The Metaphor from the Perspective of Arabic Rhetoric and Cognitive Linguists

Metaphor is one of the most beautiful figures of speech. Arab rhetoricians like rhetoricians of other languages, used to take the metaphor into consideration, so that they have incessantly tried to classify it into different types, such as: explicit metaphor, implicit metaphor, etc. Besides, metaphor plays a crucial role in linguistics and it is discussed especially in cognitive linguistics. The basic theory of this branch of linguistics is that the metaphor is not restricted to literal language only, as it is extensively used in ordinary language, however it is unconscious. In this regard, cognitive linguists believe that metaphor is one of the main language tools in structuring human mind and conceptualizing. In fact, the cognitive processes of human mind are in great measures under the influence of metaphorical structures. Using comparative approach, this article studies metaphor from both Arabic rhetoricians and cognitive linguist's points of view, and seeks to explain some aspects of differences and similarities. These similarities include classification of different types of metaphor, and the similarity of some of these different metaphors such as dead metaphor in linguistics and commonplace metaphor in rhetoric. The differences within the two bands are evident, like studying metaphors in the words, monopoly of metaphors in similar interests, using formal and linguistic criteria for the diagnosis of metaphor in Arabic rhetoric, studying metaphors in the sentences, using experimental criteria in linguistics, and differences in naming some of the kinds of metaphors in both of fields.