Conceptual and Semantic Explanation of Persian Idioms Based on Conceptual Blending Theory

Abstract

Idioms are an inseparable part of any language. Therefore, people frequently use them in everyday speech. Since idioms have complex semantic structures, in order to understand their meaning and main message, one needs to use their allegorical meaning depending on the different semantic fields to which they belong. In this research, authors tried to explain the concepts of Persian idioms with the help of Conceptual Blending theory of Fauconnier and Turner (2002). This research method is a qualitative one. Authors consider numerous idioms in Persian language but due to the limitations they had in data analysis, they selected 15 of the most frequent ones among them and used them in this research. The results revealed that we can explain and describe the idioms on the basis of the Conceptual Blending theory; in this way and by conceptually combining the elements of illustration with the figurative atmosphere which exists in the idioms, we can understand their meanings and intentions.

Keywords

• idiom
• conceptual blending
• metaphor
• mental image
• conceptual space