ABSTRACT
Kriol offers tools that allow its speakers to convey the same contents as in Dalabon, often with commensurate packaging. Given the lexical resemblances between Dalabon and Kriol, very comparable messages can be conveyed in both languages. This chapter introduces some simple notions and definitions about figurative language. It presents an overview of figurative representations of emotions in Dalabon, highlighting the prevalence of the figurative association between emotions and the body in this language. The chapter considers the realization of the body/emotion association in Kriol. In Dalabon, the descriptive emotional compounds establish a strong linguistic association between emotions and the body parts involved in corresponding emotional behaviors – in other words, between emotions and the body. Dalabon competes with Southeast Asian languages, where body-based descriptions of emotions are reported to be ‘essential’ and remarkably widespread. The discrepancy between Kriol and Dalabon in this respect is somewhat puzzling.
