There is broad agreement among evolutionary linguists that the emergence of human language, as opposed to other primate communication systems, is characterised by two key phenomena: the use of symbols, and the use of grammatical structure (Tomasello 2003). In this paper, we show that these two defining aspects of language actually emerge from the same set of underlying cognitive mechanisms with...

Although the field of natural language processing has made considerable strides in the automated processing of standard language, figurative (i.e., non-literal) language still causes great difficulty. Normally, when we understand human language we combine the meaning of individual words into larger units in a compositional manner. However, understanding figurative language often involves an int...

Suppose you ask a colleague how a class he just taught went, and he replies that "It was a great class the students were glued to their seats." There are two clearly distinct interpretations of this utterance, which might usefully be categorized as a literal and a figurative one. Which interpretation you believe is appropriate will determine your course of action; whether you congratulate your ...

The aim of this research is to elaborate Rumi's metaphorical disclosure in one his works, entitled Fihi Ma Fihi. complexity diction literary work can characterize as imagery, specifically metaphor. Jalal Al-Din Rumi was distinguished by works containing exquisite language, the unlikeness figurative language and placing him Persian Poet Top Seller America 1997. Therefore, utilize theoretical cri...

Abstract Very little is known about the processes underlying second language (L2) speakers’ understanding of written metaphors and similes. Moreover, most theories on figurative comprehension do not consider reader-related factors. In study, we used eye-tracking to examine how native Finnish speakers ( N = 63) read English nominal (“education a stairway”) similes like stairway”). Identical topi...

The domain of figurative language comprehension was used to probe the developmental relation between language and cognition in typically developing individuals and individuals with Williams syndrome. Extending the work of Vosniadou and Ortony, the emergence of nonliteral similarity and category knowledge was investigated in 117 typically developing children between 4 and 12 years of age, 19 typ...

While vampires are proliferating in children’s and young adult literature, the increasingly popular werewolf figure also deserves attention, particularly given the intriguing links that particular authors draw between the werewolf and disability. These links are seen in not only the two works I discuss in this paper, but others as well (for example, in Howl’s Moving Castle, a man cursed into th...

Analogy is a figure of speech used in different fields including advertising. Metaphor and simile are the figurative devices for creating analogy. Unlike metaphor simile, analogy has not received enough attention from researchers. There limited number studies on as an independent literary phenomenon rarely studied persuasive tool Accordingly, main aim this study to highlight successful applicat...