Conceptual metaphors of womanhood in English literary works by Indian authors

The Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT) established the pervasiveness of metaphor in thought and language and provided evidence that metaphor is, in fact, deeply embedded in our conceptual system. Contrary to the original claim that conceptual metaphors are largely universal, in almost four decades after its inception, the CMT researchers including George Lakoff and Mark Johnson have advanced the idea of cultural influence on metaphorical conceptualisation. In recent years, the trend in metaphor research has been to study how metaphor behaves in naturally occurring discourse. It is in this context that the current study explores conceptual metaphors in India’s rich cultural context. The main objectives of the current study are, (i) to examine conceptual metaphors of womanhood found in English literary works set in India’s three culturally diverse linguistic regions, and (ii) to compare and contrast them across literary works of the three regions. The data of linguistic metaphors was collected from 21 literary works, seven in each linguistic region. This data was tested for metaphoricity using the Metaphor Identification Procedure, Vrije University, Amsterdam (MIPVU) developed by the PRAGGLEJAZ Group, after which it was analysed using the CMT. The CMT enabled the identification of the source domain used in each linguistic metaphor and subsequently, the uncovering of conceptual metaphors through the establishment of cross-domain mappings between the source and target domains. The framework of the Cognitive Dimension of Metaphor Variation by Zoltan Kövecses has been used to analyse the metaphors for similarities and variations across the three regions. The Great Chain of Being metaphor or the GCB model has guided the understanding of the negative and positive conceptualisation of the metaphors of womanhood. The analysis revealed that a total of 30 source domains have been utilised by the authors across the three regions. Of these, 21 in the Indo-Aryan, 27 in the Dravidian and 23 source domains in Tibeto-Burmese literary works. Of these, the source domains, ANIMALS, OBJECTS, SUPERNATURAL ENTITIES, PLANTS, and ELEMENTS OF NATURE are the most frequently used. The source domain, ANIMALS tops in the aggregate with approximately 25% of total metaphors across the three regions conceptualising women in terms of animals. The next most frequently used source domain is OBJECTS with 22% of the total metaphors conceptualising women in terms of objects. In terms of the target domains of womanhood, the Indo-Aryan works focus more on the conceptualisation of motherhood, the Dravidian works focus more on the conceptualisation of wifehood and metaphors found in the Tibeto-Burmese literary works focus more on the women’s physical attributes and beauty. Lastly, the conceptualisation of womanhood in the Indo-Aryan and Dravidian literary works is more negative than positive, with the negative conceptualisation of womanhood being the higher in the Dravidian literary works. In the Tibeto-Burmese literary works, the percentage of positive and negative metaphors was found to be proportionate. The main implication of this research is that it is the first comprehensive study of literary metaphors ever conducted. The study analysed 708 linguistic metaphors of womanhood from 21 literary works across India.