CfP - 30 years of Conceptual Metaphors - Thematic Issue of the Companion of Cognitive Semiotics
Riccardo Fusaroli
Cognitive Semiotics – Conceptual Metaphor Theory: Thirty Years After - 2nd CfP
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Deadlines:
1. Abstract Submission: 15 June 2010
2. Paper Submission: 31 October 2010
3. Peer Review: mid January 2010
4. Re-submission: 31 March 2010
5. Publication: mid 2011
Potential contributors are encouraged to contact any of the editors in
advance of submission. Submitted publications should follow the style
instructions for Cognitive Semiotics
(http://www.cognitivesemiotics.com).
Address for electronic submissions: Editors' addresses.
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What is at stake in studying metaphors in 2010? What are the
theoretical and analytical myths to still be avoided and what are the
potentialities to further explore?
In 1979 Lakoff and Johnson published a book that - while relying on
already existing and not fully acknowledged intellectual movements -
revolutioned the field of literary, linguistic and more in general
cognitive studies. According to this view (cf. in particular Lakoff
and Johnson, 1980 and 1999, Gibbs (ed) 2008), metaphors have a central
role in the categorizing and structuring activities of human
experience. Abstract domains of conceptualization inherit structures
from more concrete ones, through the mediation of pre-linguistic
structures (image-schemata): structural patterns embodied in the
subjects through interaction with the environment, that while being
open to reconfiguration orient future experiences.
Cognition and language are embodied and these conceptual metaphors are
one of the basic mechanisms through which this happens.
In the thirty years that followed a high number of critiques and
developments have happened, both in the conceptual metaphor theory and
more in general in the field of cognitive linguistics and cognitive
semiotics. It is thus time to bring this together, to map the paths
that the concept of conceptual metaphor has followed, in order to
better follow its future trajectories and open new debates building up
on the old ones.
A non exhaustive list of themes for this issue would be:
* CMT and its epistemological foundations: many popular
simplifications of CMT seem to approach metaphors and cognition in a
physicalist and strongly reductive way. Cognitive sciences - however -
show an increasing interest in ecological and distributed models of
cognition including contextual cues, diagrammatic manipulation,
social normativity, cultural dynamics and intersubjective
negotiations. Can this offer a naturalistic perspective that preserve
the generality and intrinsic semiotic nature of metaphors, language
and more in general cognition?
* CMT and phenomenology: can a phenomenological exploration of the
perceptual/figurative aspects of metaphors and of the process through
which metaphors unfold enrich our existing models?
* CMT and empirical researches on language: psycho- and
neuro-linguistics are investigating the dynamics and the neural
correlates of metaphor production and interpretation; corpus
linguistics is trying to show the distribution and temporal
evolution of metaphors; ethnomethodology is working on the contextual
and interactional structure of language use. How do these researches
feedback on CMT? How do they articulate the relation between CMT and
its most renowned alternative, Blending Theory?
* CMT and alternative traditions: a few critiques have come to CMT
from adiacent fields, mainly cognitive psychology and analytical
philosophy. Have these critiques been persuasively countered? Which
constructive possibilities do they offer CMT?
THE EDITORS
Special issue editors of Cognitive Semiotics are:
Riccardo Fusaroli is a PhD Candidate in Semiotics at the University of
Bologna and a Visiting Researcher at the Center for Semiotics in
Århus. His research involves the conceptual articulation and analytic
application of a perspective on language as a dynamic instrument of
coordination for joint and distributed action and cognition, blending
embodied dimensions, external symbols and a social and intersubjective
horizon.
E-mail: fusa...@gmail.com
Simone Morgagni is a PhD Candidate in Semiotics at the Ecole des
Hautes Etudes in Sciences Sociales (EHESS), Paris & at the University
of Bologna. His research involves the development of a dynamic
contribution to iconism theories at the interface between semiotics
and cognitive science especially focusing on their usage in new
digital objects and user’s information systems.
E-mail: simone....@ehess.fr
ABOUT COGNITIVE SEMIOTICS
The first of its kind, Cognitive Semiotics is a multidisciplinary
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Accordingly, readers will have the opportunity to engage with ideas
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Copenhagen, trained in cognitive semiotics at the Center for Semiotics
at the University of Aarhus, and in language and literature at the
University of Copenhagen. By bringing together scholars from multiple
disciplines, the editors hope to provide a revitalized perspective on
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Riccardo Fusaroli
PhD Student in Semiotics (Bologna-Aarhus)
Cognitive Semiotics (www.cognitivesemiotics.com)
http://www.google.com/profiles/fusaroli