[lsmolucha@hotmail.com]

Metaphor and Figurative Thinking deserve to be addressed as separate discussion topic.
(We can expect overlap between different discussion topics or ‘threads’.) There is metaphor as a linguistic device, but also ‘visual metaphors’ that are expressed in images and later articulated in words. Such visual metaphors were also called ‘visual isomorphisms’ by Rudolph Arnheim. Figurative thinking refers to the thought process underlying verbal and visual metaphors.

OK let’s open this up to controversy: It is my understanding that according to the research literature:: preschoolers take metaphors literally, and the ability to understand metaphors develops along with conceptual thinking as one approaches adolescence. This would suggest
that when preschoolers call one thing by the name of another thing it is over-generalization.

Pretend play activity would be necessary for preschoolers to use figurative thinking.
The gesture of riding on a stick as if was a horse is necessary in order to think of the stick as a horse. It is not enough to verbally refer to a stick as a horse. Vygotsky clearly said this
in his 1933 paper on “Play and its Role in Mental Development” and earlier in his 1928 paper
“The Prehistory of Written Language.”

Please note: It was Ribot (1901)who first introduced the example of riding a stick as a horse.
Vygotsky also used Ribot’s example in “Imagination & Creativity in Childhood” (193).

There are many more ways to approach the typc of metaphor.
I am just getting us started on a new thread.

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