Blog 1

See Through Words By: Michael Erard

The article brought to life many possibilities behind a metaphor. The point that caught my attention was that many generalities help us define complex things. We can look at a lawyer being a shark. Two very general nouns that when put together expand the meaning of what a lawyer is. The creative part behind a metaphor can be filled deep withing meaning or just a drop of meaning. That is what makes a metaphor so amazingly awesome. Anyone could decode a metaphor and understand the message that is being spoken, written, or shown.

Another mind blowing idea shown in Michael Erard’s article was that a metaphor is more than just a sentence describing a thing. Using metaphors can help discover and solve issues within. Metaphors are seen as just figurative language in the English language but scientists can use metaphors to decode issues by thinking in a different way. Everything in the world is not all black and white, yet a diverse use of colors and combinations that have yet to be found. Metaphors help the process of figuring out how things work.

Lastly, another key part of the article was how a metaphor can come to be.  The fact that you need to fail to succeed is powerful to achieving a good metaphor. You need to direct the attention of the viewer to a place that they have not thought of before. Doing so will result in a much better understanding.  Being direct can be good but also could be a bad thing when construction a metaphor.  You need to provide context clues and background information to be able to successfully trans,it your message. I never understood how difficult it could be to make a comparison that could lead to bigger possibilities.