Abstract:Metaphor is not only a linguistic phenomenon, but a way of human thinking. According to the statistics, about 70% of the language expressions in daily life arise from the metaphorical concept. Generally speaking, language is metaphorical. Therefore, it is necessary to explore the formation of conceptual metaphor through the study of daily utterance. Love is not only an abstract concept, but one of the most important emotions, commonly expressed with the help of metaphor. Though love is an intangible emotion, it contains a wealth of conceptual content. In order to systematically study the formation and organization of the concept of love, it must understand love from a metaphorical perspective and classify the expressions associated with love, since metaphor plays an important role in the conceptualization of love. However, it has not been paid the corresponding attention. This paper explores the similarities and differences in the conceptual metaphors of love between English and Chinese from the perspective of cognitive linguistics. According to the study on the comparison of English and Chinese love metaphor, it apparently shows that there are a large number of similar ways of expressions existing in Chinese and English and many different expressions as a result of cultural differences.

Keywords: conceptual metaphor; love; cognition 

Contents

中文摘要

Abstract

Chapter1 Introduction-1

Chapter 2 Literature Review-3

2.1 The Cognitive Nature of Metaphor-3

2.2 Working Mechanism of Metaphor-3

2.3 The Features of Metaphor-4

2.3.1 Metaphor is ubiquitous-4

2.3.2 Metaphor is conceptual-4

2.3.3 Metaphor is systematic-4

Chapter 3 Comparative Analysis of Love Metaphors Between English and Chinese-7

3.1 General Conceptual Metaphors of Love in the two languages-7

3.2 Differences between Metaphors of Love in English and Chinese-10

3.2.1 Specific Conceptual Metaphors of Love in Chinese-10

3.2.2 Specific Conceptual Metaphors of Love in English-11

Chapter 4 Cause Analysis of the Differences of Love Metaphors between English and Chinese-13

4.1.Living Environment-13

4.2.Culture Origin-13

4.3.Economic Pattern-14

Chapter 5 Conclusion-14

References-16

Acknowledgements-17