Creating Perspective with Perspective
Metaphor
Who says you should know about metaphors (outside of your 7th grade English teacher)? Well, some people hope you don’t learn too much about metaphors (marketers, speechwriters, ad copy writers, screenwriters, or pundits) as you might latch onto their secrets.
Metaphors are part of a language system of non-literal comparisons. A literal comparison would inform you, for instance, that one liter of liquid is equivalent to .264 of a gallon, or that Janie is as tall as Damian Lillard (6 ft. 2 in. (or 189 cm)), or helping you understand the size of a western state county: “He [sheriff Brian Wolfe] headed off to spend his first hours on duty patrolling the roads of a county larger than the state of Delaware.” (Don’t tell Joe Biden that Oregon has a county bigger than his state!)
On the other hand, a non-literal comparison takes two dissimilar things and asks you to consider one in light of the other.
One keen observer of metaphors offers this: “Metaphors are the mind’s way of making sense of the world.” Sounds pretty important.
So, buckle in. Let’s examine some metaphors and other non-literal comparisons. And realize, before we start, that all metaphors are technically lies, since literally they cannot be true; yet, we find wonderful value and insight in these lies. If lying in other sectors of life is cause for fear or concern of a real moral stain, think of this working definition of a lie: an intentionally false statement. Thereby, an attorney making an intentionally false statement about a person on trial for embezzlement should be taken to task for a dangerous breach of professional behavior, whereas a writer making an intentionally false statement via a metaphor is recognized as using a tool of language.
Strong metaphors are famous for creating perspective, like this:
“Are you juggling rubber balls or glass balls?“
A well-known blogger (Peter Winick) used this metaphoric question when making a quick point about schedules, planning, and priorities: If you don’t take care of important (irreplaceable) items, you will suffer undesirable consequences. This writer took two dissimilar things (priority tasks and glass balls) and placed them in relationship to each other by using a common idea (when I have to make decisions about appointments, jobs, responsibilities, and meetings I “juggle” things). However, by using the idea of “glass balls” (does any juggler actually use glass balls?), we’re encouraged to think about our planning and priorities differently. Do we have some items (say a Feb. meeting of the sub-group for planning summer parties) that, as a “rubber ball,” wouldn’t be harmed if we missed the meeting (or metaphorically “dropped the ball”)? While other events (say our grandparents’ 50th wedding anniversary party) would create a disaster if we missed it (a “glass ball”). So, a properly created, or used, metaphor can quickly focus minds and hearts.
Let’s use another example to ask about the mechanism of meaning creation when using metaphors (or other non-literal comparisons):
In 2016 New York Times writer Jim Kerstetter was one of many observers of social media tech noting that Twitter was still making money, but not gaining new users at an acceptable level of growth; he put it like this:
“Now you may ask: Why does it matter that user growth has stalled, when revenue is still going up? To answer that question, let’s use the neighborhood deli metaphor. Consider an ad on Twitter — that’s how the company makes money, after all, — to be a tasty pastrami sandwich. Now imagine everyone within five blocks of your deli loves your pastrami sandwiches. But it is impossible to sell sandwiches outside of that five-block neighborhood. At some point, you’re going to run out of customers. Even worse, they’ll probably get tired of your pastrami and start eating something else. That’s what happens when Twitter stops growing. If its users are limited — like the deli’s neighborhood — the number of ads it can sell is capped. And once it hits that cap, there is nowhere to go but down.“
So, the pieces of this metaphor are: 1) a twitter ad, 2) a tasty pastrami sandwich, 3) Twitter, and 4) a neighborhood deli. By asking us to think of two dissimilar items for sale (a social media ad and a sandwich) concerning why we should be concerned about the Twitter business model, the NYTimes writer creates usable perspective. The individual ad, and the individual sandwich, aren’t nearly as important as factors constraining the neighborhood deli (hence possible factors of slowing growth for Twitter). By raising problems (e.g., geographic limitation to a customer base, or other eating options) faced by a neighborhood deli, the writer compels us to see some of the potential problems faced by Twitter gaining fewer users via a very tangible (tasty?) example.
But, perhaps you don’t care about twitter, or delis, or juggling. Should you still be concerned with better understanding metaphors? Yep!
Another seasoned observer and analyst of metaphors said: “A metaphor is a kind of magical mental changing room—where one thing, for a moment, becomes another, and in that moment is seen in a whole new way. . . . As soon as something old [or well-known] is seen in a new way, it stimulates a torrent of new thoughts and associations, almost as if a mental floodgate has been lifted.” (Grothe, 2008, p. 10)
So it seems with this comparison:
When an internet meme poses Foghorn Leghorn talking to a cartoon Donald Trump:
“Boy, I say, boy!
You’ve got more loose screws than a hardware store in an earthquake.”
Chances are you’ve never even thought once about a hardware store in an earthquake, let along the impact on screws in a shaken hardware store; yet the meme creator (playing on the idiom of crazy=a screw loose) tried to capture your attention with humor and a metaphor.
How does such a comparison break down in analysis? By component parts: who or what are we trying to describe? Answer: Donald J. Trump’s mental capacity. What are the touch points of the comparison? Answer: A hardware store. An earthquake. Resulting spillage of many containers or packages of screws. Result: humorous vision of shelves disrupted, and screws (among many other items) scattered about. Hence via metaphoric shorthand: devastation and ruin (in a hardware store beset by an earthquake) = Donald Trump’s mental capacity. BUT, what takes ten sentences to describe about the components of metaphorically-driven meaning, actually creates meaning in your mind in a fraction of a second after you’ve recognized the meme; thus pointing out another benefit of using a well-crafted metaphor: speed!
So, if you could use certain parts of language that would create powerful, instantaneous, perspective-creating meaning, should you learn more about how such language tools work? Of course.
So, as we’ve already discussed non-literal comparisons (including metaphors) operate by placing two unlike items in conceptual relationship to each other. At the risk of sounding a bit too much like Dr. Seuss let’s call those “Thing One” and “Thing Two.”
Thing One: Life in the World
Thing Two: A Stage; a play; performers in a play.
Obviously, life in the world encompasses many different elements, events, and aspects. This line of dialog seeks to utilize aspects of Thing Two (performers in a stage play) to emphasize that living life (Thing One) is much the same as a theatrical performance:
“All the world’s a stage, and all the men and women merely players.”
-Shakespeare
As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII
Of course, Shakespeare actually expanded on his basic metaphor in As You Like It, but the core comparison has become a standard of Western civilization’s received wisdom of how life works. Herein, Thing One (our lives in the world) partakes in the dynamics of Thing Two (a theatrical stage play (e.g., costumes, dialog, movement, plot, drama, etc.)). Thereby, we’re encouraged by the bard to perceive aspects of life experience as if we were actors on a stage, with all the attendant implications. Consider, if he’d written instead: “All the world’s a mountain, and all people are merely climbers,” we’d be encouraged to experience life from a very different vantage point.
Or, again, from a social media meme:
Thing One: Experiences in Life
Thing Two: Choosing Personal Response Upon Hearing Music Playing.
Obviously, experiences in life are so varied that they may encompass many different elements, events, and aspects. This meme comparison seeks to utilize aspects of Thing Two (hearing music playing and then deciding how to personally respond) so as to suggest that you have choice in your responses to experiences in life (Thing One):
“We can’t always choose the music life plays for us, but we can choose how we dance to it.”
-Unknown
One, last, quick example:
Thing One: The late Supreme Court Justice, Ruth Bader Ginsburg
Thing Two: Fragility in a flower/in a bomb
While it’s not at all unusual to compare a dynamic, forceful person to explosive material, this simile utilizes a couple of other elements:
(Juxtaposed to a stylized headshot of Ruth Bader Ginsburg):
NOT FRAGILE LIKE A FLOWER
FRAGILE LIKE A BOMB
Hence, the creator of this non-literal comparison begins with the concept of fragility and thereafter uses the contrast between a flower and a bomb (both fragile, but in significantly different ways) to suggest that Ruth Bader Ginsburg’s seeming vulnerability masked tremendous danger and power (two known attributes of bombs). By giving you advice about how to think about Justice Ginsburg the creator of this garment message allows the power of Thing Two to create awareness about Thing One.
This quick trip though metaphor (and other non-literal comparisons), should give you a decent start in understanding how such comparisons help create meaning.
Since we've only scratched the surface of metaphors, and other non-literal comparisons, make sure you can continue your exploration of metaphors. Follow up and do more reading and thinking about metaphors and other types of comparisons; below you'll find some important sources to choose from.
Explore Sources
Grothe, Mardy. I Never Metaphor I Didn’t Like. New York: HarperCollins, 2008.
Geary, James. I is an Other. New York: HarperCollins, 2011.
Pierce, Dann L. Introductory Rhetorical Metaphor Analysis. 2nd ed. Portland: River Kishon, 2016.
Pierce, Dann L. Metaphors and Beyond: The Guide. River Kishon, 2023.