Touching From a Distance: Towards a Resonance Theory of Metaphor Understanding

Abstract: The present thesis suggests a new type of theory from which to analyse metaphorical language. This new theory is motivated by shortcomings from the available theories (most notably Conceptual Metaphor Theory and Embodied Metaphor Theory) in analysing metaphors in poetry. The thesis uses a sample of metaphorical poems to highlight three key issues that the available theories have in accounting for metaphors in poetry and suggests a new theory as an attempt to resolve them. The thesis suggests that metaphorically activated domains are not necessarily best understood by the 1:1 coupling suggested by the available theories but rather by the concept of resonance, viewing the text as a trigger and the reader as a resonant space for an associative process. This resonant-associative process allows for analysis that is empirically sound as well as sensitive to the individual reader’s experience and action in reading a poem. The present suggestion brings the inquiry back into the reader themselves and aims to emphasise the interpretative importance of a reader in actually constructing a text and laboriously making sense from a text.