Anger Metaphor in Language of the Blind from Birth: A comparative study with sighted counterparts

The current paper studies anger metaphors in language of the blind. According to cognitive linguistics, cognitive metaphors play an important role in shaping the human cognitive system. Cognitive metaphors form the framework of thought and that is not just a language issue, but it is a matter of thought and wisdom. By analyzing emotional metaphors, one can discover people’s cultural differences and cognitive foundations. Anger metaphor is one of the most universal and common emotional metaphors, for anger is known as the most basic emotion of human beings. In order to explore the function of mind in shaping anger metaphors in Persian blind participants, ten congenital blinds and ten sighted participants were selected the ages 18-28. The language of both groups is Persian. This research studies the source domains of anger metaphors in language of congenital blinds in comparison with their sighted counterparts based on Kovecses’s Model (2002). The findings show that verbalism makes language of the blinds and their sighted counterparts similar even in visual anger metaphors. This is inconsistent with the belief that considers mind as the source of metaphor.