2023年专八真题详解( 新题型)PART I LISTENING COMPREHENSIONSECTION AMetaphors i n Speaki ngGood moming, everyone. Today we' ll continue our discussion on the art of speaking, focusing on theuse of metaphors i n speaki ng. Now, why do we need to tal k about metaphors i n speaki ng? Wel l , accordi ng toresearch fi ndi ngs, we utter about si x metaphors a mi nute. And metaphori cal thi nki ng i s essenti al to how weunderstand oursel ves and others, how we communi cate, l earn, di scover and i nvent. Actual l y, [ 1] metaphor i sa way of thought before it is a way with words. Now, to assist me in expl aining this, I' ve enl isted the hel pof a man whose contri buti ons to the fi el d are so tremendous that he hi msel f has become a metaphor. I am,of course, referri ng to none other than El vi s Presl ey. Hi s Al Shook Up i s such a touchi ng l ove song. [ 2] It' sal so an exampl e of how we i nevi tabl y resort to metaphor when we deal wi th anythi ng abstract, l i ke i deas,emoti ons, feel i ngs, concepts, thoughts. In thi s, El vi s i s fol l owi ng [3]Ari stotl e' s cl assi c defi ni ti on of metaphor,that is, metaphor is the process of giving the thing a name that belongs to something else. And this is themathematics of metaphor. X equals Y. It' s very simple, isn' t it? This formula works wherever metaphor ispresent. Elvis used metaphor, and so does Shakespeare in this famous line from Romeo and huliet, that is,“Juliet is the sun.” Now here, Shakespeare gives the thing, Juliet, a name that belongs to something else, thesun. In fact, [4]whenever we gi ve a thi ng a name that bel ongs to somethi ng el se, we gi ve i t a whol e networkof analogies too. We mix and match what we know about the metaphor' s source, in this case, the sun, withwhat we know about i ts target, Jul i et. [5]And metaphor gi ves us a much more vi vi d understandi ng of Jul i etthan if Shakespeare had literally described j ust what she looks like.So how do we make and i nterpret metaphors? Thi s mi ght l ook fami l i ar. [ 6] The fi rst step i s pattemrecogni ti on. Metaphor i s not j ust the detecti on of patterns; i nstead, i t i s the creati on of patterns. And thesecond step i s conceptual synesthesi a. And what i s synesthesi a? [7]It i s the experi ence of a sti mul us recei vedby one sense organ and another sense organ as wel l , [ 8] for exampl e, l i ke col ored heari ng. Peopl e wi th col oredhearing actual l y see col ors when they hear the sounds of words or l etters. We al l have synesthetic abil ities,and many of the metaphors we use every day are synestheti c. For i nstance, si l ence i s sweet. Neckti es arel oud. So metaphor creates a ki nd of conceptual synesthesi a, i n whi ch we understand one concept i n thecontext of...
