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A cross-cultural account of the metaphor conceptualisations of thought as

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SOCIAL SCIENCES & HUMANITIES

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A Cross-Cultural Account of the Metaphor Conceptualisations

of Thought as Food in Persian
Zahra Khajeh*#, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua
Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities, School of Language Studies and Linguistics,
Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia, 43600 Bangi, Selangor, Malaysia

ABSTRACT
The eating experience, being vitally essential for the survival of human beings, can be
extended to convey other conceptually abstract experiences. As a cognitive-semantic
account of metaphor conceptualisations, this study aims to investigate the relationship
between food-related metaphorical concepts and Persian cultural cognition and cultural
models, as well as how they influence the targeted speakers’ beliefs and ideas. Following
the orientation of experientialists’ views (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, 1999) and most
discussions of metaphorical concepts since then within the cognitive linguistics movement,
this study in particular explores the commonalities and variations in ontological metaphor
conceptualisations of thought/ideas as food in a cross-cultural comparative study of English
and Persian. The metaphoric extensions of food and cognition in Persian, to a great extent,
are mediated and motivated by embodied experiences; as well as socio-cultural orientation,
Iranian traditional medicine and the spiritual tradition of Sufism as it is shown through
the marginal role the Persian language plays a role in the rational-irrational dichotomy.

Keywords: Cross-culture, conceptualisation, mapping, embodiment, em-mindedness, cognition

INTRODUCTION
Since George Lakoff and Mark Johnson
ARTICLE INFO first introduced the Conceptual Metaphor
Article history:
Received: 2 September 2013 Theory (CMT) in their Metaphor We Live
Accepted: 3 March 2014
By (1980), an extensive debate emerged
E-mail addresses:
[email protected] (Zahra Khajeh), regarding cognitive linguistics and cognitive
[email protected] (Imran Ho-Abdullah),
[email protected] (Tan Kim Hua),
psychology. The book has become the icon
* Corresponding author of a new perspective of metaphor analysis,
Author’s current affiliation
in which metaphors are not considered as
#

Department of English, Kazeroun Branch,

Islamic Azad University, Kazeroun, Iran

ISSN: 0128-7702 © Universiti Putra Malaysia Press

 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

just dispensable ornaments of language in domain mapping thought/ideas as target

poetic and rhetorical dimensions, but have domains. Thought/ideas as food is metaphor
cognitive significance and, in most cases, conceptualisation we live by in various
they cannot be substituted by any form of related or unrelated cultures. Moreover,
literal language. In reality, indeed, abundant when researchers deal with the issue of
data collected from a variety of research food-related metaphor similarities and their
have shown that most of the metaphorical motivations across a variety of cultures, they
expressions the native speakers of a certain address it mostly in terms of conjectures
language produce are based on conceptual rather than synchronic and diachronic
metaphors. Such research and viewpoints proofs. One of the concerns of this study will
have initiated a very significant issue in be to distinguish between the universalities
cognitive linguistics as to what extent and of metaphor and the type specific to the
in what ways conceptual metaphors are Persian society and culture searching for
relevant to universalities that can be found various proposition-schemas at work in
and utilised in all languages and cultures Persian speakers’ conceptualisations. As the
(e.g. Kövecses, 2002, 2005, 2008, 2010). linguistic data suggest, the images of food-
This study, therefore, is a step in related metaphor conceptualisations occur
the process of investigating the cross- extensively in Persian, indicating their close
cultural universalities and/or variations of correspondence with Persian culture, myth,
food-related metaphor conceptualisations folklore, race, identity, religion, spirituality,
through examining the data taken from community and body as well (Khajeh &
Persian. Adopting an experiential notion Imran-Ho, 2012, p. 84).
of interpreting metaphorical expressions
cognitively as a cross-domain mapping PERSIAN CULTURAL COGNITION
from a source (more delineated) domain to AND EM-MINDED CULTURAL
NOTIONS – THOUGHT AS FOOD
the target (less delineated) domain (Lakoff
& Johnson, 1980, 1999; Lakoff, 1987), the Duality of ‘Head-Heart’ Centring
present research explores how metaphorical Conceptualisation in Persian
constituents reflect various cognitive and In their book, Culture, Body, and Language:
cultural models by investigating the metaphor Conceptualizations of Internal Body
conceptualisations of thought/ideas as food Organs Across Cultures and Languages,
in the Persian language. The most general Sharifian and co-authors (2008) stress
supposition to make at this juncture is that on three major body parts as the locus of
due to the prominent significance of food rationality: ‘head’, ‘heart’ and ‘abdomen’.
in everyday life as a specific source of According to these scholars, the dominant
nourishment and exquisite pleasure, food/ cultural characteristic of Southern Asian
eating has a pervasive use in a variety of and Polynesian peoples is recognised as
cultures and languages as a concrete source ‘abdomincentrism’. Moreover, while the

1116 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

Indonesian and Malay languages use the particular to a given cultural community and
liver as the seat of intellect and reasoning , comprise all lexical items grounded in one
the Australian language (Kuuk Theayorne ) specific culture. Cultural words are language
uses the belly when discussing rationality. vehicles to discover deep conceptualizations
On the other hand, Japanese, Korean, and in culture and thought .”
Chinese people’s seat of thinking is located Something interesting about the Persian
in their heart, referred to as cardiocentrism, del is that it seems del does not dichotomise
and for European and Greek-based Western the rational and irrational in Persian culture
Asians, it is manifested in their head , as both the rational and the irrational
(mind) which is known as cerebrocentrism are blended and unified into one sense,
(Sharifian et al., 2008, pp.14-16). conceptualising affective and cognitive
In fact, there is a clear-cut division processes as being one process. The concept
between intellect and emotion in Western can be best recognised in the figurative
culture, which is especially derived from expression az del beravad har ān-ke az dide
Cartesian dualism beliefs. Having its origin beraft (lit. from heart goes anyone who from
in Classical Greek thinking, Western culture sight goes), meaning ‘one who is out of
deeply relies on the dichotomy between the sight will be forgotten’, which corresponds
body (material) and the soul (immaterial). to the English expression, ‘Out of sight, out
In other words, the locus of irrational of mind’. While in English remembering is
emotion and desires is the heart as part of represented by ‘mind’, it is conceptualised
the body, while rational thoughts, ideas by the Persian heart, implying that the
and intelligence reside in the mind and are loss of memory can be associated with a
largely disembodied (Lakoff & Johnson, loss of love or affection as well. del can
1999). be described as a primitive soul at which
Persian is among those languages that a rational reasoning process, together
conceptualise the intellect and emotion with all sorts of intuitional and emotional
as ‘body and soul’, upholding a marginal influences take place. Consequently, del is
role in cerebrocentrism. The concept of not merely a physical concrete organ but
del (‘heart’) in Persian may refer to some more importantly, an inner drive and self,
aspects of intellect and reasoning. The depicting both body and soul as a whole.
cognitive-related conceptualisations of In other words, del is a cultural word,
del is associated with Sufism, Avicenna’s conceptualising the unique worldviews of
doctrine of four humours and experiential Persians. It is evident that the body part del,
reality. It seems the concept of del in ‘heart’, is responsible for a wide range of
Persian corresponds to the notion of gogo conceptualisations in Persian, used to hold
in Basque, representing inner drives. Gogo affective senses as emotion, desire, intuition,
is a cultural word in Basque, or as Ibarretxe- patience and courage as well as cognitive
Antuñano (2012) describes it, “Specific processes as thought, ideas and memories.
conceptualizations of the world which are
Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1117
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

The Concept of Del and Thinking as The abundant instances of food-related

Eating as Metaphor and kitchen-related metaphors in the works
The various conceptualisations of del are very of writers and poets of Sufism and their
likely motivated by certain cultural models concern for making a connection between
in Persian. Iranian traditional medicine and various states of mind and those of the
Sufism as worldviews are among the most body, all indicate the essential role of the
influential pathways in Persian culture processes, which a cook (human being)
in constructing metaphorical concepts in embodies. The alchemy of operations in the
general and shaping culinary expressions in kitchen and during the cooking process can
particular. Following the Greek tradition, in all be conceptualised and mapped onto what
Iranian traditional medicine, the ‘heart’ and is involved in all creation. In the process
‘liver’ have predominant influences over of transformation of raw into ripe, visible
the other organs of the body. In line with into invisible, or external into internal state
Aristotle’s ideas, Avicenna (1930) believed of food, it is the cook who must consider
that ravān ‘soul/psyche’ originated from the nature of substances to maximise their
the heart. Moreover, in his theory of four potential for human sustenance, changing
humours, Avicenna stressed that the primary them into soul. The cook, moreover, is
humours of the body originated from the aware of the qualities of the food, and
food digestion process and that human appropriately organises them in a manner
personality could be identified with respect to enhance the harmony between the body
to prominent body-temperament properties organs and nourishment, a harmony that
(Khajeh et al., 2013a, b). leads to the sustenance of the soul. The
The spiritual tradition of Sufism, on cook has to pay heed to the food flavour,
the other hand, influenced the conceptual odour, colour and essence, as well as to the
faculty of the Persian people, which is fully properties of the food i.e. if it is hot or cold,
manifested in Iranians’ way of thinking, if it expands or contracts, and if it influences
their psyche and their literary works. thought or emotion, flourishing intensity
Sufi literature contains a great number of or calmness. In the body, the result of this
metaphorical expressions conceptualising apprehension and discrimination transforms
del with ‘thinking’ in food/eating domains. the meticulously-selected attributes of food
In Sufism, for example, the concept of food into strength and vitality, intellect and spirit
is adopted and used to refer to a versatile and this makes the food fully pleasing i.e.
symbol, depicting the visible world. It may it will be consumed with heart and soul, as
also be mapped onto the concept of divine shown in a poem by Moelana Jalal-uddin
nourishment and sustenance, the unseen Rumi (1207-1273), the most popular Sufi
world now made visible through a reference writer: ‘My heart boils up, aspiring to your
to its edibility. heat; closes its eyes to grope what you see
clear.’

1118 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

The image schema found in the above Based on the conceptual schema of del as
example conceptualises a ‘man of heart’ the seat of thinking, therefore, del can be
who is associated with divine love, and associated with intellectualism and reason.
being cooked and boiled indicates spiritual In Persian, one may talk about the inability
maturation of the human soul. ‘Heart’ to understand someone’s words or thoughts
and ‘divine love’ are conceptualised in a while conceptualising it in the source
container-content relationship as it is studied domain of eating activity. The expression
and discussed in the sense of Lakoff (1987), qazā sar-e del-am mund-e (food head-GEN
Lakoff and Johnson (1980) and Lakoff and del-POSS-1SG remain-PCTP-is) roughly
Turner (1989). Similar to the ‘ordeal’ the means, ‘I have difficulty in digesting food in
food ingredients endure in the cooking/ my stomach’; the negative feeling of pain or
boiling process, the heart is pictured as restlessness from overeating is felt in del or
a boiling pan (container) representing the stomach. The same schema can be extended
process of preparation and transformation in expressions associating del with thoughts
into the human soul that experiences inner and ideas that are difficult to be understood
feeling and divine love (content). The (digested) as in:
underlying conceptual pattern ‘heart as
(1) tamām-e harf-hā-š sar-e
container’ and ‘heart as entity’ (which can
all-GEN word-PL-POSS-3SG head-GEN
boil) in Persian encompasses del as the locus
del-am mund-e del-POSS-1SG stay-PCTP-is
of intellect, reasoning, understanding as well
All his words have stood on my heart.
as affection and spirituality; metaphorising
‘I cannot digest/comprehend his words.’
‘boiling hot heart’ as a conceptual framework
to represent the degree of getting closer to
It seems that both Iranian Traditional
God.
Medicine and the Sufi belief system have
The metaphoric concepts of Persian
highly dominant effects on Persians’
figurative expressions that use del, as it
conceptualisations and worldviews,
is shown, are largely originated from a
motivating certain metaphorical
synthesis of different aspects of traditional
constructions of body parts such as del
faculties of Persian culture, religion,
in Persian. It is noteworthy to add that
medicine and philosophy, mysticism and
the cultural models explored here are
spiritual beliefs. In other words, del in
not of totally distinct faculties, but both
Persian, traditionally, is viewed as the seat of
share the fundamental concepts of their
wisdom and spiritual knowledge that is much
belief systems, and are influenced by one
deeper than the rational mind. The spiritual
another, leading to particular cultural
attributes related to the concept of del are
conceptualisations in Persian.
still alive and are extensively used in present
day Persian metaphorical expressions.

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1119
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

Lakoffian Theory of Conceptual Metaphor they express (Lakoff & Turner, 1989).
Thought as Food The mappings between the ontological
The food/eating domain reflects strong conceptual metaphors of mind and those of
correspondences with intellectual realities in non-metaphorical bodily experience of food
many languages. The ontological conceptual and eating are shown in the following:
metaphor ideas/cognition as food denotes
TABLE 2
the image schema of an eating process Mapping of Conceptual Metaphor of ‘Mind’ and
representing structural similarities between ‘Food’
the concrete domain of food and those
Ontological metaphor Non-metaphorical
of ideas (Kövecses, 2010). The general of mind experience of food
conceptual mappings between the concepts MIND IS A The body is a container
in the two domains are shown in the CONTAINER
IDEAS ARE Food consists of
following table: OBJECTS objects
COMMUNICATION We take food in from
TABLE 1
IS SENDING IDEAS the outside
Mapping of Food and Ideas (adapted from
FROM and
Kövecses, 2010)
ONE MIND- it travels through the
CONTAINER TO body
food Domain ideas Domain
ANOTHER
Preparing Producing
Taking in Perceiving
As the above table illustrates, we deal
Processing Understanding
Nourishment/ Physical/Mental well with intellectual realities (ideas, thought
Sustenance being and mind) in a manner that assimilates the
structural knowledge we experience with
It is to be noted that the perception of food, eating and the body, which in turn
structural similarities is motivated by some facilitates understanding of conceptually
underlying primary concepts the language dissimilar domains. This concept of
users have about mind, thinking process container-content can be best regarded as the
and human communication. As Reddy idea of boundedness. Humans are bounded
(1979) puts it, the metaphorical concepts physical beings and are mostly inclined to
‘ideas are objects, words are containers’, associate less accessible abstract entities
and ‘communication is sending’ (through a to the closest concrete realities. According
conduit) are pervasive in most languages. to Lakoff and Johnson (1980), “We are
Lakoff (1987, p. 450) further developed physical beings, bounded and set off from
the container metaphor, and suggested the the rest of the world as outside of us. Each
concepts ‘the mind is a container’ and ‘ideas of us is a container with a bounding surface
are entities’. Therefore, for communication and an in-out orientation” (p. 29).
to take place, we take the ideas out of our The underlying primary metaphors,
mind, and put them into certain words, for example ‘mind is a container’, are
and then words stand for the concepts molecular, and are naturally constructed

1120 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

through a conflation of experiences that MATERIALS AND METHODS

lead to cross-domain mappings (Lakoff & This study is a qualitative introspection-
Johnson, 1999, 47-48). Complex metaphors, based study of food-related metaphorical
however, are constructed through conceptual conceptualisations of ideas and thought.
blending of some primary metaphors. They The data for the study mainly involved
do not have explicit embodiment grounding, naturally occurring and non-literary spoken-
but their construction is grounded on written citations of food-related themes, and
the basis of their constituent parts i.e. therefore were far more likely to be typical
the experiential grounding of generic of everyday language in use rather than those
primary metaphors. ‘Thinking is eating’, for invented or poetic corpora suggested and
instance, is considered a complex metaphor discussed in the Contemporary Metaphor
that is shaped from the primary conceptual Theory. The corpus, thus, has been taken
metaphors ‘mind is a container’, and ‘ideas from documented material, both print and
are food’. In what follows, a schematic on-line databases of Persian food-related
representation of conceptual mapping metaphors from a variety of monolingual
between ‘food and ideas’ is suggested and bilingual dictionaries and some other
through an example in Persian as in Fig.1 lexicographical works such as dictionaries

sohbat-hā-š eštehā-ye hame ro tahrik kard

speech-PL-POSS-3SG appetite-GEN all ACC stimulation do-PST-3SG
His speech stimulated the appetite of all.
‘His speech made everyone eager to listen to him.’

Conceptual Metaphor
IDEAS ARE FOOD

producing an idea preparing food

TARGET SOURCE
perceiving an idea taking in food
understanding an idea processing food
well-being nourishment

Skeletal World
structure
Partial mapping knowledge

Application of source knowledge to highlight target aspects

Perceived structural connections

‘mind’ is a container and ‘ideas’ are contents

Fig.1: Schematic representation of conceptual metaphor

sohbat-hā-š eštehā-ye hame ro tahrik kard

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1121
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

of idiomatic metaphorical expressions and ‘flavour’ of food, ‘preparation’ of food

thesauri and native speakers’ intuition of and ‘digestion’ of food, which can be
Persian linguistic metaphors. The analysis is subsequently mapped conceptually into the
mainly based on the author’s intuition as a some certain aspects of the thought domain
native speaker of Persian. It has been further such as ‘content’, ‘quality’, ‘production’ and
crossed-checked informally by other native ‘comprehension’, through which a certain
speakers of Persian. The consulted Persian proposition-schema can be postulated
dictionaries are loqatnāme-ye dehxodā for each pairing. The findings will then
(Dekhoda Dictionary), 1998; farhang-e illuminate the cultural backgrounds of
jāme vāžegān; amsāl-o- hekam-e dehxodā ‘cognition’ concepts in Persian, leading us
(Proverbs and Mottos), 1999; Farhang-e to portray the cultural motivations for their
amid (Amid Dictionary), 1992; farhang-e construction or semantic changes. Since the
bozorg-e soxan (The comprehensive general framework of this study is based on
Dictionary of Talk), 2002; farhang-e fāarsi- the underlying assumptions made by CMT,
englisi (English-Persian Dictionary), 1984. it is expected that the findings of such a
The corpus involves various patterns cognitive-semantic cross-cultural study
related to the food and eating domain, would rectify this theory in general and
which can broaden the scope of food- food-related conceptualisations of ‘thought’
related metaphorical concepts. It consists of in specific.
keywords for food and eating as well as those
body organs associated with the eating act, RESULTS AND DISCUSSION
eating-related verbs, the terms referring to To illustrate the heuristic procedures used
food preparation, food ingredients, cooking in the analysis, the proposed proposition-
traditions and styles, the instruments applied schema for the metaphor conceptualisation
in the eating process and food quality such of ‘thought as food’ is introduced in the
as flavour, smell and shape. section below.
Linguistic metaphorical expressions of
‘ideas as food’ and ‘thinking as eating’ are Proposition-schemas in the
analysed based on real-world knowledge Conceptualisation of ‘Thought Is Food’
about the bodily experience of eating. Metaphor
It searches for the image schematic The content of thought is the ingredient
correspondences between each source- of food. In Persian, speakers often encounter
target domain pairing and for their related metaphorical expressions such as:
entities, qualities and functions . The
(2) goft- e- hā-š por o peymān ast
underlying mapping principle for each
speech-GEN-PL-POSS-3SG full and scale is
metaphor conceptualisation of the food
His speech contains much ingredient.
domain, as Su (2002) points out, can
‘His speech is informative .’/
be reflected in ‘ingredients’ of food,
(‘His speech contains a lot of information.’)

1122 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

(3) harf-hā-š bi māye fatir-e metaphorically transferred to the quality

Word-PL-POSS-3SG without - material azymic is of thought. The examples manifest that
His words do not contain ingredient. a variety of flavours of food domains are
‘His words are not informative/helpful enough.’ metaphorically extended to qualify the ideas
and thought in Persian; while some are
The above sentences use the terms metaphorically applied to modify spoken
por-o peymān ‘have much ingredient’, and words (sweet, bitter, raw, uncooked), some
bi-māye ‘without ingredient’ to refer to are specifically used to modify the degree
the content of the speech or knowledge of of experience or knowledge of the speakers
the speaker associated with the ingredient (raw, cooked). Consequently, what is
or content of food made by good or bad mapped in the target domain of thought can
material. The ingredients of food are be either general concepts or specific ideas.
conceptualised as the content of thought/ Generally speaking, sweet tasty food is
knowledge/language using metaphorical consistently utilised in most cultures to refer
concepts of the word originally taken from to positive and pleasant mental qualities,
the ingredients of food. bearing the general schema ‘sweetness
The quality of thought is the flavour is perceived as positive’; nevertheless,
of food. In Persian, there are metaphorical there are specific metaphor instantiations
expressions which contain the flavour of shedding light on the underlying cultural
food to describe the quality of thought as in: differences. In Persian, the metaphorical
expression širin aql ‘sweet mind’ conveys
(4) harf- hā-š širin- e /talx-e/ xām-e/ na-poxte ast/
the idea of stupidity, endowing the term
word-PL-POSS-3SG sweet is/ bitter is/ raw is/
with negative connotation, manifesting the
uncooked is/
schema ‘sweetness is perceived as negative’.
bā-maze ast/ bi-maze ast
The metaphorical concept of related
tasteful is/ tasteless is
expressions can be found in the traditional/
‘His words are sweet/bitter/raw/uncooked/
historical beliefs of Iranians regarding
tasteful/tasteless.’
donkey’s meat, which was considered
(5) ādam- e xām-iye/ poxte-iye sweet, but had a negative connotation, as
person-GEN raw is/ cooked is consumers of the meat had had to consume
He is raw/cooked. it during famine and war.
‘He is inexperienced/knowledgeable and It is important to say that conceptual
experienced.’ mapping is a complicated cognitive
phenomenon, which involves multi-level
In English, the expressions ‘sweet conceptualisation in a hierarchical nature.
thought’ or ‘bitter thought’ use flavour of Therefore, from a cognitive perspective,
food to illustrate the quality of thought and understanding metaphorical themes would
ideas. In these expressions, food flavour is not be an easy task; it might entail much

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1123
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

complexity. However, our mind seems to is the quantity of food’ can be understood
be naturally capable of organising basic through conceptual entailments in the
knowledge in a hierarchical manner to proposition schema ‘the quantity of thought
enable us to interpret intricate meaning is measured by the quantity of food in its
expressed in metaphorisation (Lakoff & container’. In order to decode its meaning,
Johnson, 1999). To show how two or more one more proposition schema as ‘the quality
propositions are blended together in a chain of thought is the flavour of food’ is needed.
to represent more complex conceptual Sweetness as the pleasant taste of food
metaphors, consider the following example: is mapped conceptually into an arousing,
pleasant thought. As such, the linguistic
(6) ye del-e por harf daram ke
metaphorical expression of (5) makes sense
az bas širin-e
to us because it comprises the conceptual
one heart-GEN full word have-1SG that
themes as in the following:
from much sweet-is
sir ne-mi-iši 1. Conceptual metaphor:
full NEG-PROG- become-2SG ‘thought as food’
I have a heart full of words, so much sweet that you 2. Conduit metaphor:
do not become full. a. ‘words are objects’
‘I have tonnes of such sweet words to speak that it b. ‘words are containers of ideas’
makes you eager/hungry to know them all.’ 3. Image schema
‘the container of food is the container
In this example, the bodily organ ‘belly/
of thought’
stomach’ as a container for food to be stored
and digested is metaphorically regarded as 4. Proposition schema:
the container for holding words. Through the a. ‘the quantity of thought is measured
conduit metaphor ‘words are objects’, the by the quantity of food in its
words are thus conceptualised as objects that container’
can be contained in a container. In addition, b. ‘the quality of thought is the flavour
(6) entails ‘the container of food is the of food’
container of thought’ image schema through The formation of thought is the
which the ‘content of belly/stomach’ in the preparation of food. The proposition
food domain is mapped onto the words as schema here illustrates the formation
the ‘content of the mind’ in the thought of thoughts, and the thought here is
domain. On the other hand, the term por conceptualised as the preparation of food,
or ‘full’ metaphorically profiles the large as in:
amount of food in a container which is
further mapped onto the quantity of thought (7) be harf- hā- š xeili čāšni mi- zan-e
as it could be measured in a container. Thus, to word-PL-POSS-3SG much spice PROG-
the image schema ‘the quantity of thought hit-3SG

1124 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

He adds too much spice to his words. as a metaphorical conceptualisation of

‘He exaggerates too much.’ ‘comprehension of thought is the digestion
of food’. Digestion refers to an act of
Here, the sentence means he embellishes assimilating food in a form that can be
his speech with pompous or inflated words absorbed and utilised by the body.
(i.e. ‘spice’) to convince others to agree (9) moratab harf-hā -š ro dar zehn- aš
with him. always word-PL-POSS-3SG ACC in mind-
POSS-3SG
(8) ideh-hā-ye jadidi dar zehn- aš dar hāl- e
nošxār mi- kone
idea-PL-GEN new in mind-POSS-3SG in now
rumination PROG-do-3SG
GEN
He always ruminates his words in the mind.
qavām āmad-an-e
‘He always contemplates what he says .’
inspissations come-INF is
New ideas are being inspissated in his mind.
nošxār kardan (rumination), a compound
‘Well-organised new ideas are being shaped in
verb in which the nominal element nošxār
his mind.’
consists of noš ‘drinking’+xār ‘eating’ is
used to express food digestion by ruminants,
The expression qavām āmadan
but in Persian, it is metaphorically applied
‘inspissations’, in the sentence above,
in special contexts referring to the
means forming a new idea or proposal of a
contemplation of knowledge, speech or
new concept. The process involved in the
thought in general. It implies the digestion
production of new concepts in speech and
of something that was consumed previously,
mind is analogous with the formation and
repeatedly. This is a concept formed upon
preparation of food. The basic meaning of
the metaphor, ‘comprehension of thought is
qavām āmadan in the food domain is to
the digestion of food’.
cause the food to be thickened as by boiling
This type of conceptual mapping
or evaporation, making it well cooked and
can be expressed by a variety of verbs
thick. This process is metaphorically used
in Persian as xordan ‘eating’, bali’dan
in the thought domain, profiling the abstract
‘swallowing’, hazm kardan ‘digesting’,
notion of forming a well-constructed new
javidan ‘chewing’, jazb kardan ‘absorbing’,
concept or thought. Thus, the metaphorical
gāz zadan ‘biting’, makidan ‘nibbling/
conceptualisation of this expression in the
sucking’, češidan ‘tasting’ the food,
Persian culinary lexicon is used to describe
originally used in the food domain and
this notional transfer from the source domain
metaphorically applied to refer to processing
(food) onto the target domain (thought) .
and understanding knowledge in a general
The comprehension of thought is
sense. ‘Thought’ as used here can be either
the digestion of food. There are verbs
abstract, meaning knowledge, the outcomes
in Persian that manifest the process of
of a study or simply the words uttered. These
digestion (comprehension/understanding)

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1125
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

and so many other words represent our daily then say-2SG

concepts of ideas/thought referred to as Chew your words well, then speak.
metaphors used in our culture that colour ‘Understand what you want to say before you
our language . In fact, food processing in speak.’
the body is likened to internalising ideas or
mentally absorbing notions in many related Accepting/ understanding is
and unrelated languages and cultures. This swallowing. The manifestation of the
general metaphor conceptualisation can be conceptual metaphor ‘the mind is the body’
subdivided into more precise concepts as is reflected in the metaphorical expression,
follows: ‘swallowing an idea’. The concept is
grounded in our common experience of
Learning is eating. ‘body’ and ‘mind’. Accepting or rejecting
(10) u xore ketāb dār-e pleasant/unpleasant ideas metonymically
he eater book has -3SG implies the swallowing of food. The mapping
He is a book eater. principle for the conceptual metaphor
‘He loves books a lot.’ ‘accepting/understanding is swallowing’
lies in the fact that both ideas and food are
Understanding is tasting.
expected to be consumed and processed by
(11) harf-hā-t ro maze maze
the mind and the body respectively. In other
kon, ba’d begu
words, the act of swallowing is mapped
word-PL-POSS-2SG ACC taste taste do-2SG,
on to the processing, comprehending
then say-2SG
or acquiescing of thoughts and ideas.
Taste your words, then speak.
Swallowing stands for the whole process of
‘Understand what you want to say before you
the activity of eating, carrying a particular
speak.’
metonymic concept. It mostly corresponds
Understanding is digesting. to the act of drinking a liquid substance
(12) harf-hā-i ro ke to mi- gi, with minimal physical management of
hich kas the active zones of eating as an activity.
word-PL-GEN ACC that you PROG-say- In Persian, for example, drinking from
2SG, no body the elixir of knowledge, wisdom and love
ne-mi-tune hazm kon-e manifest the discovery and understanding
NEG-PROG-can-3SG digestion do-3SG of these abstractions. Thus, as the following
The words that you say, nobody can digest them. examples represent, swallowing a liquid in
‘What you say cannot be understood by anyone.’ Persian denotes experiencing a mental focus
on the intended concept.
Understanding is chewing.
(13) harf-hā -t ro xub bejo, (14) mesl-e āb-e xordan hame ro
ba’d begu like-GEN water-GEN eating all ACC
word-PL-POSS-2SG ACC good chew-2SG, az bar-am

1126 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

from memory-be- PRS-1SG Therefore, the focus of the expression

Like drinking water, I know all from my memory. lah-lah zadan for X would not be on
‘I know all by heart.’ physical thirst or hunger, but a strong mental
longing and desire for something (e.g.
(15) dar yek češm be ham zadan hame-
knowledge, information, ideas, love or
ye doruq-hā-š
sexual interaction) as shown in the following
in one eye to gether hit-INF all-GEN
expression:
lie-PL-POSS-3SG
ro bali’d, ye āb ham (16) del-am barāye dunestan-e
ru-š ACC swallow-PST-3SG, one water also xabar-hā
on-DEM.PRO heart-POSS-1SG for understanding-GEN
In the twinkling of one eye, he swallowed all his news-PL
lies. lah lah mizane.
‘He instantly swallowed all his lies.’ panting panting PROG-hit-3SG
My heart is panting for knowing the news.
Moreover, in Persian, abstractions ‘I am very eager to know the news.’
such as knowledge, wisdom and love are
metaphorised as physical needs, in the form The metaphor is understood as a strong
of water, food and fruit. The conceptual desire to discover the news, and here
metaphor ‘abstract needs are physical we have a metaphor interacting with a
needs’, therefore, shows the correspondence metonymic mapping. The ‘container’
between the source domain of eating and that image-schema of del ‘heart’ (part) stands
of intellection, which is reflected in Persian for the person (whole). The compound
expressions such as tešne-ye dāneš ‘thirst Verb construction lah-lah zadan is mapped
for knowledge’, or gorosne-ye tajrobe-hā- onto strong want and longing to discover
ye jadid ‘hungry of new experiences’. We or understand X. The understanding of this
visualise the bodily experience of eating expression needs an activation of an image-
food with those we use in other experiences schematic structure in which the part-whole
as ‘knowledge’ and ‘experiences’. schema highlights the relationship between
When we cannot have enough food, the source and target domains.
we feel hunger or thirst, and this is On the other hand, the image schema
conceptualised in the metaphors ‘desire of unfavourable, disgusting or indigestible
is hunger/thirst’, and ‘satisfying desire is food which results in difficulty in the
eating’. In this connection, a very interesting swallowing or digesting may be mapped as
example in Persian is the term lah-lah the ‘thought’ domain, reflecting a struggle
zadan which means ‘to pant’ (e.g. like a dog for understanding or accepting the ideas and
from thirst , etc.), and metaphorically, it is thoughts in mind.
applied to reflect a thirst and hunger to get
the awareness of intellection or emotion.

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1127
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

(17) sa’i kardam hame-ye harf-hā-ye (18) kāš zamin dahan bāz kone,
kezb-eš ro Wishing ground mouth open do-3SG,
try do-PST-1SG all-GEN word-PL-GEN man ro foru bede
lie-POSS-3SG ACC foru bexor-am vali I ACC down give-3SG
ta modat-hā sar-e I wish the ground opens its mouth and swallows me.
down eat-1SG but till time-PL ‘I wish the ground would swallow me up/ I wish I
head-GEN could hide from memories.’
del-am mānde bud
stomach-POSS-1SG stay-PST The above example is a metaphorical
I tried to swallow all his false words, but they had personification of the ‘ground’ used as
stood on my heart for a a metonymic concept suggesting a part
long time. (mouth) to stand for a whole (person).
‘I tried to swallow all his lies, but I couldn’t forget It imputes the human physical ability of
them for a long time.’ ingestion, where the human functions as
eater (a strong agentive subject) swallowing
The above mixed metaphorical (foru dādan) the memories of the past that
expression reflects an overloading pressure need to be hidden away, thus conceptualising
on stomach sar-e del māndan ‘to be the metaphor ‘swallowing is hiding’.
troubled with ingestion’ when there is
Persuading is eating.
difficulty swallowing (foru- xordan) and
(19) bā dāstān-hā-ye bi-mani-š maqzam
digesting more food. In the same way,
with story-PL-GEN without-meaning-POSS-
incomprehensible information or news
3SG brain-POSS-1SG
may create an overload of pressure for the
ro xor-d
mind, and this gives rise to the metaphor
ACC eat-PST-3SG
‘an overload of pressure on the mind is an
He ate my brain with his meaningless stories.
overload of pressure on the stomach’.
‘Telling meaningless stories, he made me upset.’
On the other hand, the concept of
destruction and elimination can also be
In Persian, the meaning of light as a
served as a target domain by the act of
verb xordan may be extended to indicate
swallowing as a source image, though there
the concepts of both ‘overcoming’ (by a
is no reference of mastication (biting and
strong agent) and ‘undergoing torment’ (by
chewing) in this eating process. Swallowing
an affected object) in both the intellectual
makes food inaccessible as the visible
and emotional domains as it is with ‘eating
substances (from outside the body) become
someone’s head or brain’. The related
invisible (inside the body), conceptualising
metaphoric expressions, therefore, indicate
the sudden removal and enclosure of an
that someone (an agent) can eat another
entity. The concept of X is swallowed by
person’s ‘head’ or ‘brain’ to irritate or
Y is illustrated in the following Persian
upset the latter. It seems in Persian, when
expression.

1128 Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014)
 Metaphor Conceptualisations of Thought as Food

offended, one ‘uses’ another person’s head/ same experiential embodied accounts, which
brain to force him to experience a sort of are constructed under motivation of a similar
psychological torment in destroying his cultural em-mindedness. The variations
intellectual or emotional ‘container’ or in the em-minded cultural elements, on
‘contents’. the other hand, may cause a completely
The examples cited above and so many different conceptualisation or a different
other metaphorical themes present our daily understanding and reasoning of the same
concepts of ideas/thought referred to as physiological experience, which leads to
metaphors we use in our own culture. It is also variations in the meanings of the same
a way other cultures conceptualise thought conceptual metaphor in the same mapping.
using food as the source domain. In fact, Thus, this study shows a clearer image of
food processing in the body is assimilated as the interaction between the human body,
internalising the ideas or mentally absorbing mind and particular cultural norms in the
notions across many related and unrelated conceptualisations of metaphoric themes of
languages and cultures. Nevertheless, some ‘thinking’ in the source domain of the acts
metaphor conceptualisations in Persian like of ‘food’ and ‘eating’ in Persian.
maqz-am ro xord, ‘he ate my brain’, do not Under the principles of mapping from
seem to be meaningful in other languages the source domain of ‘food’ and ‘eating’ to
when translated literally. the abstract domain of ‘ideas’ and ‘thought’,
the prominent features of the source domain
CONCLUSION used are food ‘ingredients’, ‘flavour’,
The most salient factor that is still ‘preparation’ and ‘digestion’, which are
disregarded in conceptual metaphor studies mapped respectively to the target domain
is cultural cognition or em-minded cultural of ‘thought’ as its ‘content’, ‘quality’,
accounts that are rooted in a nation’s ‘production’ and ‘comprehension’. As the
worldviews, belief systems, traditions, linguistic instances in this study show,
habits and even linguistic systems, which among the identified proposition-schemas
have constructed and reconstructed for ‘thought as food’, those related to ‘food
thought and speech over time. In fact, preparation’ and ‘food digestion’ seem
while metaphors mostly are motivated to be the most abundant and productive .
and mediated based on physiological Moreover, it has been revealed that some
embodiment, no one metaphor can be particular features of ‘food’ as the source
viewed as culture-free; metaphors are a domain have been more salient and likely to
manifestation of cultural models comprising be used as mapping concepts in Persian. It is
embodiment, cultural em-mindedness and noteworthy to say that not all metaphorical
the interplay of both. With this distinction expressions introduced in the corpus data
in mind, it can be concluded that metaphor fit exactly into the suggested framework.
universalities mostly are the result of the Conceptual mapping is in fact a very

Pertanika J. Soc. Sci. & Hum. 22 (4): 1115 - 1131 (2014) 1129
 Zahra Khajeh, Imran Ho-Abdullah and Tan Kim Hua

complex cognitive process that requires pp.  253–274. Amsterdam/ Philadelphia: John
multi-facet conceptualisations in order to Benjamins.

construe the metaphors of the ‘thought as Khajeh, Z., & Imran-Ho, A. (2012). Persian culinary
food’ concept. metaphors: A cross-cultural conceptualization.
This study, therefore, shows that GEMA: Online Journal of Language Studies, 12
(1), 69-87. ISSN 1675-8021
variations in the linguistic metaphorical
themes may have resulted from the specific Khajeh, Z., Imran-Ho, A., & Tan, K. H. (2013a).
proposition-schemas for the mapping Emotional temperament in food-related
metaphors: A cross-cultural account of the
conceptualisations. The identified models
conceptualizations of ‘sadness’. International
enable us to demarcate the em-minded
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commonalities and diversities in the way we 2200-3452.
think and speak. The ontological metaphoric
Khajeh, Z., Imran-Ho, A., & Tan, K.H. (2013b). The
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