Actually it is a kind of spatial metaphors when Chinese localizer qian is used to represent time , it can not only repre-sent the past, but the future.Figure-ground, as a visual spatial conception , is a metaphorical application in language .This paper is a spatial metaphorical analysis of Chinese localizer qian representing time from three aspects : egocentric representations , land-mark-based representations and allocentric representations , based on figure-ground theory .It shows that qian represents the past from the perspective of egocentric representations;it represents the future from t...
