A TEORIA DA METÁFORA CONCEPTUAL REVISITADA

Abstract

This study investigates metaphor comprehension in a foreign language. Ten metaphorical expressions were selected from English and American sites and their conceptual mappings were defined (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980; Grady, 1997). We developed two multiple choice tests and asked 118 subjects to judge the expressions in a questionnaire with and without a context. We discuss the results of the tests for the expressions “The temperature went from boiling to subzero” and “It has managed to sneak into their hearts”. The high scores in the questionnaire without a context demonstrate that the subjects use conceptual knowledge in the comprehension of metaphor.