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From: dcs2e@darwin.clas.virginia.edu (David Swanson)
Subject: Re: Languages: Hard, Harder, Hardest
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Date: Sun, 28 Jul 1996 20:01:24 GMT
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In article <4tfcho$6v5@news.ox.ac.uk>
patrick@gryphon.psych.ox.ac.uk (Patrick Juola) writes:

> >OK, "red like a banana" ain't bad, but when it comes to infuriated do
> >we say "angry like ... something or other," and for tower do we say
> >"tall-rock-tent," and so on?  At some point this grows tedious.  You
> >also said nothing about numbers.  For eighteen do we say "four like the
> >number of seeds in a such and such plant"?  
> 
> Are those actually questions, or are you just spouting rhetoric?

Actual questions.  Got any answers?


> The general idea is that distinctions which are common and relevant

common and relevant to what?


> tend to become grammaticized and lexicalized; ones that are not
> especially common nor relevant will remain metaphorical.  What are
> our words for kinds of grass ("Kentucky bluegrass"?  "crabgrass"?)
> but thinly-disguised metaphors?
> 
> If you really want to know more about the nature of metaphor as
> a cross-linguistic way of extending the lexicon,


Not only do I not really want to, I don't even pretend to.

 then I suggest
> you consult (George) Lakoff's work. 
> 
> If you just want to spout ill-informed tripe, then I suggest you take
> it to alt.people.who.care.
> 
>         Patrick


David

"Heideggerian hope comes into question." J.D.
