Metaphtonymy

Coined by L. GOOSSENS, in his 'Metaphtonymy', in L Goossens, P Pauwels, B. Rudzka-Ostyn, A Simon-Vandenbergen & J Vanparys, eds. Metaphor/Metonymy. Mailto:OED3 about it.

The word was coined by L. Gossens in 1990, & was reviewed by C. Forceville in _JPragm_ (vol. 28) -- review of P Bawels & al, Metaphor/metonymy.

Gossens's essay is repr., with a postscript, in R Dirven & R Poerings, _Metaphor and Metonymy_ (Gruyter)).

C. Forceville writes:

"In his first contribution, "Metaphtonymy: the interaction of metaphor & metonymy in figurative expressions for linguistic action," Goossens proposes to investigate non-literal linguistic action expressions with as their donor domains `body parts,' `sound,' and `violent action.' The database yields about 100 items in each of these categories, which are further subdivided.

In the `sound' category, Goossens mentions "to bark" (as in "to bark a command") as a typical example of metaphor. The situation is different, however, for "giggle", in
"`Oh dear,' she giggled, 'I'd quite forgotten.'""Giggle," Goossens argues, can be understood in terms of metaphor, namely if we conceive of the speaker talking as if giggling. On the other hand, we can also interpret the utterance as a _combo_ of talking and giggling.

If the latter, no domain boundaries are crossed; the giggling is part of the whole, which suggests synecdoche, hence metonymy. But often contexts do not unequivocally make clear which of the situations applies.

Goossens concludes that in many such cases, "we are still aware of the metonymic
basis in the metaphorical interpretation" (p. 164) and hence proposes to call this

`metaphor from metonymy.'

While the domain of violent action, providing only a handful of items with a metonymic ingredient, is dealt with in a short, somewhat cryptic half page, the domain of body parts is rich and complex enough to warrant further subdivisions.
About half of the 100 cases can be classified as

pure metaphors

or

pure metonyms;

most of the remaining (`mixed') cases feature either

`metaphor from metonymy'

(As in "talk with one's tongue in one's cheek"
and "close-lipped"), or

`metonymy within metaphor'


("Bite one's tongue off"; "catch someone's ear").

In the latter, a body-part occurs both in the donor and the target domain, but with such a different function that a metaphorical interpretation is inescapable.

Goossens also discusses two rare cases,

`metaphor within metonymy'

and
`demetonymization in a metaphorical context,'

each of which he identifies only once in his corpus.

While Goossens' two main categories of `metaphtonymy' are suggestive, the single occurrences of the rare cases do not lead to a clear delineation and require further
theorizing. In his second paper, Goossens discusses metaphtonymy in more depth by applying the concept to uses of the word `mouth' in the works of Aelfric (late Old English), Chaucer (Middle English), and Shakespeare (early Modern English) respectively -- which allows for a diachronic investigation.

Goossens first distinguishes five metonymic uses of

`mouth,'

supporting them with examples from his corpus.

-- We should do 'arse'
as in

"We sailed to the arsehole of the river".

Sadly, I see the arsehole of the river from my window -- every morning!

"After showing that some cases could also be interpreted literally, and hence that there is a clear continuum between literal and metonymic uses, he goes on to demonstrate his thesis that some cases are mid-way between metonyms and metaphors -- his metaphtonyms."

Whereas some cases in the corpus are ambiguous between metonym and metaphor, allowing for two discrete interpretations, others feature aspects of both, and
should therefore be located somewhere on the continuum between them, whereby the subtypes identified in Goossens' preceding paper are illustrated and discussed.

The final part examines to what extent the five main types of metonymy involved in

`mouth'

have become

'conventionalized'

-- NOT pace Grice! -- in present-day English, and suggests which factors have contributed to, or blocked, standardization.

Although Goossens adduces a wealth of data, which convincingly show different subtypes of metonymy, their metaphorical element remains

somewhat obscure.

to speak metaphtonymically.

This is mainly due to the fact that he fails to discuss in sufficient detail how in his examples a feature from a donor domain is projected onto another domain, which is, after all, the hallmark of metaphor, if not metonymy (Never mind metaphtonymy).

This remaining unclear, it is in turn difficult to see how exactly the different subtypes of metaphtonymy are to be distinguished from one another."

Or, as Grice would say,

Do not multiply metaphtonymies beyond neccesity/metonymy.

Etc.