Figures of speech
In Ma¯ ori Language Week, a few weeks back, much was made of the fact that Ma¯ ori is a figurative language, and this was seen as a reason for giving the language support.
The very fact that ‘‘being figurative’’ was seen as a reason for supporting Ma¯ ori, rather than ‘‘having particular important metaphors’’ (for example) seems to imply that there are other languages which might not be.
I disagree: every language is full of figurative expressions. In fact, one specialist, Raymond Gibbs Jr, has suggested that literal meaning is a corrupt idea. To illustrate, let me amuse you with a short piece of fiction.
When the kids descended on us for the weekend, they nearly ate us out of house and home, but we all had a whale of a time. When we played Trivial Pursuit, they wiped the floor with us on most topics, but we had the last laugh because they got into hot water answering questions about Shakespeare.
Next day, we took off for the beach in brass monkey weather, but a walk round the headland blew away the cobwebs. The posh cafes were nothing to write home about, and their helpings wouldn’t keep the wolf from the door, so the kids needed a square meal later on. On Sunday, it rained cats and dogs, but the museum came up trumps. We didn’t get a chance to unwind until they left.
The words and expressions in italics in the story are all figurative in one way or another. Because the figurative readings have been around for a long time, we don’t notice them. An invented text like this one tends to crowd such examples together rather unnaturally. Another approach is to take a single word and see how it is used figuratively. Here I will look at head.
A literal head sits on one’s neck. The head of a school or of a state is a figurative head (the same metaphor is present in chief and in chef, both of which have reached us via French).
The phrases head of a bed, head of a pimple, a head of broccoli, a head of a stream, the head of a valley, a headline, and come to a head are all metaphors.
Put something into someone’s head, win by a head, head-hunting, head of cattle, give someone their head, have one’s head screwed on, keep your head above water, to bang one’s head against a brick wall, off the top of your head, to be in over one’s head, to be head over heels in love, to bite someone’s head off and to scream one’s head off and even to head a ball are all figurative in one way or another.
All these examples show that English (as an example of a general trend) does not lack figurative expressions. We don’t notice most of them, because they are so familiar – they are the normal way of saying something.
A new language brings us face to face with unfamiliar figures, and we notice them and find them picturesque or incomprehensible as the case may be. New learners of English (or Japanese or Hungarian) are just as struck by the unfamiliar figures of speech as new learners of Ma¯ ori.
All languages have well-entrenched figures of speech. When we learn a new language, we have to learn the new figures of speech as part of the new culture. Figures of speech in every language are important for speakers of that language, and reflect something of the culture in which the language has developed.
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