A Study of the Effect of Time and Gender on Conceptual Metaphors of Grief in the Works of Ahmad Mahmood and Simin Daneshvar before and after Islamic Revolution: From the Socio-Cognitive Approach

In cognitive approach, conceptual metaphor belongs to human cognitive system which has root in conceptual system of mind as the concept does not relate to literature and poems. The domain of emotions is a new approach in which language has dynamic and indivisible connection with science of cognition and emotions. According to Kovecces (2010) by studying frequent conceptual metaphors, one can attain the worldview of the language society. The present study studies grief conceptual metaphors in the works of Ahmad Mahmood and Simin Daneshvar on the basis of Kovecces (2010) and investigates the effect of time and gender in the use of metaphors. The goal of this study is to understand how the concept of grief in conceptual metaphors is conceived and on the basis which concepts in the source domain, the concept of grief is formed. Also this research tries to account for how changes of time and gender in using conceptual metaphors relating to grief in the aforementioned works are shown.

When a conceptual domain is understood on the basis of another domain, a conceptual metaphor is formed. This understanding is the result of systematic mappings or correspondences between two conceptual domains. As a result, conceptual metaphor is conceived as the conceptual domain in which A is the conceptual domain of B. Mapping is a set of correspondences in two sides of metaphor. According to Kovecses (2010), the most common sources are domains of human body, health and illness, animals, plants, buildings, units and tools, games and sports, trade, cooking and food, warmth and coldness, light and darkness, forces, movement and direction, and the common targets are feelings, willingness, ethics, thoughts, society/nation, politics, economy, human relation, relation, time, life and death, religion, events and actions. Social aspect includes  men’s talking style about women, women’s talking style about men, men and women’s talking style about women describing the world generally by men and women. Focusing one metaphor on one or more target metaphor is called highlighting. The necessity of highlighting metaphor is hiding, in which aspects of the target concept which is moved away from the focus, are hidden.. For example, if  one considers the conceptual metaphors of  the present investigation namely, “container, travelling, and war”  while focusing on different aspects of the discussion such as content, advance, and success, one can understand that one only a part of the concept of  discussion is bolded and is the focus of metaphor in each.

The method of this present study is discovery and research. The method to recognize the metaphor is called Pragglejaz group (2007). In this method, the analysis of conceptual metaphor is based on the linguistic metaphor. Metaphoric meaning is the indirect meaning of the word which is the result of comparing the contextual and the main meaning used in other contexts. In Iran, literature has a special realization in south and southwest of Iran in Khuzestan, Fars, and Bushehr attracting writers of the south and also other writers to these regions. The most important of the geographic story literature comes from the efforts of south writers. Stories which have originated from the culture and nature consisting writers who are in middle urban class. The works of the south writers describe poverty, depravities and rural oppressed people who are weak and helpless and workers who are wanderer.  In this research only the works of Mahmood and Daneshvar who have many works before and Islamic revolution are chosen.

This research aims at studying the mappings and source domains in the works of Mahmood and Daneshvar before and after Islamic revolution.  In the early works of Mahmood source domains of thing, death, illness, burden, and animal behavior had the most frequency. In the post Islamic revolution works of Mahmood, the source domains of barriers, destruction, death, matters in the container, things, matters, and water had the most  frequency. One can say that Mahmood has tried to show two representation of grief by changing the focus of metaphors as the two aspects of different extrovert’s and introvert’s worldview. Analyzing the grief emotion in early works, one can see an animal which has an external reaction to grief.  He considers grief as ‘’ undesirable food’’ which by eating it, one shows beasty reactions which has external reactions. Finally, he considers grief as burden which is dreadful. But in recent works, grief pictures show a scene from the introvert aspect.  Mahmood considers, in his recent works, borders which passing them is totally destructive. Although he in the works after Islamic revolution totally moves toward reducing expression and negative expressions. But it seems that in his worldview, negative effect of grief is more severe and destructive.In the prerevolutionary works of Daneshvar, the source domains of thing, fire, heat, illness, animal behavior, pressure, and compression have the most frequency. In recent works of Daneshvar, the source domains of thing, illness, barrier, destruction, fire/heat, and death have the most frequency in showing grief. It seems that Daneshvar in her first life felt grief completely and depicted the effects of grief more destructive than the second period. In her recent works by using more frequent domains of barrier, force and water, she considers grief as a force which is a beerier for happiness, health and pleasantness. In this period of her life, one can the see increasing capacity of Daneshvar facing this emotion.