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Dead metaphor

Device
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

A metaphor that has lost its original imagery through overuse and is now understood literally

Detailed Definition
A Dead metaphor is a figurative expression so overused that its original imagery has faded into conventional meaning (e.g., “falling in love,” “grasping an idea”); while often criticized as cliché, dead metaphors reveal how language fossilizes poetic insight into everyday speech, and poets may deliberately revive or interrogate them to expose hidden assumptions—as in the meta-poetic work of Wallace Stevens or Anne Carson.
Example
Example in poetry:
“Legs of steel” once vivid, now clichéd; “Heart of stone” has lost its original emotional force; “Time flies” began as metaphor but now functions as idiom; “Break the ice” no longer evokes literal shattering; Dead metaphors permeate bureaucratic language like “streamlining processes.”
Additional Notes
Dead metaphor has lost original figurative force through overuse ("leg of table"). Contrasts with live metaphor. Related to cliché. Once vivid, now literal. Poets revive these through defamiliarization or wordplay.
Also Known As
Fossilized metaphor Frozen figure Clichéd comparison Worn-out trope
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