Exploring the Metaphor–Body–Psychotherapy Relationship

This article explores the interfaces between two constructs in linguistics and psychotherapy—metaphor and the human body—as a means of illustrating meaningful exchange between linguistic and mental health research. Three distinctly well-motivated research strands with underexplored overlaps: (a) the theoretical relationship between metaphor and the body, (b) the use and management of metaphors in therapy, and (c) the body as a therapeutic resource complementing verbal interaction, are first described. Taking a practitioner-informed approach called “correspondent analysis,” which combines the methods and insights of the metaphor researcher and psychotherapist, a series of session extracts are then analyzed to illustrate the connections between the three strands and what they imply for both metaphor research and therapeutic practice. This culminates in the proposal of a triangle model for the metaphor–body–psychotherapy relationship, with wider implications for applied metaphor research also discussed.