Metaphoric Reasoning and Pragmatic Modelling

Abstract

Chapter 2, Modelling and metaphoric reasoning, discusses the act of modelling, especially, its representative and descriptive functions and how it operates within a context which includes a metaphorical language. Metaphors adapt to and at the same time transform this language. The concept of “pragmatic modelling” is discussed further and is connected to how metaphorical language operates in Digital Humanities (DH) as well as other (mainly interdisciplinary) modelling contexts. Furthermore, the chapter exemplifies how metaphors themselves are models of knowledge, as they define the schemes within which specific concepts operate and knowledge is established and expressed. In particular, in a DH context, the use of metaphors can have practical outcomes in how affordances influence data processing, storage, and design, and in how data are presented and interfaces are built. In this chapter, we propose to consider modelling as a creative and usually highly pragmatic process of thinking and reasoning in which metaphors assume a central role and where meaning is negotiated through the creation and manipulation of external representations combined with an imaginative use of formal and informal languages.