Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad
There is a growing interest in cognitive approaches to literature in recent years; undoubtedly conceptual metaphor has become one of the favourite topics for analysis. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in Metaphors We Live By (1980), assert that metaphor is not just a matter of words; rather it is inhe...
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| Format: | Article |
| Language: | English |
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Sciendo
2020-12-01
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| Series: | Romanian Journal of English Studies |
| Subjects: | |
| Online Access: | https://doi.org/10.1515/rjes-2020-0006 |
| _version_ | 1818027317549596672 |
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| author | Motlagh Afsaneh Askar |
| author_facet | Motlagh Afsaneh Askar |
| author_sort | Motlagh Afsaneh Askar |
| collection | DOAJ |
| description | There is a growing interest in cognitive approaches to literature in recent years; undoubtedly conceptual metaphor has become one of the favourite topics for analysis. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in Metaphors We Live By (1980), assert that metaphor is not just a matter of words; rather it is inherently conceptual and conceptual metaphors help us comprehend abstract concepts in terms of more concrete ones. This article proposes that metaphor is used to overcome the inadequacy of language in the face of indescribable phenomena, such as slavery, racism and multiple oppressions of black women throughout history in Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad (2016). Patricia Collins tries to convey through her work, Black Feminist Thought (2000), which will be used here, that all these oppressions exist even today. The result of this study indicates that Whitehead has picked up and given life to the old slavery story to emotionally engage a global audience at the present time, when racial hatred seems to be a thing of the past. |
| first_indexed | 2024-12-10T04:45:59Z |
| format | Article |
| id | doaj.art-c06c653f2afb48bfa30eb5ff41333059 |
| institution | Directory Open Access Journal |
| issn | 2286-0428 |
| language | English |
| last_indexed | 2024-12-10T04:45:59Z |
| publishDate | 2020-12-01 |
| publisher | Sciendo |
| record_format | Article |
| series | Romanian Journal of English Studies |
| spelling | doaj.art-c06c653f2afb48bfa30eb5ff413330592022-12-22T02:01:46ZengSciendoRomanian Journal of English Studies2286-04282020-12-01171385210.1515/rjes-2020-0006rjes-2020-0006Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground RailroadMotlagh Afsaneh Askar0Malayer University of HamedanThere is a growing interest in cognitive approaches to literature in recent years; undoubtedly conceptual metaphor has become one of the favourite topics for analysis. George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in Metaphors We Live By (1980), assert that metaphor is not just a matter of words; rather it is inherently conceptual and conceptual metaphors help us comprehend abstract concepts in terms of more concrete ones. This article proposes that metaphor is used to overcome the inadequacy of language in the face of indescribable phenomena, such as slavery, racism and multiple oppressions of black women throughout history in Colson Whitehead’s The Underground Railroad (2016). Patricia Collins tries to convey through her work, Black Feminist Thought (2000), which will be used here, that all these oppressions exist even today. The result of this study indicates that Whitehead has picked up and given life to the old slavery story to emotionally engage a global audience at the present time, when racial hatred seems to be a thing of the past.https://doi.org/10.1515/rjes-2020-0006colson whitehead’s the underground railroadcognitive linguisticsfreedommetaphormatrix of dominationslavery |
| spellingShingle | Motlagh Afsaneh Askar Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad Romanian Journal of English Studies colson whitehead’s the underground railroad cognitive linguistics freedom metaphor matrix of domination slavery |
| title | Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad |
| title_full | Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad |
| title_fullStr | Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad |
| title_full_unstemmed | Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad |
| title_short | Traveling Ever Toward Freedom: A Metaphorical Feminist Study of Colson Whitehead’s the Underground Railroad |
| title_sort | traveling ever toward freedom a metaphorical feminist study of colson whitehead s the underground railroad |
| topic | colson whitehead’s the underground railroad cognitive linguistics freedom metaphor matrix of domination slavery |
| url | https://doi.org/10.1515/rjes-2020-0006 |
| work_keys_str_mv | AT motlaghafsanehaskar travelingevertowardfreedomametaphoricalfeministstudyofcolsonwhiteheadstheundergroundrailroad |