This article presents an emergent model of the conceptualization of strah (Fear) in Croatian with focus on the constructions derived from the container image schema coded by preposition u (in). the semantic and syntactic analysis of the collocations of lexeme strah demonstrates conceptual hierarchy of the activation of metonymic and metaphoric processes via syntactic organization and perspectivization. It is argued that the meaning of the lexeme strah is conceptualized by metonymic profiling sensory-motor correlates of affective states and by superimposing metaphorical mappings of objects, spatial relations, object/entities with thematic and agentive roles that are organized in an emergent system of respective ontological, spatial, thematic and agentive patterns of linguistic constructions.
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