Grasping metaphoric and metonymic processes in terminology

Abstract

Metaphor plays an important role in language creativity and knowledge representation in specialised domains, and its role has been studied by scholars in the field (e.g. Temmerman 2000; Faber and Márquez 2004; Tercedor Sánchez 2004; Ureña Gómez Moreno 2011; Vandaele and Lubin 2005). In contrast, metonymy has received little attention in terminology. In this paper, we describe salient features of metaphor and metonymy in specialised domains and show the importance of retrieving and codifying specialised knowledge units through metaphoric and metonymic patterns in texts. Special attention is given to the cultural differences of metaphoric and metonymic processes. We illustrate these features with data from the environmental domain.