Metaphors play an important role in the various discourses of our worldmaking, serving as a means of structuring, narrativizing and naturalizing cultural phenomena and transformations. Focussing on the reciprocal relationship between metaphor and theory, the essays in this volume explore the cultural implications and ideological functions of metaphors and examine their constitutive role in determining the perception of cultures and theories. As well as providing an introduction to the theory of metaphor, this volume contains numerous theoretical and historical case studies, covering examples from the Middle Ages through the Enlightenment to medernity, postmodernity, and the contemporary media society, which illustrate how on the one hand metaphors shape cultures and theories and on the other hand cultures and theories shape metaphors.