Glossary of Linguistic Terms

Containment Schema

Definition: 

A containment schema is an image schema that involves a physical or metaphorical

  • boundary
  • enclosed area or volume, or
  • excluded area or volume.
Discussion: 

A containment schema can have additional optional properties, such as

  • transitivity of enclosure (whereby if one object is enclosed by a second, and that by a third, the first is also enclosed by the third)
  • objects inside or outside the boundary
  • protectedness of an enclosed object
  • the restriction of forces inside the enclosure, and
  • the relatively fixed position of an enclosed object.
Source: