Language, Law, and Culture: Exploring Conceptual Metaphors in Ghanaian Supreme Court Judgements

The purpose of this study is to explore how conceptual metaphors used in Ghanaian Supreme Court judgments reflect the nation’s cultural and social values. Guided by Lakoff and Johnson’s conceptual metaphor theory, which posits that metaphors are not just linguistic expressions but fundamental conceptual structures that shape our understanding of the world, the study examines 6 selected cases and analyses them through a descriptive qualitative research design. The study adopts the Pragglejazz Group’s metaphor identification procedure (MIP) as the analytical framework. Findings revealed dominant metaphors associated with “Journey”, “Building”, spatial orientation of “Up” and “Down”, and “personification”, which mirrors Ghanaian worldviews of progress, endurance, moral order, and spirituality. These metaphors demonstrate how judges draw unconsciously on cultural schemas to frame legal reasoning and communicate justice in relatable ways. It recommends incorporating linguistic-cultural analysis in legal education to enhance interpretive competence among judges and lawyers. The study contributes to scholarship by extending metaphor theory into African legal linguistics, illuminating the intersection of law, language, and culture in Ghana’s judicial system. It also offers a culturally sensitive model for understanding how legal metaphors shape meaning, reasoning, and perception in postcolonial legal contexts.