Gendered Metaphors in Proverbs

A study on Italian and French

Abstract

In this contribution, I aim at reconstructing and categorizing the recurrent gendered metaphors for WOMAN in Italian and French proverbs against the backdrop of Cognitive Metaphor Theory (CMT). After focusing on the particular interplay of metaphors and the paremiological text genre, chosen as a means of gaining insight into diachronically longstanding cultural beliefs, I propose the use of a bottom-up method to address cultural conceptual metaphors about WOMAN. Finally, I address analogies and differences in the metaphorical patterns involved in the construction of gender in Italian and French proverbs.