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While the MIP and MIPVU were designed to be rigorous testing procedures with as high a level of objectivity as possible, there is still potential for disagreement over, for example, which sense of a word is the most basic, or whether there is a sufficient relationship between the word’s basic and contextual sense for it to be deemed

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metaphorically used. The Pragglejaz Group (2007) sought to mitigate these concerns by introducing multiple rounds of coding and discussion between raters, which had a positive impact on inter-rater reliability. In this study, too, the data was checked through after the first round of coding, and so-called ‘tricky cases’ were discussed with an experienced metaphor analyst. These tricky cases were often those in which the relationship between the basic and contextual senses was difficult to define. Table 2.8 below gives examples of some of these ‘tricky cases’, with a brief summary of why they posed problems in the first round of coding.

Language and level

Tricky case Reason for difficulty Decision

Japanese FCE Patients who have serious desease (sic)

Could be metaphorical as a

‘disease’ is not a physical object to be possessed. However, diseases are caused by bacteria and viruses which are concrete things; does this mean that diseases can be literally ‘had’?

Indirect metaphor

Japanese FCE Ordinary people are keen on watching film stars

The basic sense of ‘keen’ is

‘sharp’, as in the example ‘a keen blade’. Is there enough of a

If the basic sense of ‘alone’ refers to people, is it an example of

Table 2.8 Examples of 'tricky cases'

79 2.4 Conclusion

This chapter has introduced the Cambridge Learner Corpus and the method used to extract texts from it for the present study. It was also noted that the essays that make up the corpus for this study are from different levels of the CEFR, and these levels were also briefly introduced. Next, the data formatting decisions were described. Finally, the procedure used to identify the metaphors in the corpus was introduced, along with some of the practicalities of data annotation.

In the next chapter, the quantitative results produced from this analysis are presented and discussed.

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3.1 Introduction

One significant concern expressed by Nacey (2013) is the paucity of quantitative data on metaphor use by learners of English. Her own research goes a significant way towards rectifying this lack, but as mentioned in Chapter One, it focuses on metaphor use by higher-intermediate and advanced learners, comparing it to the writing of native speaker A-level students. Her results give a fascinating insight into metaphor use by learners of English and how it differs from native-speaker metaphor use, but it does not address the question of metaphor development. Littlemore et al.’s (2014) study was the first to do this, investigating metaphor use at different student levels, with a focus on German and Greek learners of English. Their study uncovered a certain degree of variation between the two language backgrounds. In particular, the German-speaking learners produced much less metaphor at KET level than their Greek counterparts, and there was also a statistically significant increase in their metaphoric densities between levels CAE and CPE which was not found in the Greek data (Littlemore et al., 2014).

These findings highlight the need for further research focusing on students from different language backgrounds, and the results reported in this chapter aim to complement those of Littlemore et al (2014) to add another piece to the growing picture of metaphor use in learner English. They also provide a quantitative foundation to contextualise the results of the studies reported in subsequent chapters.

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This chapter is primarily concerned with answering Research Question One, investigating how learners’ use of metaphor changes as they progress in their language learning. This question can be further divided into the following subsections:

a) How does the metaphoric density of writing produced by learners vary depending on their CEFR level and native language?

b) How much variation in metaphor density is there among learners of the same CEFR level and native language?

c) How does the use of metaphor clusters vary according to CEFR level and native language?

d) How does the type of metaphor used vary according to CEFR level and native language? This includes use of indirect metaphor, direct metaphor, implicit metaphor and possible personification.

e) How does the use of open-class and closed-class metaphor vary according to CEFR level and native language?

f) How much variation in the words used metaphorically by learners is observed as they progress through the levels?

g) Does text genre have an effect on metaphoric density?

The level of detail afforded by these questions is necessary because merely investigating metaphoric density does not give the full picture. After all, metaphor use would be expected to increase as the levels advance. As so many words in the English language are metaphorically used, it seems self-evident; as vocabulary knowledge increases, so too will metaphor use, as students will learn more words and phrases that are frequently metaphorically used. Metaphor also plays a significant role in polysemy, with

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the different meaning extensions of a word frequently being linked metaphorically with the more basic, prototypical sense (Littlemore, 2009, Taylor, 2002). As learners develop their vocabulary depth and become more aware of the different senses a word can have, they will thus inevitably begin to produce more metaphor. This increase was also demonstrated in the German and Greek learners’ writing investigated by Littlemore et al.

(2014), and there is no reason to expect that the French and Japanese learners considered in this thesis will substantially differ in their metaphoric development in this regard. The more interesting insights are therefore to be found in explorations of the type and variety of metaphors learners use.

3.2 Research Question 1a: How does the metaphoric density of writing