This study seeks to clarify the nature of linguistic synesthesia using a lexical-conceptual account. Based on a lexical analysis of Mandarin synesthetic usages, we find that linguistic synesthesia maps the metaphorical meaning between two domains; and linguistic synesthetic mappings and conceptual metaphoric mappings have similar behaviors when sense modalities are treated as conceptual domains that contain a set of mappings constrained by Mapping Principles. This lexical-conceptual account is designed to capture the fact that linguistic synesthesia involves mapping between lexicalized concepts (...) of sensory properties, instead of the real-time sensory input that is processed in neurological synesthesia. The incorporation of a lexical semantic view with the framework of Conceptual Metaphor Theory not only offers a coherent and comprehensive account for the nature of linguistic synesthesia, but also handles aspects of linguistic synesthesia previously only accounted for by non-metaphorical accounts. These design features make this proposal the most comprehensive account to fit the current data. Furthermore, by showing linguistic synesthesia as a type of metaphor, our study strengthens the role of conceptual metaphors as the link between the perceived world and our conceptualization of that world. (shrink)

Meaning in sensory language is often built through figurative mechanisms, such as synesthetic metaphors, where a sensorial domain is used to talk about perceptions from a different sense, as in sweet[taste] texture[touch]. The motivation of synesthetic transfers of meaning has been studied in general and literary language, resulting in attempts to reveal universal patterns regarding the directionality of meaning transfer and sensorial conceptual preference. However, those universals have not been proven in any sensory Language for Specific Purposes (LSP). We a (...) sensory LSP corpus of olive oil tasing notes in English to explore the nature of these metaphors, test existent models and explanatory accounts and identify tendencies present in synesthetic meaning transfers. The computer-assisted semi-automatic scalable methodology followed consists of the innovative quasi-simultaneous identification of semantic incongruences and the classification of synesthetic expressions in the discourse according to the source and target sensorial domains. Results show the inadequacy of existent models to explain synesthetic behavior in olive oil tasting language. The patterns found are discussed in the light of cognitive constraints and LSP genre analysis to conclude that a multi-causal approach is needed to explain the motivation of synesthetic transfers of meaning. (shrink)