio-physical “image content ” to a subjectiv