Chapter 5. Mixed metaphor

The article sketches how a particular approach to metaphor, the ATT-Meta approach, which has been partially realized in an implemented AI program, copes with various types of mixing. Mixing here is broadly construed as including felicitous compounding, not only infelicitous mixes such as when there are unintended comical effects. The structures of mixing considered included chaining (called here serial mixing), parallel mixing (e.g., when different metaphorical views are brought to bear on the target of the metaphor), and combinations of serial and parallel mixing. ATT-Meta has specific technical advantages as regards mixing. These include (i) a focus on individual mappings as opposed to packages of mappings such as conceptual metaphors, (ii) the use of generic mappings called view-neutral mapping adjuncts, which are not specific to particular metaphorical views and cope with certain core types of information that are commonly manipulated in metaphor, and (iii) the construal of mappings as going from pretence spaces (fictional spaces) to surrounding reasoning spaces as opposed to going from one domain to another.