The Function of Metaphor in Cultural Investigation of the Language:The Case Study of “the World as a Market”in the Qur’an from the Perspective of Cognitive-Cultural Linguistics

In recent years, cognitive linguistics and particularly its cultural dimension as a research-provoking theory related to different aspects of language, has attracted the attention of more scholars. Among the concepts presented in this theory, conceptual metaphors can be considered useful means for analyzing all kinds of texts, especially sacred texts. Sharifian (2017) used conceptual metaphors as an analytical tool to provide cultural explanations for linguistic phenomena. The present research used Shairifan's cultural linguistics model as its theoretical framework to analyze Qur’anic ayahs containing "the world as a market" metaphor. The language and method of the Holy Qur’an is based on mores and meta-mores. Naturally, Qur’anic implications share this feature so that the intended concepts can be explained to the Qur’an's audience. Considering the culture-building role of metaphor as well as its use in Arabic as a rhetorical device, the almighty God has not only proscribed using it but has confirmed its usage as it can change the mental and behavioral patterns of humans. The main questions of this study concerns the frequency and the causes of using the metaphor of life as a market, identifying the surahs where it has been used more frequently and how the cognitive cultural linguistics can explain this application. Content analysis and qualitative analysis (to respectively estimate and evaluate the frequency of the use of this metaphor and to present cultural-cognitive indications of the reasons for using it in the text of theHoly Qur’an) were used as research methods. The research corpus consisted of all Qur’anic ayahs. The ayahs containing lexical items having to do with market and trade and their frequency were identified. The results show that this conceptual metaphor is used in 2.2 percent of all ayahs. Furthermore, this metaphor appears much more frequently in Medinan surahs than in Meccan ones because given the role and importance of market and trade in the life of early Islam Arabs and in general due to their significance in supplying humans' physiological needs, historical-social developments in a country can be regarded as an independent variable.