Pictorial metaphors for information
| DOI | https://doi.org/10.1108/JD-07-2015-0080 |
| Pages | 794-812 |
| Published date | 12 September 2016 |
| Date | 12 September 2016 |
| Author | Jenna Hartel,Reijo Savolainen |
| Subject Matter | Library & information science,Records management & preservation,Document management,Classification & cataloguing,Information behaviour & retrieval,Collection building & management,Scholarly communications/publishing,Information & knowledge management,Information management & governance,Information management,Information & communications technology,Internet |
Pictorial metaphors
for information
Jenna Hartel
University of Toronto, Toronto, Canada, and
Reijo Savolainen
School of Information Sciences, University of Tampere, Tampere, Finland
Abstract
Purpose –Arts-informed, visual research was conducted to document the pictorial metaphors that
appear among original drawings of information. The purpose of this paper is to report the diversity of
these pictorial metaphors, delineate their formal qualities as drawings, and provide a fresh perspective
on the concept of information.
Design/methodology/approach –The project utilized pre-existing iSquare drawings of information
that were produced by iSchool graduate students during a draw-and-write activity. From a data set of
417 images, 125 of the strongest pictorial metaphors were identified and subjected to cognitive
metaphor theory.
Findings –Overwhelmingly, the favored source domain for envisioning information was nature. The
most common pictorial metaphors were: Earth, web, tree, light bulb, box, cloud, and fishing/mining,
and each brings different qualities of information into focus. The drawings were often canonical
versions of objects in the world, leading to arrays of pictorial metaphors marked by their similarity.
Research limitations/implications –Less than 30 percent of the data set qualified as pictorial
metaphors, making them a minority strategy for representing information as an image. The process to
identify and interpret pictorial metaphors was highly subjective. The arts-informed methodology
generated tensions between artistic and social scientific paradigms.
Practical implications –The pictorial metaphors for information can enhance information science
education and fortify professional identity among information professionals.
Originality/value –This is the first arts-informed, visual study of information that utilizes
cognitive metaphor theory to explore the nature of information. It strengthens a sense of history,
humanity, nature, and beauty in our und erstanding of infor mation today, and c ontributes to
metaphor research at l arge.
Keywords Information theory, Information, Metaphor analysis, iSquare, Visual research,
Visualization of information
Paper type Research paper
1. Introduction
Metaphors are ubiquitous means by which people structure thought. They have an
important function as mind settings, which influence our cognition of the self and the
world (Moser, 2000). Building on a tradition of research into verbal metaphors, since the
1990s there has been growing interest in visual or pictorial metaphors. A number of
studies have explored visual metaphors in diverse genres, such as advertising
(Forceville, 1996), films (Carroll, 1996), and cartoons (Morris, 1993).
In the work at hand, arts-informed, visualresearch, and the draw-and-writetechnique
were combined with metaphor analysis to provide a new perspective on the concept of
information. The study is based upon an exercise in which graduate students express
information as a drawing, and explores the pictorial metaphors that appeared in such
drawings. The project contributes to the conceptions of information already in the
literature; demonstrates a novel interdisciplinary methodology and research design; and
has benefits for information science education and professional practice.
Journal of Documentation
Vol. 72 No. 5, 2016
pp. 794-812
©Emerald Group Publishing Limited
0022-0418
DOI 10.1108/JD-07-2015-0080
Received 2 July 2015
Revised 19 February 2016
Accepted 1 March 2016
The current issue and full text archive of this journal is available on Emerald Insight at:
www.emeraldinsight.com/0022-0418.htm
794
JDOC
72,5
Metaphors link two conceptual domains, the source domain and the target domain.
By means of an expression taken from a concrete area (the source domain), something
located in the target domain may be made more understandable. The target domain is
abstract, unknown, and difficult to envisage, as far as its meaning is concerned (Lakoff,
1987, pp. 276-278). To fully understand abstract things, it helps to refer to concrete,
physical, or tangible things. For example, in the metaphorical expression “Loveisa
journey,”everyday knowledge about journeys (the source domain) is mapped onto
knowledge about love (the target domain). By means of such corresponden ces, we may
come to understand love through our knowledge of journeys. In this example,
metaphor is a linguistic device, but the same correspondence strategy can be used in
the visual realm.
More than 2,000 original drawings of information have been collected in the
iSquare research program (www.iSquares.info). The majority of the images take the
form of literal representations of information, namely depictions of documents,
technology, and/or people (Hartel, 2014a). The authors of this paper noticed that
alongside many literal renderings were pictorial metaphors, in which information
was expressed as a tree, light bulb, or city, among other easily recognizable source
domains. A literature review confirmed that the pictorial metaphors for information
had yet to be systematically identified, documented, and explicated −which are the
objectives of this study.
The paper proceeds as follows. Section 2 reviews relevant writings on metaphors,
pictorial metaphors, and information visualization. Section 3 specifies the research
questions, followed by the theoretical framework and research design in Section 4.
Section 5 discusses the results: elaborations of common pictorial metaphors for
information. Section 6 is a discussion with a summary and implications of the study;
the paper ends with Section 7, a brief conclusion.
2. Metaphors and metaphor-related research
2.1 Conceptual metaphors
Since the 1980s, conceptual metaphor theory (CMT) has provided a predominant
perspective on the study on metaphors. CMT was developed within the field of
cognitive linguistics, and this theory became widely known with the publication of
Metaphors We Live By, by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson, in 1980. One of the
strengths of metaphors is that they create a stereoscopic vision that allows
simultaneous viewing of an idea from two or more points of view. Metaphors can
provide a new or alternative view of a given target domain by linking it with an
unexpected source domain, or by mapping unexplored features from a familiar source
domain to the target (Lakoff and Johnson, 1980, pp. 10-13).
There are a number of common source domains. The human body is an ideal source
domain, since, for us, it is clearly delineated and (we believe) we know it well. Other
source domains include, for example, animals, plants, buildings and construction,
machines and tools, games and sport, money, cooking and food, heat and cold, light and
darkness, forces, movement and direction (Kövecses, 2010, pp. 18-22). When this rich
knowledge about elements is mapped onto target domains, we have cases of
metaphorical entailment (Kövecses, 2010, p. 132). Each source concept has a
metaphorical entailment potential; that is, it can potentially map extensive everyday
knowledge onto the target domains that are abstract, diffuse, and lack clear delineation
(Kövecses, 2010, pp. 23-29).
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Pictorial
metaphors for
information
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