Cover not available

Article published In: Review of Cognitive Linguistics
Vol. 12:2 (2014) ► pp.375–409

Get fulltext from our e-platform
JBE logo with link
PDF logo with download linkDownload PDF
authorization required

The two-Mover hypothesis and the significance of “direction of motion” in temporal metaphors

 | San José State University
Published online: 31 October 2014
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/rcl.12.2.05moo
It is claimed that expressions that instantiate sequence is relative position on a path (e.g. Spring follows winter) are the only type of temporal expression in English in which two distinct entities metaphorically move. A possible motivation for why we do not find two Times-as-Movers going the opposite “direction” may be that people are not disposed to tracking two “nows”. It is further hypothesized that this could be a crosslinguistically common or universal tendency, and data relevant to the constraint are discussed for Japanese and Wolof (West Africa). This exercise documents and categorizes certain semantic relations (such as ahead/behind) that are relevant to the study of direction of motion in metaphors of time.
References (38)
Bender, A., Beller, S., & Bennardo, G. (2010). Temporal frames of reference: Conceptual analysis and empirical evidence from German, English, Mandarin Chinese, and Tongan. Journal of Cognition and Culture, 101, 283–307. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Clark, H. (1973). Space, time, semantics, and the child. In T.E. Moore (Ed.), Cognitive development and the acquisition of language (pp. 27–63). New York: Academic Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cutrer, M. (1994). Time and tense in narratives and everyday language. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of California at San Diego.
Einstein, A. (1961). Relativity: The special and the general theory. [Translated by Robert W. Lawson.] New York: Three Rivers Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Evans, V. (2013). Language and time: A cognitive linguistics approach. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fauconnier, G. (1994/1985). Mental spaces: Aspects of meaning construction in natural language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (1997). Mappings in thought and language. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fauconnier, G., & Turner, M. (2002). The way we think: Conceptual blending and the mind’s hidden complexities. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Fillmore, C. (1982). Towards a descriptive framework for spatial deixis. In R. Jarvella & W. Klein (Eds.), Speech, place, and action: Studies in deixis and related topics (pp. 31–59). Chinchester: John Wiley and Sons Ltd.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (1997/1971). Lectures on deixis. Stanford: CSLI Publications.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Grady, J. (1997). Foundations of meaning: Primary metaphors and primary scenes. Ph.D. Dissertation. University of California at Berkeley.
. (1999). A typology of motivation for conceptual metaphor: Correlation vs. resemblance. In R. Gibbs & G. Steen (Eds.), Metaphor in cognitive linguistics (pp. 79–100). 
Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (2005). Primary metaphors as inputs to conceptual integration. Journal of Pragmatics, 371, 1595–1614. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hanks, W. (1990). Referential practice: Language and lived space among the Maya. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Hill, C. (1978). Linguistic representation of spatial and temporal orientation. In J. Jaeger, 
A. Woodbury, F. Ackerman, C. Chiarello, O. Gensler, J. Kingston, E. Sweetser, 
H. Thompson & K. Whistler (Eds.), Proceedings of the fourth annual meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (pp. 524–538).
Hutchins, E. (2005). Material anchors for conceptual blends. Journal of Pragmatics, 371, 1555–1577. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lakoff, G. (1987). Women, fire, and dangerous things: What categories reveal about the mind. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought. New York: Basic Books.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Turner, M. (1989). More than cool reason: A field guide to poetic metaphor. Chicago: The University of Chicago Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Levinson, S.C. (2003). Space in language and cognition. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Liddell, S. (2003). Grammar, gesture, and meaning in American Sign Language. Cambridge, MA: Cambridge University Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
McTaggart, J.M.E. (1908). The unreality of time. Mind, 171, 456–473.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Moore, K.E. (2006). Space-to-time mappings and temporal concepts. Cognitive Linguistics, 171, 199–244. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
. (2011). Ego-perspective and field-based frames of reference: temporal meanings of front in Japanese, Wolof, and Aymara. Journal of Pragmatics, 431, 759–776. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Newton, I. (1686). Philosophiae naturalis principia mathematica. London: Royal Society.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Núñez, R. (1999). Could the future taste purple? Reclaiming mind, body, and cognition. In R. Núñez & W.J. Freeman (Eds.), Reclaiming cognition: The primacy of action, intention, and emotion (pp. 41–60). Thorverton, UK: Imprint Academic.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Ohara, K. (Kyoko Hirose Ohara). (1991). Extensions of mae and saki from space to time. UC Berkeley: Unpublished.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shinohara, K., & Matsunaka, Y. (2010). Frames of reference, effects of motion, and lexical meanings of Japanese front/back terms. In V. Evans & P. Chilton (Eds.), Language, cognition, and culture: The state of the art and new directions (pp. 293–315). London: Equinox.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Shinohara, K., & Pardeshi, P. (2011). The more in front, the later: The role of positional terms in time metaphors. Journal of Pragmatics, 431, 749–758. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Svorou, S. (1994). The grammar of space. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Talmy, L. (2000). Toward a cognitive semantics: Volume 1, Concept structuring systems. 
Cambridge: MIT Press.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Tenbrink, T. (2011). Reference frames of space and time in language. Journal of Pragmatics, 431, 704–722. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Traugott, E.C. (1975). Spatial expressions of tense and temporal sequencing: A contribution to the study of semantic fields. Semiotica, 151, 207–230. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Yu, N. (2012). The metaphorical orientation of time in Chinese. Journal of Pragmatics, 441, 1335–1354. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar
Cited by (11)

Cited by 11 other publications

Yang, Yongfei, Chris Sinha & Luna Filipovic
2023. Sequential Time construal is primary in temporal uses of Mandarin Chinese qian ‘front’ and hou ‘back’. Language Sciences 95 ► pp. 101511 ff. DOI logo
Huumo, Tuomas & Krista Teeri-Niknammoghadam
2022. Moving reader or moving text?. In Analogy and Contrast in Language [Human Cognitive Processing, 73], ► pp. 371 ff. DOI logo
Zhong, Lingli & Zhengguang Liu
2022. Metonymic event-based time interval concepts in Mandarin Chinese—Evidence from time interval words. Frontiers in Psychology 13 DOI logo
Vesić Pavlović, Tijana
2018. The role of path metaphors in conceptualising life in English and Serbian: a corpus-based analysis. Brno studies in English :1 ► pp. [63] ff. DOI logo
MOORE, KEVIN EZRA
2017. Elaborating time in space: the structure and function of space–motion metaphors of time. Language and Cognition 9:2 ► pp. 191 ff. DOI logo
Ruiz de Mendoza Ibáñez, Francisco José
2017. Conceptual complexes in cognitive modeling. Revista Española de Lingüística Aplicada/Spanish Journal of Applied Linguistics 30:1 ► pp. 299 ff. DOI logo
Huumo, Tuomas
2015. Temporal frames of reference and the locative case marking of the Finnish adposition ete- ‘in front of / ahead’. Lingua 164 ► pp. 45 ff. DOI logo
Huumo, Tuomas
2017. The grammar of temporal motion: A Cognitive Grammar account of motion metaphors of time. Cognitive Linguistics 28:1 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
HUUMO, TUOMAS
2018. Moving along paths in space and time. Journal of Linguistics 54:4 ► pp. 721 ff. DOI logo
Huumo, Tuomas
2019. Why Monday is notin front ofTuesday: On the uses of English and Finnish front adpositions in sequence metaphors of time. Linguistics 57:3 ► pp. 607 ff. DOI logo
[no author supplied]
2022. Figuring out Figuration [Figurative Thought and Language, 14], DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 30 november 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.

Mobile Menu Logo with link to supplementary files background Layer 1 prag Twitter_Logo_Blue