Book Description

This book analyses the conceptual mechanisms behind the notion of “The Christian Life” in the collection of sermons preached by John Henry Newman (1801–1890) and published in eight volumes as Parochial and Plain Sermons (1834–1843). The study utilises tools of cognitive semantics, such as the theory of conceptual metaphor and metonymy and the theory of conceptual integration. Cognitivism offers an integral perspective on language and is gaining in popularity among scholars in the whole world. The book identifies a number of metaphorical models of “The Christian Life” in Newman’s sermons, based on structural metaphors, such as “A Journey”, “A Race”, “A Trial” and “Family Life”, as well as some models based on ontological metaphors, such as animalisations (“The Sheepfold” metaphor), vegetalisations (the “Christ is a Plant” metaphor) and reifications (“The Gift” metaphor). Each of the models constitutes a coherent set of metaphors, metonymies and metaphtonymies, present throughout the whole of Newman’s Parochial and Plain Sermons. It is also shown that the conceptualisation of “The Christian Life” is based on conceptual blending between conventional metaphors functioning in everyday English and the transcendental conceptual domain of “Christianity”. The book will be of interest to linguists, particularly those interested in cognitive linguistics, as well as to theologians, especially those focused on the theory of preaching, and to everyone interested in the legacy of John Henry Newman.