A Study of Metaphorical Mapping Involving Socio-cultural Values : How Woman is Conceptualized in Japanese

The present study investigates a type of metaphor involving socio-cultural values in their mapping and interpretation. The linguistic data are Japanese metaphorical expressions that conceptualize women as plants or animals. First, the typology of metaphor based on previous research is discussed, focusing on conceptual, correlation, and resemblance metaphors, followed by our proposal to distinguish "sociocultural metaphors" within resemblance metaphors. The main part analyzes the data to illustrate various characteristics of socio-cultural metaphors, which is divided into the following sections: 1) Women as Animals or Plants, 2) Some Mapping Gaps and Asymmetry, 3) Properties Involved in the Mapping, 4) Socio-cultural Codes, and 5) Social Structures and Interpretation of Woman Metaphors. The result of the questionnaire survey reported in 4) seems to suggest that interpretations and usage of some metaphorical expressions have undergone certain changes over the years. The study concludes by suggesting further research in socio-cultural metaphor in Japanese and other languages.