Abstract
The aim of this paper is to use the method of contrastive lexical-semantic analysis to establish the (mis)match of the lexical and semantic structure of the idioms that consist of the lexeme that is going to be translated in English for now as a „heart” ("srce" and "kokoro") in Montenegrin and Japanese language - which we would usually perceive as the location of feelings. Therefore, this study aims to test the extent to which this can be confirmed, in the case of proposed cultural models of this body part. The corpus for this research, which consists of 127 somatisms (idioms which contain at least one body-part term as a constituent), are being singled out from general and phraseological dictionaries, media, as well as from electronic sources. The data are analyzed primarily from a cognitive point of view, with the aim of establishing whether the two languages are comparable in terms of the meaning of the idiom as a whole. Secondly, the approach used for the analysis originated in Lakoff and Johnson's “Metaphors we live by” (1980). The basic claim of this interpretation is that the mind is inherently embodied, although it is mostly unconscious and abstract concepts that are metaphorical. The study is showing that conceptualizations of certain body parts in both languages are not arbitrary but are motivated by a small number of cultural models elaborated by conceptual metaphors. Therefore, the somatism “heart” is not immanent to speakers of different languages, it is not universally present in languages.
Author Information
Kristina Gvozdenovic, University of Montenegro, Montenegro
Miomir Abović, Faculty of Montenegrin Language and Literature, Montenegro
Paper Information
Conference: KAMC2020
Stream: Language and Cultural Studies
This paper is part of the KAMC2020 Conference Proceedings (View)
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To cite this article:
Gvozdenovic K., & Abović M. (2021) Wide (Conscious) Heart – Idioms in Montenegrin and Japanese Language ISSN: 2436-0503 – The Kyoto Conference on Arts, Media & Culture 2020: Official Conference Proceedings https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2436-0503.2021.10
To link to this article: https://doi.org/10.22492/issn.2436-0503.2021.10
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