Metaphors that Entrap

A large body of research has been conducted into what is termed by cognitive scientists as metaphor. So as not to muddy the waters, think of metaphor as a template or lens through which you view the world. Cognitive scientists have been systematically unpacking the significance of conceptual metaphor in our daily lives since the sixties.


Those scholars propose that metaphors are not simply playthings of the mind, but are a “natural outgrowth of the manner in which our minds are constituted”. What that means is that conceptual metaphors are product of your neurophysiology, that you have a genetic predisposition to attribute meaning to things by way of metaphor.

George Lakoff is professor of cognitive sciences at the University of California at Berkely and he asserts that metaphor rules almost all of our thinking:

“We may not always know it, but we think in metaphor. A large proportion of our most commonplace thoughts make use of an extensive, but unconscious, system of metaphorical concepts, that is, concepts from a typically concrete realm of thought that are used to comprehend another, completely different domain. Such concepts are often reflected in everyday language, but their most dramatic effect comes in ordinary reasoning.

Because so much of our social and political reasoning makes use of this system of metaphorical concepts, any adequate appreciation of even the most mundane social and political thought requires an understanding of this system. But unless one knows that the system exists, one may miss it altogether and be mystified by its effects”.

On the conscious level metaphor can create shortcuts to understanding: cognition as the crow flies. Say, you have a complex idea you need to get across. The choice is yours: you can take your audience on a energy-sapping trek through the terrain, cross raging rivers of data, scale each conceptual obstacle as you come to it and finally, if you’re lucky, arrive at your destination. Or, you can invite them to take flight, fix their bearings and make their way to journey’s end on the wing of a metaphor.

The above is a crude metaphor for the complex internal processes involved in learning something new by linking it to something you already know or something universally known. It’s also an example of a surface metaphor. You understand the hitherto unknown by associating it or joining it to something familiar. You’re aware of a metaphor being used and you recognise how the metaphor was constructed to illustrate why metaphor can be the shortest way to explain difficult concepts. These types of metaphors are described as superficial, or surface, although they may draw on deeper conceptual metaphors.

Many people imagine metaphor as a by-product of the mastery and creative use of language. Metaphors are viewed as cute linguistic toys and playthings of speech, as tools for those who perhaps fall victim to ornamental expression, often in place of plain talk. Surface metaphor, however, if used appropriately can create powerful shortcuts to comprehension, but it’s important to make a distinction between the two types of metaphor. Conceptual metaphor describes a much deeper process, as you will see.

Researchers have built up a formidable body of linguistic research that proposes that deep metaphoric concepts govern what you perceive, how you negotiate the world and how you communicate with people. They prescribe the way you function right down to the minutiae of daily life. Conceptual systems are generally beyond consciousness and that’s why you may not be aware of how you structure your meaning and how you apply conceptual metaphors.

In the late seventies, Lakoff and Johnson embarked on a project to develop linguistic evidence to point out deficiencies in contemporary theories of meaning. Within weeks of the decision to collaborate, they discovered that Aristotlean logic (what Edward deBono describes as Rock Logic) didn’t allow them to legitimately or in scientific terms raise the type of issues they wanted to address.

Like Korzybski had observed before them, the stumbling block was the two- thousand-three-hundred-year-old notion of objective and subjective reality. They subsequently developed an alternative theory of metaphorical concepts that placed human experience and understanding at the centre of their model of meaning.

Lakoff and Johnson pioneered new theories that took into account how people experience meaning in their lives. They identified a deeply embedded conceptual framework and argued that most of our conceptual system is metaphorically structured.

But who cares what a renowned linguist and a prominent philosopher cooked up between them? Of what relevance is it to the pursuit of charismatic communication? Why is it important to know about conceptual metaphors, and what do you do with the knowledge once you’ve got it? Well, think about it. Conceptual metaphors are generally beyond consciousness and you’re not aware of them governing your thinking or behaviour.

What do you think would happen if someone applied a conceptual metaphor in a speech, conversation, or debate, entrapped you within it and slipped in a few self-serving suggestions? Because metaphor is part of the way you unconsciously make sense of the world, you’d be oblivious to what was happening and may be subject to covert influence without ever knowing it.

Some conceptual metaphors when used as a deliberate technique by your opponents have the power to embroil you in a cycle of self-destructive behaviour that can damage your reputation and credibility. Some unethical communication specialists teach these as a technique to public figures as a means of manipulating their opponents into showing their so-called “true colours”. Experts call the technique ‘conceptual entrapment’ and it can be a frighteningly devious way of triggering the more primitive elements of your personality.

Remember, conceptual metaphors may well play a pivotal role in defining everyday realities. They help structure what you do and help you understand what you’re doing when you’re doing it. While you have a genetic predisposition to consciously and unconsciously process information by way of metaphor, the brain software you use to do it is not content free. What this means is that much of the metaphor software in your brain is culturally or experientially biased - has a lot of content.

Conceptual metaphors can be deliciously seductive, so much so that they can obscure all other kinds of possible conceptions, options, ideas and viewpoints that exist outside of them. People can become so entrapped within a conceptual metaphor that no amount of pleading to view things from another perspective will register. In politics, office environments, social policy debate and even in the home this may have extremely dangerous implications.

In my next post we will review some of the more toxic of these metaphors.

(C0 Desmond Guilfoyle 2004 - 2006




 

More Words that Lose Hearts

INCREDULITY CREEP


Recall those conversations or speeches you’ve heard where your initial feelings about the speakers were positive but the longer they went on, the less believable you found them. Give your unconscious mind a pat on the back, because it was well and truly on the case. It was most likely picking up a host of linguistic cues that denote lack of commitment, the possibility of deception, and other credulity stretching devices. Below are some of the more common examples that induce what is called incredulity creep, the gradual wearing away of credibility through unintentional admissions of dishonesty or, in some cases, habitual use of verbal crutches:

Honestly, truly, really, certainly, no kidding!

Think about it for a moment, why would anyone preface or end a statement of truth with one of the above words? People usually take direct path in expressing the truth. Any deviation, surely, is significant.

The statement “Honestly, I have explored every avenue, and on balance this is the best option.” is not the shortest way of expressing what the speaker believes is the truth. If uttered without any prior questioning of her honesty, the statement can be seen as a significant cue of sensitivity. In truth, you could expect the speaker to say something like, “Out of all the options I looked at, this is the best one.”

The truth, as you inherently know, requires no heralding of its arrival. In the first example, the speaker may well know that what she is about to say is, in essence, dishonest, and so prefaces her remark with a protestation of honesty in order to deceive those listening. This is a common pattern of language identified by specialists in the scientific analysis of content for deception.

You should avoid prefacing your comments with words such as the above. Ensure you do not use them as verbal crutches, because you will inadvertently trigger sensitivity to deception at the unconscious level of your listeners.

Believe me, believe it or not

“Believe me, there’s no person better equipped to do this job than me.” Now, what do imagine is the motive of the speaker in prefacing his remark with an appeal for you to believe him? Chances are you have already intuited that the speaker wants you to make an immediate decision for fear of the discovery of people who are indeed much better equipped to do the job than him.

In most contexts “Believe me”, and “believe it or not” (remembering that “not” cannot be processed unconsciously) are clues of deceptive behaviour or, in some cases, insecurity or doubtfulness about the veracity of one’s statements. People who have confidence in the truth or validity of their sentences are rarely observed to introduce a perceived truth with an appeal to believe.

“Believe it or not” in some instances can be interpreted as an expression of indifference to listeners. It can also be intuited by people as a means of feigning nonchalance or even-handedness to cover up a strong desire for a lie, or, in some cases, a truth, to be embraced. Avoid these expressions at all costs and develop a habit of saying what you mean and meaning what you say.

Naturally, obviously, of course, clearly, it goes without saying

Often, the best deep level interpretations people make of these words are that the speaker is prone to condescension or showing off what they know. One of the easiest ways to lose an audience’s sympathy is to demonstrate a superiority complex through linguistic cues such as the above.

In some contexts, speakers use the above words in an attempt to convince listeners that the ideas etc. that follow are legitimate or normal practice. Don’t you? And, can you not sense at some level when a speaker is using these terms to deceive or win you over on the basis that they’re simply repeating common knowledge?

Words like “obviously”, “clearly”, etc., in some fields of linguistics are termed ‘lost performatives’. If you find yourself on the receiving end of statements like the above, recover the lost performative by asking “Obvious to whom?” or “Clear to Whom?” and notice the interesting replies you elicit.



(c) Desmond Guilfoyle 2004 - 2006


 
 

The Thoughts Feelings Dyad: How Balance Increases Persuasive Appeal

Media research reinforces how emotions drive viewing and listening choices in selected audiences in radio and television. Even ‘Hate Radio’, as we know it, gains its audiences by pressing the emotional Hot Buttons of targeted audiences: outrage buttons, disgust buttons, anger buttons, despair buttons, particularly in the upper demographics. This form of stimulation reinforces a hate radio audience’s pre-existing emotions and may even give them pleasure.

Feelings drive actions: the action media operators are most concerned about is encouraging listeners to commit the act of choice in favour of their products and services - in other words, tune in, and stay tuned in. The same thing applies in presentations to groups – you need your listeners to tune in and stay tuned in if your message is to be heard.

The challenge is, then, to decide on the kind of emotions you wish to evoke in your audiences: emotions that drive listeners to act by choosing to listen and pay attention to you and your message.

They don’t have to be negative emotions like fear, hate, jealousy or outrage, although on some occasions they can legitimately be associated with your message. They can be emotions that are more useful to people’s everyday lives. They can be emotions which stir people to create a better future, generating optimism, hope, humour, strength, control, curiosity and so on.

So, if people think-feel and then commit the act of choice to listen or not listen to you, what kind of emotions could you stir ethically? Below is an incomplete list that you may like to add to:

curiosity confidence exhilaration

enthusiasm shock humour

self-control empowerment desire

hope expectation anticipation

titillation thrill scepticism

suspense belonging sense of knowing

sympathy empathy discovery

happiness joy material desire (greed?)

status triumph (winning) pleasure

concern motivation comfort

encouragement re-assurance disbelief

courage passion certainty

Content is all about positioning. If the content of your message regularly stirs a range of the above emotions, people will associate you with the generally useful emotions evoked. This is what is meant by gaining a ‘Share of Heart’.

By tapping appropriate emotions you can associate pleasure and stimulation with what you’re doing. The linkage of pleasure and stimulation to the experience of listening to your presentation greatly enhances the possibility of your message being taken on board by your audience.

Only Giving Head?

It is a myth that thoughts and feelings can be separated. This myth gives rise to the idea that you can have a discourse, debate, or just a plan old conversation and not feel anything at all.

Much of the rhetoric that many speakers engage in is based on the spurious notion that you can separate thoughts from feeling. This reveals itself in interesting ways:

¨ ‘Hard heads’ who suppress the music and emotion of their voices because it gives them “credibility” and “balance”.

¨ Stories told in abstract language, which removes the ‘life’ from the story.

¨ Real serious discourses with ‘analysis’, without real life examples in which to embed an audience’s experience.

¨ Speakers sounding as if they have the world on their shoulders and every word uttered must be spoken with gravity.

¨ Presenters with personal phobias that reflect a fear of so-called trivialisation.

¨ Discourse using language that removes the speakers or moderator from the ‘dirty world’ of human emotions.

¨ Conversations conducted in ‘surface rhetoric’, such as econo-speak, pollie-speak, or in-house shorthand.

You might be interested to know that the pre-scientific notion of separating thoughts from emotions was revived and championed by a philosopher called Descartes, who lived a couple of hundred years ago.

The notion had been around since biblical times, but he picked it up and ran with it. He proclaimed that somewhere, he wasn’t quite sure where, there existed absolute ‘truth’. His method of finding that somewhere was to somehow lapse into “pure rationality” in order to take a “a God’s Eye view” in the hope that all would be revealed. He failed.

In many ways, the assumption that there is such a thing as objectivity, pure rationality, non-bias and dispassion still governs much of the practice of so-called rational debate and discourse.

Rational debate, by its very rules, demands that you separate thoughts from feelings, and engage in “unfeeling” dialogue. This still happens in some pockets of academia as well as business and the media.

Interestingly, modern psychology has a name for people who have stopped feeling for others, or can’t think-feel in the concrete realm any more. They’re called sociopaths.

Words That Lose Hearts: What I'm Saying Is.....

Words have caused wars, racial hatred, international incidents, civil conflict and the division of our communities. Words, and our structure and interpretation of them have also awakened the entire index of honourable human emotions and actions. Powerful things, are they not? Depending upon whose minds and mouths structure and deliver them and whose ears and brains hear and process them, words can make us soar with the eagles and hunt with wild dogs.

An evolutionary prank seems to have been played on the human race during its development of language. As you are about to discover, you can’t help but communicate deception even when intending to deceive, you can’t usually resist communicating hypocrisy when it’s present and you can’t help communicating the importance or unimportance of relationships and objects. You’re often grossly inadequate to the task of hiding your prejudices, foibles, misgivings and desires. You truly are your message.

Over time on this blog, we’ll review a broad range of words that win and lose hearts. The examples you encounter in this post will, hopefully, encourage you to open up your earlids to track the barely hidden meanings found in everyday speech patterns.

Several years ago a world class athlete was tested for drugs and registered a positive result. When the scandal erupted he went to ground, leaving others to speak on his behalf. The media pounced on the story and, as is its custom, formed a pack and hunted down the athlete’s parents. Resistance was futile. His parents went into damage control and called a press conference. Below is a segment of what they said:

“What we are saying is that **** is not into drugs. He is telling us that he is not a drugs cheat. We’re saying he has absolutely no reason to take steroids. It doesn’t make sense.”

The parents were either lying or suspected their son had in fact swallowed performance pills. How can you be so sure? The answer is that when people tell the truth about serious matters they close off all other options. Normally if an individual is innocent, or known to be innocent, a strong, unequivocal denial will be made. If the athlete’s parents had said “He didn’t do it.” or “He is totally innocent” then you could assume an absence of deception.

Instead, the parents told audiences what they were ‘saying’ and what the athlete was ‘telling’. This can be seen to be an unconscious ‘leakage’ of the truth behind the matter. The parents chose not to commit to a complete lie, as in “He didn’t do it”, but to say something that required substantially less commitment either way.

There is a two-part principle in psycho-linguistics that states that when people make a truthful denial about an event that occurred in the past they will make an unambiguous commitment to their innocence. Secondly, their language will reflect the true tense of the situation. If they are talking about a past event they will deliver their statement in either first person singular past tense, “I didn’t do it”, or second person singular past tense, “He didn’t do it.

There is no commitment present in the answer the parents gave and their tense is inconsistent. “**** is not into drugs” is second person singular present tense. In other words, **** is not into drugs now, but may well have been yesterday or at the time the test was taken. The supporting statements are simply an attempt to give plausibility to the lie and contain no commitment to the truth.

The “What I’m saying” manoeuvre is a favourite of politicians and other players in social and political debate. You can speculate that they’ve used it so frequently in place of what they really ought to be saying that it’s become an habitual part of their linguistic behaviour. It never-the-less remains a marker for deceit deep in the memories of those who hear it, and often it serves to reinforce the cynicism people justifiably harbour towards their elected representatives.

(c) Desmond Guilfoyle 2006

Words: The Latent Power of 'Not'

 

Imagine the immense delight you would feel to have an audience break into spontaneous applause after you’d made a significant point. You can appreciate, can’t you, that a reaction like that signals an audience ‘going for’ you and your ideas in a very big and tangible way.

Consider, too, speaking in front of a group of people and triggering silent “ahuh” or “yes” responses all the way through your presentation. The air would be electric with positive energy, wouldn’t it? Now, what if you could create tactical sentences that excite those responses at will? You may say to yourself now, “that can be something really worth learning, can’t it?”

Review your experience of reading the paragraph above. Can you remember the number of times that you felt physically in alignment with its propositions? Maybe you felt a few ahuh-ahuh-ahuh’s as you quickly absorbed the points, or maybe the sensations of agreement and approval were a little stronger than that, providing more than enough reason for you to remain interested and continue reading.

The internal sensations you experience from a mild “ahuh” to a wanton ‘go-for-it’ impulse feel good. Consider the value of these positive feelings being associated with you and your content as you deliver your message. If people associate pleasure and stimulation with you and your message, three things happen. 1) People will remember more of your content, 2) People will be much more likely to embrace your message, and 3) People will come back for more.

The sensations associated with ‘Yes!’ and ‘go-for-it’ responses are an important consideration in the relationships Charismatic communicators establish with audiences. They are particularly gifted in the assessment and management of emotion in those they seek to persuade. They take constant readings and actively engage in regulating the emotional mercury as circumstance demands. This gift can be seen as a combination of self-appraisal, the capacity to read and manage an audience’s emotional state, and the ability to fashion words in such a way as to make them irresistible.

Having felt the power of ‘Yes!’ and understanding the value of incorporating ‘yes’ triggers into your speaking style, your next step is to learn some of the patterns and sequences charismatic communicators use to evoke those responses. In this article we will review what you will come to know as ‘tactical negation’, or in simple words using the word ‘not’ to trigger positive reactions in your audience.

THE ‘YES’ NOT

The word not and its derivatives exist only in language. This is to say that ‘not’s’ are a mental construct and generally do not mirror the way your brain works. They are tough on your unconscious mind and that is why, for example, you can’t not think of evoking ‘yes’ responses when instructed not to think about them, without thinking about them first and then attempting to stamp a not on them. As you can see, it’s not all that hard to tie your mind up in ‘not’s’, is it not?

Some ‘not’s’, however, are better than others. You may not have begun to wonder where this is all taking you, until now. And as you begin to consider the immense possibilities of this simple word, you can appreciate, can you not, how a few cleverly placed ‘not’s’ can bring about a strong sense of the opposite? O.K., enough is enough!

The ‘not’s’ you are going to find relatively easy to integrate into your language style are connected to what are called tag questions. Some tag questions, such as “right?”, “O.K.?”, “You know?” and others that are part of powerless language can reduce your effectiveness as a speaker. However, appropriately inserted tag questions containing a ‘not’ can have the effect of producing silent affirmation in your listeners, thus significantly increasing your effectiveness. It would be useful to be able to use a linguistic device like ‘not’ and have your audience nodding in agreement as you go along, wouldn’t it?

During the important phases of building an argument it can be extremely useful to evoke your listener’s silent agreement on the points you introduce, to encourage them to feel a ‘yes’ coming on at various stages during the delivery of your argument.

A series of tag questions have been inserted at crucial points in this article to illustrate the usefulness of tag questions containing a ‘not’. Perhaps you’d like to scan what you’ve read so far to discover for yourself how a negative like ‘not’ can induce internal sensations of agreement.

Having completed your scan, begin to think about how you can insert similar tag questions into your speaking style. Try out a few of the following tag questions on occasions and notice the physical symptoms of agreement they evoke.

Isn’t it?/is it not? couldn’t you? hasn’t it?/has it not?
doesn’t it?/ does it not? could you not? aren’t we?/are we not?
don’t you?/do you not? shouldn’t you? wouldn’t?/would it not?
haven’t you?/have you not?/ should you not?/ you can add more to this list
can’t you?/can you not?/ won’t you?/will you not?

In future articles, I will cover a range of linguistic and rhetorical devices that, if used intelligently, can increase immensely your power as a communicator and public speaker.

(c) 2004 - 2006 Desmond Guilfoyle

Mega-Frame or Perish!

A Mega-Frame is like ornate framing that surrounds a picture or painting. It encloses and defines information. Amateur and professional artists deeply appreciate the value of framing: the right frames will enhance their pictures - the wrong frames will devalue them. Many an artist has created works that have not become truly expressive or beautiful until they have been enclosed in the right frame.

Framing has a long and rich history. The Sophists of ancient Greece were masterful framers and re-framers. Aristotle coined the word “atechnoi” to describe it. One of ancient Rome’s greatest orators, Cicero, elevated frames (“statis”) to an art form. His speeches are still studied by students of influence and rhetoric.

Mega-framing describes Strategic or psychological framing and underpins the art of managing perception. It takes in the ‘big picture’ rather than detail. It may be an overarching theme that enjoins or describes the detail in your presentation, or it may link all your points to a lesson, a purpose or a moral.

Mega-frames are powerful because they allow you to enclose your message within a framework of higher intentions, virtues or a big-picture concept generally understood or held to be true by most people. This is termed frame alignment, and it refers to the linkage of a message to a set of common interests, values or beliefs, so as to position a speaker and audience as one.

In selecting a mega-frame, your aim can be to link your total presentation to one major idea, high principle or key value.

Every society is rooted in deep sets or clusters of ideals. In western society, for example, we ‘believe’ in democracy. From that belief comes a raft of ‘virtues’, represented by abstracts such as Freedom of Speech, the Right to Choose, Respect for Individual Rights, Freedom of Movement, Equity in Society (in some quarters), and so on.

The key is to establish a legitimate association between your idea/message/proposal/action and a universal virtue or value. Examine the following words and see if you can detect a “virtue” in them. Put them into a sentence, internalise them and notice the emotional responses they bring about.

• goodness • health • love • peace
• choice • dream • happiness • fairness
• liberty • vision • truth • justice
• rights • honesty • opportunity • ethics
• safeguard • success • strength • prosperity
• freedom • righteousness • self-control • family
• safety • purity • empowerment • compassion
• protection • relief • scientific • respect

The above words represent values embraced by most people in western worlld. They are anchors for the aspirations of our communities and few individuals would venture to challenge them. Each person will have his or her own personal interpretation of what they mean, however, in all but a few cases, the feelings people associate with the words will be positive ones.

Virtue mega-frames educe unconscious acceptance of the content in which they are wrapped. They add immense power to your presentation because most people embrace them as self-evident truths. Review the following opening sentences and notice how a strong virtue frame helps the speaker evoke powerful emotional responses to support her case:

“This is not an issue about governments resuming private land to subdivide and on-sell. This is an issue about freedom. Freedom from the greedy intentions of bureaucrats who want to fund their grandiose projects by robbing you of your birthright; freedom to live your life on a piece of rural Australia without fear that the land of your labour can be snatched from you; freedom from the whims of fat-cats who live hundreds of miles away, never having experienced life in a close rural community.

I know that, as small landowners, you value freedom above all else. Why else would have you chosen to build your life here, free from all the contaminations of big-city life? Now is the time to fight for the justice of your cause; to fight for your freedom; to send an unequivocal message to those who would destroy your community forever.

And know that your calls will be heard by many decent-minded country Australians. They will help you in your fight, because they know that you must never, never, never, give in to bully boys from the big city, who, like common thieves, would take your freedom from you. They know that the price of giving in would be their freedom too.”

In everyday life, you assess information unconsciously through the filters of your values, beliefs, decisions and attitudes. Emotions, or feelings, erupt from the filtering process and drive action. It’s a natural process and enclosing your message in a Virtue Mega-Frame taps into that process. It allows you to filter your message through the core values, beliefs and embraced virtues of your audience.

(c) 2006 Desmond Guilfoyle