ABSTRACT

Metaphors are recognized as bridging scientists’ challenges in communication with the public. In mathematics, however, which often involves abstract concepts and relations, less attention has been paid to the role of metaphors in public communication. In this article we examine the metaphors appearing in the discourse of 10 mathematicians in five radio broadcasts to communicate advanced mathematical concepts and activities to the public. Using Cameron’s metaphor categorization procedure, we recognized seven systematic metaphors, MATH AS: SLOG, A SYSTEM, DISCOVERY, BUILDING AND CONSTRUCTING, A KEY, VISUOSPATIAL, and SLIPPERY/MYSTERIOUS, in the contexts of negative numbers, symmetry, pi, the Poincaré conjecture, and prime numbers. Mathematicians’ talk displayed these metaphoric resources in an emergent and situated way to communicate approximations of advanced ideas. The context and participants’ reactions created a transforming cycle for the interchangeable use of metaphors for both theory-constructive and pedagogical functions.

摘要

隐喻被认为是弥合科学家在与公众交流中所面临的挑战。但是，在经常涉及抽象概念和关系的数学中，人们很少注意隐喻在公共传播中的作用。在本文中，我们通过五个广播电台研究了10位数学家的演讲中出现的隐喻，以向公众传播先进的数学概念和活动。使用卡梅伦的隐喻分类程序，我们在负数，对称性，pi，庞加莱猜想的背景下，识别出七个系统隐喻，MATH AS：SLOG，A SYSTEM，DISCOVERY，BUILDING AND BUILDING，KEY，VISUOSPATIAL和SLIPPERY / MYSTERIOUS。和素数。数学家的演讲以一种新兴的，隐蔽的方式展示了这些隐喻资源，以交流高级思想的近似性。上下文和参与者的反应为隐喻的理论构造和教学功能的互换使用创造了一个转换周期。