METAPHOR AND ITS TIES TO AMBIGUITY AND VAGUENESS.

This paper examines the comparative usefulness of seeking to explain metaphor through the notions of ambiguity and vagueness. I argue that, despite long standing attempts to explain metaphor as a species of ambiguous language, all such attempts fail. I also argue that a less explored association, that between metaphor and vague language, can be exploited much more successfully in explaining a quite different aspect of metaphor--why speakers might choose that trope over literal utterance in everyday contexts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]