“Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie: Summary and Critique

Introduction: “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

“Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie first appeared in the journal Metaphor and Symbol in 2004 (Volume 19, Issue 4, pages 265–287), although it was published online on November 17, 2009 by Routledge. In this influential article, Ritchie critiques traditional, top-down models of metaphor interpretation and introduces a connectivity theory that emphasizes the importance of conversational context and neural embodiment. Drawing on Sperber and Wilson’s relevance theory and Clark’s model of common ground, Ritchie argues that metaphor comprehension emerges through dynamic interactions between the metaphor’s vehicle, topic, and the shared cognitive environment of the speakers. Rather than assuming metaphors have fixed meanings, the article posits that meaning is constructed in context and varies depending on the listener’s cognitive and conversational background. This approach has been pivotal in literary theory and cognitive linguistics, offering a more flexible, context-sensitive model for understanding metaphor that aligns with how people actually communicate and think.

Summary of “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

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Theoretical Terms/Concepts in “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

🌟 Concept	🔤 Definition	💬 Example	🧠 Explanation
🧩 Connectivity Theory	A model where metaphor interpretation is based on forming connections between the topic, vehicle, and elements in working memory.	“MY JOB IS A JAIL”	Metaphor is interpreted by linking jail-related ideas (e.g., confinement, punishment) with job-related dissatisfaction already activated in the hearer’s mind.
🧠 Working Memory	The currently active set of concepts, memories, emotions, and contextual knowledge that influence metaphor interpretation.	Remembering prior job complaints when hearing “MY JOB IS A JAIL”	Working memory serves as a neural workspace where topic-vehicle connections are actively processed.
🌐 Common Ground	Shared assumptions and knowledge that communicators believe they have.	Two friends recalling shared travel experiences.	Interpretation depends on what participants think they both know, not actual identical knowledge.
🔄 Mutual Cognitive Environment	The set of all facts assumed to be mutually known and accessible during communication.	Both parties knowing it’s raining outside during a chat.	Ritchie critiques this concept as inherently problematic and uncertain—people only guess at mutual knowledge.
🎯 Relevance	A communicative act’s capacity to generate meaningful effect with minimal cognitive effort.	A sarcastic “Great job” after a mistake.	Metaphor interpretation seeks to maximize cognitive payoff by connecting with the most accessible context.
🔗 Neural Embodiment	The idea that interpretation involves physical changes in neural connections.	Linking “anchor” to stability and love.	Understanding a metaphor alters brain activity, strengthening some neural associations and weakening others.
🌪️ Metaphorical Entailments	The extended logical and emotional implications activated by a metaphor.	“SHEEPDOG THIS PROJECT” → guide team, chase off threats, etc.	Metaphors can restructure broader understanding of roles, tasks, or relationships by activating chained meanings.
🧭 Interpretive Context	The combination of immediate physical, conversational, and emotional environment.	The tone of “MY WIFE IS AN ANCHOR” during a breakup vs. honeymoon.	Metaphor meaning varies entirely depending on contextual cues at the moment of interpretation.
🌀 Ambiguous Metaphor	A metaphor that can be interpreted in multiple ways depending on context.	“ANCHOR” = stability or burden.	Ritchie argues metaphors don’t have fixed meanings; context determines interpretation dynamically.
🧬 Cognitive Economy	The brain’s tendency to process only what’s needed to interpret a message.	Not overthinking “That’s cold” unless context demands it.	Interpretation usually halts once sufficient meaning is extracted for the current goal.

Contribution of “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie to Literary Theory/Theories

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📚 1. Reader-Response Theory
➡️ Focus on the reader’s role in meaning-making.

🔍 Ritchie’s Contribution:

• Emphasizes the interpretive role of individual cognition and memory.
• Meaning is not fixed but constructed differently by each reader/listener based on their cognitive environment.
• “Each metaphor is interpreted in the particular communicative context in which it is encountered, and individual interpretations will not necessarily match” (Ritchie, 2004, p. 265).
• This aligns with reader-response theorists like Stanley Fish, who argue that meaning is produced by interpretive communities rather than embedded in the text itself.

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🧠 2. Cognitive Poetics (Cognitive Literary Studies)
➡️ Interdisciplinary theory connecting cognitive science and literary analysis.

🧬 Ritchie’s Contribution:

• Advances a neurologically grounded model of metaphor processing.
• Suggests metaphor interpretation involves neural restructuring: “new neural connections are formed between the network of… ‘vehicle’ and… ‘topic’” (p. 279).
• Incorporates Kintsch’s model of working memory and embodied cognition to explain how metaphor resonates with reader memory, perception, and context.
• His rejection of abstract top-down theories parallels cognitive poetics’ call for bottom-up experiential processing of texts.
• Contributes to theorists like Peter Stockwell and Reuven Tsur.

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💬 3. Pragmatics and Relevance Theory
➡️ How meaning is shaped by conversational context and inferencing.

📣 Ritchie’s Contribution:

• Builds on Sperber and Wilson’s Relevance Theory and Clark’s Common Ground.
• Emphasizes that metaphor interpretation is “an interaction of both vehicle and topic with the common ground” (p. 265).
• Challenges formalist metaphor theories by embedding metaphor in social and discursive practice—language is never interpreted in isolation.
• Shows that relevance is evaluated dynamically during discourse, depending on effort and payoff (p. 271).
• Adds depth by introducing “working memory” as a cognitive model for tracking these inferential processes.

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🌀 4. Post-Structuralism / Deconstruction
➡️ Meaning is unstable, deferred, and contextually variable.

🔓 Ritchie’s Contribution:

• Disputes the idea of “the meaning of a metaphor” as fixed or stable (p. 265).
• Demonstrates that metaphors are always situated—meaning is contingent, potentially ambiguous, and subject to interpretive slippage (p. 278).
• Example: “MY WIFE IS AN ANCHOR” can imply stability or entrapment based on conversation (p. 277–278).
• Echoes Derrida’s notion of différance, where meaning is always in flux and dependent on deferral and difference.
• Supports post-structuralist critiques of referential certainty in language.

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🔄 5. Critique of Conceptual Metaphor Theory (Lakoff & Johnson)
➡️ Challenges universalist models of metaphor as conceptual mapping.

🚫 Ritchie’s Contribution:

• While acknowledging CMT (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980), Ritchie argues it presumes preexisting, universal metaphor structures.
• Instead, he proposes context-driven, emergent metaphor interpretation based on dynamic cognitive interactions (p. 284).
• “The connectivity model… does not share the assumption… that thematically similar expressions are necessarily expressions of a common underlying conceptual metaphor” (p. 284).
• Contributes to the pluralist critique of CMT and advances a more relational, situated, and social-cognitive model.

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🧭 6. Contribution to Narrative Theory and Discourse Analysis
➡️ Metaphor as a structuring tool in narrative meaning-making.

🗣️ Ritchie’s Contribution:

• Explores how metaphor contributes not just to local meaning but to the overall restructuring of discourse context.
• “The metaphor strengthens the connections between the speaker’s wife and other facts… and lays the foundation for connecting her to aspects of his life yet to be mentioned” (p. 279).
• Shows that metaphors shape narrative coherence and thematic progression, making it relevant to scholars of storytelling and discourse structure.

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🎓 Summary of Scholarly Value
David Ritchie’s connectivity theory transforms metaphor interpretation from a static, symbolic mapping into a dynamic, embodied, and socially embedded process, enriching:

• 🧠 Cognitive Literary Studies
• 💬 Pragmatics & Relevance Theory
• 🌀 Post-structural Discourse Theories
• 🧍 Reader-Response Theory

It enables a more nuanced, flexible, and neurologically realistic model of how metaphors generate meaning in context—and why they often mean different things to different people.

Examples of Critiques Through “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

📚 Literary Work	🔍 Key Metaphor	🧠 Connectivity Theory Interpretation	🧾 Critique Focus
🌊 The Great Gatsby by F. Scott Fitzgerald	“Boats against the current”	Connects to themes of nostalgia, futility, and emotional resistance in working memory. The “boat” metaphor is interpreted in the context of Gatsby’s personal losses and failed aspirations.	Ritchie’s theory highlights how metaphors like this gain resonance through shared cultural narratives (American Dream, progress) that are contextually activated.
🌳 King Lear by William Shakespeare	“I am a man / More sinned against than sinning”	Activates a moral schema in audience’s working memory. Listeners interpret this metaphor differently depending on their alignment with Lear’s plight (e.g., victim or delusional).	Demonstrates how interpretation diverges across audiences due to varying beliefs and emotional contexts, supporting Ritchie’s claim that metaphors lack fixed meaning.
🔥 Jane Eyre by Charlotte Brontë	“A ridge of lighted heath, alive, glancing, devouring” (Describing Bertha’s fire)	Metaphor triggers visceral imagery and danger-related schemata. Context (emotional repression, colonial subtext) activates interpretations of madness, wild femininity, or resistance.	Shows how metaphors shape reader affect and identity interpretation differently based on prior ideological or gender frameworks (cognitive common ground).
🕰️ Beloved by Toni Morrison	“124 was spiteful. Full of a baby’s venom.”	Here, the house is personified through metaphor. Depending on the reader’s knowledge of slavery’s trauma, “spiteful” activates associations of haunting, memory, and violence.	Ritchie’s theory helps explain polysemous metaphor readings—trauma, mothering, repression—all vary based on individual reader’s context and cultural knowledge.

🧩 How Ritchie’s Connectivity Theory Enhances Literary Criticism:

• 💡 Contextual Fluidity: Metaphors are interpreted within specific discourse moments, not as fixed conceptual mappings.
• 🧠 Cognitive Activation: Each reader brings a unique working memory of prior knowledge, experiences, and emotions to the reading act.
• 🔄 Dynamic Construction: Meaning emerges through neural and cultural connections formed during reading, not retrieved from a static source.

Criticism Against “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

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Representative Quotations from “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie with Explanation

📝 Quotation	💡 Explanation
“It is rarely accurate to discuss ‘the meaning of’ a metaphor, as if metaphors must have a single well-specified meaning.” (p. 265)	Ritchie challenges the notion that metaphors carry fixed or universal meanings. Instead, he promotes a view where meaning is constructed in context and varies by listener and situation.
“Interpretation is always affected by the cognitive environment of the hearer, including immediate context and working memory.” (p. 266)	This emphasizes the listener’s mental state, prior knowledge, and momentary context as essential to how a metaphor is understood.
“Common ground consists of what participants think they share—not what they actually share.” (p. 268)	Ritchie redefines common ground as perceived mutual knowledge, not objective overlap. This distinction is key to understanding why metaphors sometimes fail or misfire.
“Metaphor interpretation involves the creation of new neural connections… between elements in the hearer’s working memory.” (p. 279)	Central to Ritchie’s connectivity theory, this suggests metaphor functions by activating and restructuring neural links, not by retrieving fixed concepts.
“Relevance is not a fixed property of messages, but an emergent property of the relationship between message and context.” (p. 272)	Meaning is not embedded in the metaphor itself but emerges from the interaction between the metaphor and the reader’s/listener’s context.
“The metaphor can be relevant in several ways at once, depending on the hearer’s memory and context.” (p. 272)	A metaphor may trigger multiple interpretations, and what becomes salient depends on which associations are active for the listener.
“The connectivity model of metaphor comprehension emphasizes the construction of ad hoc connections over mapping of preexisting structures.” (p. 284)	Ritchie contrasts his theory with Co

Suggested Readings: “Metaphors in Conversational Context: Toward a Connectivity Theory of Metaphor Interpretation” by David Ritchie

1. Loewenberg, Ina. “Identifying Metaphors.” Foundations of Language, vol. 12, no. 3, 1975, pp. 315–38. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/25000846. Accessed 2 June 2025.
2. Fienup-Riordan, Ann. “Metaphors of Conversion, Metaphors of Change.” Arctic Anthropology, vol. 34, no. 1, 1997, pp. 102–16. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/40316427. Accessed 2 June 2025.
3. Penfield, Joyce, and Mary Duru. “Proverbs: Metaphors That Teach.” Anthropological Quarterly, vol. 61, no. 3, 1988, pp. 119–28. JSTOR, https://doi.org/10.2307/3317788. Accessed 2 June 2025.
4. Ibarretxe-Antuñano, Iraide. “Vision Metaphors for the Intellect: Are They Really Cross-Linguistic?” Atlantis, vol. 30, no. 1, 2008, pp. 15–33. JSTOR, http://www.jstor.org/stable/41055304. Accessed 2 June 2025.