Shifting identities

The Metaphorics of Nature-Culture Dualism in Western and Basque Models of Self

Abstract

The paper is divided into two major parts, preceded by a short introduction. The first section consists of a theoretical discussion that examines the role of the dualist model and its accompanying dichotomous metaphorics in the development of Western ontology, epistemology, and personhood with particular emphasis on the nature/culture and body/mind dyads along with the role played by them as ‘root metaphors’. This section also explores the notion of ‘relational epistemology’, van Dijk’s (2002) Common Ground and Habermas’s (1994) Lebenswelt. The second section of the study deals with the way certain Basque conceptual frames of reference relating to personhood are undergoing change and reorganisation in Euskara, the Basque language, under the influence of the Western modernist model. The goal of the paper is to demonstrate the role that metaphor studies in cognitive linguistics could play in increasing awareness of the linguistically embedded character of this Western ontology ─ the manner in which these habits of thought are deeply imprinted in language. In short, the Western ontology with its nature/culture dichotomy is rendered visible and even exotic, that is, from the perspective of these non-Western relational epistemologies.