Discussion Forum (Archived)
Guest
From this week's show, I heard the use of "back" with "refer". This reminded me of an annoying corporate combination with "push". It's not the combination that annoys me, but it's lack of clarity. Many use it to mean delay, as in "push back" a timeline. Shouldn't this be "push forward"? After all, we say to "go back in time". What would "push forward" be then? "Back" should mean earlier and "forward" should mean later. I favor the use of the simple English word "delay". Everyone understands this. The opposite would be "regress". English can be such as a simple and clear language. How do some people manage to mess it up???
I don't know if this will help or not–I certainly understand your plea for clarity–but I think the intended meaning of push back is to move away, make more remote from the reference point, which is now. We can't move things into the past, so all that's left is to move them farther into the future. Also somewhat counter-intuitively, I understand "move up" to mean making something happen sooner, up in the sense of closer to now. Messy, perhaps, but used nonetheless.
Peter
This matter of spatial metaphors for time is the subject of much linguistic interest, and quite a bit of disagreement. A consistent linear view is by no means universal. In fact, no known language displays such a consistent linear metaphor for time.
The whole topic is by no means as intuitive as one might think. Some studies support a limited Sapir-Whorf-like view of language influencing aspects of temporal understanding. Other studies support a universal response in aspects of temporal understanding.
Here are some resources:
Kevin Ezra Moore
San José State University
Cognitive Linguistics. Volume 17, Issue 2, Pages 199–244, ISSN (Online) 1613-3641, ISSN (Print) 0936-5907, DOI: 10.1515/COG.2006.005, July 2006
Space-to-time mappings
Abstract
Most research on metaphors that construe time as motion (motion metaphors of time) has focused on the question of whether it is the times or the person experiencing them (ego) that moves. This paper focuses on the equally important distinction between metaphors that locate times relative to ego (the ego-based metaphors Moving Ego and Moving Time) and a metaphor that locates times relative to other times (sequence is relative position on a path). Rather than a single abstract target domain TIME, these two kinds of temporal metaphor metaphorize different kinds of temporal concept—perspective-specific vs. perspective-neutral temporal concepts. Recognition of this distinction enhances the explanatory potential of conceptual metaphor theory (Lakoff and Johnson 1980). An example involves the interaction of deixis and the temporal reference crosslinguistically of vocabulary with the spatial meanings in-front and behind. More generally, this approach refines our ability to describe the temporal concepts involved in motion metaphors of time. Such temporal concepts are present not only in the target domains, but also in the source domains of motion metaphors of time, where we find space-to-time metonymy, which may play a role in motivating the metaphors. In order to distinguish such metonymy from metaphor, we need to characterize metaphor as a mapping across frames rather than domains.
Linguistic spatial classifications of event domains in narratives of crime
Blake Stephen Howald, Department of Linguistics, Georgetown University
Linguistic spatial classifications of event domains in narratives of crime
A Conceptual Analysis in English, German, and Tongan
Bender, Bennardo, and Beller
A Conceptual Analysis in English, German, and Tongan
People tend to think about time in terms of space, … . … If languages differ with regard to the [frames of reference] that they prefer in the one domain — as is indeed the case — then they might also differ in the other domain. …
Instances from English, German, and Tongan are provided in order to scrutinize the relationship of relevant prepostions and underlying concepts.
and finally
Linguist
Space has been often viewed as a universal cognitive primitive, an 'a
priori form of intuition' that conditions all of our
experience. However, various studies show that linguistic and cultural
systems determine – at least partially – the nature and cognitive
accessibility of the information selected by speakers, thereby casting
some doubts on the supposedly universal properties of the category of
space.
Martha Barnette
Grant Barrett
Grant Barrett
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