Blog 3

              When I first read “See through words” I was very critical. I was stumped by the literal meanings of some of the metaphors such as, “a paintbrush is a kind of pump” (Erand 2). I wasn’t a fan of a metaphor for a metaphor, the comparison to a room, and I even was stating that some of his metaphors were too harsh. I was distracted by the surface of the metaphors and didn’t understand what Erand was talking about. This time, I agreed with most of what he said. I understood that sometimes people can’t fully comprehend a metaphor, especially when they aren’t extremely familiar with the item. It is the furniture, or the explanation that truly maps, or connects the two items together with a metaphor. The second time reading the piece allowed me to also admire the power Erand gave to the people. He recognized that for a metaphor to be any good, it needs to be in vocabulary the average human understands along with being accepted by them and cultural values. For example, the dandelion and orchid, was in terms the humans could understand, but the preconceived cultural notions about both plants halted the success of the metaphor.

              My understanding of this article increased dramatically during this second reading. Looking less literally at the text, and the in-class discussion did wonders to “clear the fog”. My understanding of this article also increased after looking up the word prototypical, which means the original, or a model, and what the Enron scandal was. When first reading about the dual reference from Sam Glucksberg, I had no idea of what “Enron” was, and what it had to do with an accounting scandal. After reading about it on CNN, I was clear that Enron was the peak accounting scandal, as it was the largest bankruptcy filling in the US at the time it occurred. This metaphor clearly portrays taking the head, or the prototype of a category, and using it for further comparison.

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