NOUN
- a metaphor that has occurred so often that it has become a new meaning of the expression (e.g., `he is a snake' may once have been a metaphor but after years of use it has died and become a new sense of the word `snake')
How To Use dead metaphor In A Sentence
- Spelling mistakes, dead metaphors and casual infelicities abound. Times, Sunday Times
- Dead metaphor, being a special kind of metaphor, has not been taken into systematic research.
- But we shall get a clearer idea of the nature of mixed metaphor if we regard all these as violations of the following simple rule: When a live metaphor (intentional or unintentional) has once been chosen, the words grammatically connected with it must be either (a) recognizable parts of the same metaphorical idea, or one consistent with it, or (b) unmetaphorical, or dead metaphor; literal abstract nouns, for instance, instead of metaphorical concretes. Metaphor.
- This is a dead metaphor in the standard language, and so will attract little notice.
