The Figurative Metaphor in the Discourse of Enlightenment of Hashem Salih in the Light of Cognitive Linguistics

Abstract

The research is a linguistic approach to the figurative metaphor in the discourse of enlightenment of the Syrian Arab intellectual Hashem Salih based on George Lakoff and Mark Johnson's theory of figurative metaphor. The research deals with the way Salih's discourse represents the ideas of modernizing the Arab reality and criticizing the historical obstacles that prevent its progress, which are abstract ideas represented through non-creative daily realistic metaphors. The objectives of the research are summarized in revealing the formats of figurative metaphors in Salih's speech and the effectiveness of those metaphors in the harmony of his speech and revealing the source of those metaphors that flow into knowing the references of his speech and their cultural and intellectual specificity. The research consists of an introduction that includes the concept of discourse and enlightenment discourse and the study of discourse in the light of mental linguistics and figurative metaphor. The first section of the research includes structural metaphor and its most important patterns. The second section describes the spatial directive metaphor whereas the third section deals with existential metaphor represented by abstract ideas.