Conceptual metaphors in the public speeches of Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin (2014-2015)
Keywords:
conceptual metaphors, ideological key concepts, methodology for multiple data, Obama and Putin, political discourse
Abstract
This pilot study discusses conceptual metaphors reconstructed via analysis of linguistic metaphorical expressions (ME) which, being conventional for political discourse, signify POLITICS, ECONOMY, and AMERICA / RUSSIA target conceptual domains as the highlights of the politicians’ public speeches. The data – ME coming from B. Obama’s and V. Putin’s speeches obtained from official Internet resources – are processed according to the methodology developed earlier by the author of this paper. Grounded on the findings of Conceptual Metaphor Theory, this methodology represents an algorithm for exposure and further description of conceptual metaphors employed in a thematically coherent discourse, and manifested by multiple ME numbering dozens and over. Their analysis, aiming to portray the metaphorical system as a whole, enables an in-depth study of the target and source conceptual domains, and a thorough account of their cross-mapping influenced by the discourse type. In this study, focused on political discourse, the systems of conceptual metaphors tracked in the public speeches of each president are regarded separately and in comparison. The obtained results expose the speakers’ ideological worldviews, and the workings of conceptual metaphors as instruments for exerting influence on the public. The supplement to this paper demonstrates reconstruction of conceptual metaphors in the speeches of each politician, and compares these speeches with regard to ideological key concepts of the metaphoric narrative.Downloads
Download data is not yet available.
References
Anderson R.D. (Jr.). (2001). Metaphors of dictatorship and democracy: change in the Russian political lexicon and the Transformation of Russian Politics. Slavic Review, 60 (2), 312335.
Arutyunova, N.D (1990). Diskurs [Discourse]. In V.N. Yarceva (Ed.) // Lingvisticheskij ehnciklopedicheskij slovar – Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary. Moscow: Sovetskaya ehnciklopediya, 136-137 (in Russian).
Baranov, A.N. & Karaulov, Yu. N. (1991). Ocherk kognitivnoj teorii metafory [An essay of the cognitive theory of metaphor]. In Russkaya politicheskaya metafora: materialy k slovaryu – Russian political metaphor: materials for a dictionary. Moscow: Institut russkogo yazyka AP SSSR, 184–193 (in Russian).
Bayley, P. (1985). Live oratory in the television age: The language of formal speeches. In P. Bayley, G. Ragazzini, D.R.B.P. Miller (Eds.). Campaign language: Language, image, myth in the U.S. presidential elections 1984. – Bologna: Cooperativa Libraria Universitaria Editrice Bologna, 1985, 77–174.
Brovchenko, I.V. (2011). Konceptual'naya metafora v klishe angloyazychnogo nauchnogo teksta [Conceptual metaphor in clichés of the academic text]. Unpublished candidate dissertation, Bohdan Khmelnitsky National University, Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Russian).
Chaban, N.A. (1997). Koncept POLITIKA SUVERENNOJ UKRAINY v verbal'nom voploshchenii [The concept POLITICS OF SOVEREIGN UKRAIN in linguistic representation]. Cherkassy: Bohdan Khmelnitsky State University of Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Russian).
Chomsky, N. (2004). Language and politics. 2nd ed. – Edinburgh et al. : AK Press, 2004.
Chernyavskaya, V.E. (2006). Diskurs vlasti i vlast' diskursa. Problemi rechovogo vozdejstviya [Discourse of power, and power of discourse]. Moscow: Nauka (in Russian).
Chudinov, A.P. (2001). Rossiya v metaforicheskom zerkale: kognitivnoe issledovanie politicheskoj metafory (1991-2000) [Russia in the metaphoric mirror: a cognitive study of political metaphor]. Ekaterinburg : Ural State Pedagogical Institute (in Russian).
Budaev, E.V. & Chudinov, A.P. (2012). Zarubezhnaya politicheskaya lingvistika [Foreign political linguistics]. Moscow: Flinta (in Russian).
Dem'yankov, V.Z. (2002). Politicheskij diskurs kak predmet politologicheskoj filologii [Political discourse as an object of political philology]. In Politicheskaya nauka. Politicheskij diskurs: Istoriya i sovremennye issledovaniya – Political science. Political discourse: History and contemporary studies, 3. Moscow: INION RAN, 32–43 (in Russian).
Dijk van, T.A. (1988). Making news: a study in the construction of reality. New York: Free Press.
Dirven, R. & Verspoor, M. (1998). Cognitive exploration of language and linguistics. Amsterdam / Philadelphia : John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Epstein, R. (2016). In the future Big Data will make actual voting obsolete. Quarts. April 27, 2016. Available from https://qz.com/669983/maybe-we-should-let-google-vote-for-us/
Evans, V. & Green, M. (2006). Cognitive linguistics. An introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Fekseus, H. (2010). Iskusstvo manipulyacii. Kak ne dat' sebya obmanut': per. so shved. E.N. Hohlovoj [The art of manipulatuin: how to evoid cheating: translated from Swedish]. Moscow: Ripol Klassik (in Russian).
Kovecses, Z. (2000). The scope of metaphor. In Z. Kovecses (Ed.). Metaphor and metonymy at the crossroads: A cognitive perspective. Berlin – N.Y.: Mouton de Gruyter.
Kovecses, Z. (2002). Metaphor: A practical introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lakoff G. (1993). Contemporary theory of metaphor. In A. Ortony (Ed.). Metaphor and thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 202–251.
Lakoff, G. (2008). The political mind: Why you can't understand 21st-century politics with an 18thcentury brain. N.Y.: Viking.
Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1980), Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought. N.Y.: Basic Books.
Luk’yanec', V. (2002). Fіlosofіya diskursu [Philosophy of discourse]. Vіsnik NAN Ukraїni – Messinger of the Ukrainian National Academy of Scences, 12, 22– 28 (in Ukrainian).
Nagels, A., Kauschke, Ch., Schrauf, J. et al. (2013). Neural substrates of figurative language during natural speech perception: an fMRI study. In Fronties in Behevioral Neuroscience. 19 September. Available from http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnbeh.2013.00121/full
Radchenko, O.Yu. (2012). Konceptual'na metafora v termіnosistemі marketingu [Conceptual metaphor in the terminology of marketing]. Unpublished candidate dissertation, Bohdan Khmelnitsky National University, Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Ukrainian).
Shejgal, E.I. (2000). Semiotika politicheskogo diskursa [Semiotics of political discourse]. Moscow-Volgograd: Peremena (in Russian).
Shevchenko, Y.S. (2011). Dyskurs y eho katehoryy [Discourse and its categories]. Visnyk Harkivs’koho nac. un-tu imeni V.N. Karazina – Messenger of V.N. Karazin National University of Kharkiv, Ukraine, 973 (68), 6–12.
Woody, A. (2016). Why winning politics is now tied to dig data analytics. Datanami. May 10. Available from https://www.datanami.com/2016/05/10/winning-politics-now-tied-big-data/
Yavors'ka, G.M. & Bogomolov, O.V. (2010). Nepevnij ob’yekt bazhannya: YEVROPA v ukrayns'komu polіtichnomu diskursі [A vague object of desire: EUROPE in Ukrainian political discourse]. Kyiv: Vidavnichij dіm Dmytra Burago.
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2011). Konceptual'naya metafora: procedura analiza dlya mnozhestvennyh dannyh [Conceptual metaphor: a research procedure for multiple data]. Aktual'nі problemi mentalіngvіstiki. Zb. statej za materіalami VII Mіzhnarodnoї naukovoї konferencії – Topical problems of mental linguistics. Papers of the 7th International scientific conference. Cherkasy, 3–6. (in Russian).
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013a). Imya kak tekst: konceptual'naya set' leksicheskogo znacheniya (analiz imeni ehmocii) [Name as text: a conceptual network of lexical meaning (analysis of the name of emotion)]. Kogniciya, kommunikaciya, diskurs. Mezhdunar. ehlektr. sbornik nauchnyh trudov, Har'kovskij nac.un-t imeni V. Karazina. – Cognition, communication, discourse. International electronic scholarly journal, V.N. Karazin National University, Kharkiv, Ukraine, 6. 47–76. (in Russian). Available from https://sites.google.com/site/cognitiondiscourse/vypusk-no6-2013/zabotinskaa-s-a
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013b) Konceptual'naya metafora v special'nom yazyke: procedura analiza [Conceptual metaphor in a language for specific purposes]. Inostrannye yazyki v vysshej shkole (Ryazanskij gos. un-t imeni S.A. Esenina) – Foreign languages in a higher school, S. Yesenin Ryazan State university, Russia, 3 (26), 24–32 (in Russian).
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013c). Konceptual'naya metafora: kongruehntnoe i nekongruehntnoe kartirovanie vo mnozhestvennyh dannyh [Conceptual metaphor: congruent and incongruent mapping in multiple data] In A.N. Rudyakov (Ed.). Funkcional'naya lingvistika – Functional linguistics, 5. Simferopol', 104–106 (in Russian).
Arutyunova, N.D (1990). Diskurs [Discourse]. In V.N. Yarceva (Ed.) // Lingvisticheskij ehnciklopedicheskij slovar – Linguistic encyclopedic dictionary. Moscow: Sovetskaya ehnciklopediya, 136-137 (in Russian).
Baranov, A.N. & Karaulov, Yu. N. (1991). Ocherk kognitivnoj teorii metafory [An essay of the cognitive theory of metaphor]. In Russkaya politicheskaya metafora: materialy k slovaryu – Russian political metaphor: materials for a dictionary. Moscow: Institut russkogo yazyka AP SSSR, 184–193 (in Russian).
Bayley, P. (1985). Live oratory in the television age: The language of formal speeches. In P. Bayley, G. Ragazzini, D.R.B.P. Miller (Eds.). Campaign language: Language, image, myth in the U.S. presidential elections 1984. – Bologna: Cooperativa Libraria Universitaria Editrice Bologna, 1985, 77–174.
Brovchenko, I.V. (2011). Konceptual'naya metafora v klishe angloyazychnogo nauchnogo teksta [Conceptual metaphor in clichés of the academic text]. Unpublished candidate dissertation, Bohdan Khmelnitsky National University, Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Russian).
Chaban, N.A. (1997). Koncept POLITIKA SUVERENNOJ UKRAINY v verbal'nom voploshchenii [The concept POLITICS OF SOVEREIGN UKRAIN in linguistic representation]. Cherkassy: Bohdan Khmelnitsky State University of Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Russian).
Chomsky, N. (2004). Language and politics. 2nd ed. – Edinburgh et al. : AK Press, 2004.
Chernyavskaya, V.E. (2006). Diskurs vlasti i vlast' diskursa. Problemi rechovogo vozdejstviya [Discourse of power, and power of discourse]. Moscow: Nauka (in Russian).
Chudinov, A.P. (2001). Rossiya v metaforicheskom zerkale: kognitivnoe issledovanie politicheskoj metafory (1991-2000) [Russia in the metaphoric mirror: a cognitive study of political metaphor]. Ekaterinburg : Ural State Pedagogical Institute (in Russian).
Budaev, E.V. & Chudinov, A.P. (2012). Zarubezhnaya politicheskaya lingvistika [Foreign political linguistics]. Moscow: Flinta (in Russian).
Dem'yankov, V.Z. (2002). Politicheskij diskurs kak predmet politologicheskoj filologii [Political discourse as an object of political philology]. In Politicheskaya nauka. Politicheskij diskurs: Istoriya i sovremennye issledovaniya – Political science. Political discourse: History and contemporary studies, 3. Moscow: INION RAN, 32–43 (in Russian).
Dijk van, T.A. (1988). Making news: a study in the construction of reality. New York: Free Press.
Dirven, R. & Verspoor, M. (1998). Cognitive exploration of language and linguistics. Amsterdam / Philadelphia : John Benjamins Publishing Company.
Epstein, R. (2016). In the future Big Data will make actual voting obsolete. Quarts. April 27, 2016. Available from https://qz.com/669983/maybe-we-should-let-google-vote-for-us/
Evans, V. & Green, M. (2006). Cognitive linguistics. An introduction. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
Fekseus, H. (2010). Iskusstvo manipulyacii. Kak ne dat' sebya obmanut': per. so shved. E.N. Hohlovoj [The art of manipulatuin: how to evoid cheating: translated from Swedish]. Moscow: Ripol Klassik (in Russian).
Kovecses, Z. (2000). The scope of metaphor. In Z. Kovecses (Ed.). Metaphor and metonymy at the crossroads: A cognitive perspective. Berlin – N.Y.: Mouton de Gruyter.
Kovecses, Z. (2002). Metaphor: A practical introduction. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Lakoff G. (1993). Contemporary theory of metaphor. In A. Ortony (Ed.). Metaphor and thought. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 202–251.
Lakoff, G. (2008). The political mind: Why you can't understand 21st-century politics with an 18thcentury brain. N.Y.: Viking.
Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1980), Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, G. & Johnson, M. (1999). Philosophy in the flesh: The embodied mind and its challenge to Western thought. N.Y.: Basic Books.
Luk’yanec', V. (2002). Fіlosofіya diskursu [Philosophy of discourse]. Vіsnik NAN Ukraїni – Messinger of the Ukrainian National Academy of Scences, 12, 22– 28 (in Ukrainian).
Nagels, A., Kauschke, Ch., Schrauf, J. et al. (2013). Neural substrates of figurative language during natural speech perception: an fMRI study. In Fronties in Behevioral Neuroscience. 19 September. Available from http://journal.frontiersin.org/article/10.3389/fnbeh.2013.00121/full
Radchenko, O.Yu. (2012). Konceptual'na metafora v termіnosistemі marketingu [Conceptual metaphor in the terminology of marketing]. Unpublished candidate dissertation, Bohdan Khmelnitsky National University, Cherkasy, Ukraine (in Ukrainian).
Shejgal, E.I. (2000). Semiotika politicheskogo diskursa [Semiotics of political discourse]. Moscow-Volgograd: Peremena (in Russian).
Shevchenko, Y.S. (2011). Dyskurs y eho katehoryy [Discourse and its categories]. Visnyk Harkivs’koho nac. un-tu imeni V.N. Karazina – Messenger of V.N. Karazin National University of Kharkiv, Ukraine, 973 (68), 6–12.
Woody, A. (2016). Why winning politics is now tied to dig data analytics. Datanami. May 10. Available from https://www.datanami.com/2016/05/10/winning-politics-now-tied-big-data/
Yavors'ka, G.M. & Bogomolov, O.V. (2010). Nepevnij ob’yekt bazhannya: YEVROPA v ukrayns'komu polіtichnomu diskursі [A vague object of desire: EUROPE in Ukrainian political discourse]. Kyiv: Vidavnichij dіm Dmytra Burago.
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2011). Konceptual'naya metafora: procedura analiza dlya mnozhestvennyh dannyh [Conceptual metaphor: a research procedure for multiple data]. Aktual'nі problemi mentalіngvіstiki. Zb. statej za materіalami VII Mіzhnarodnoї naukovoї konferencії – Topical problems of mental linguistics. Papers of the 7th International scientific conference. Cherkasy, 3–6. (in Russian).
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013a). Imya kak tekst: konceptual'naya set' leksicheskogo znacheniya (analiz imeni ehmocii) [Name as text: a conceptual network of lexical meaning (analysis of the name of emotion)]. Kogniciya, kommunikaciya, diskurs. Mezhdunar. ehlektr. sbornik nauchnyh trudov, Har'kovskij nac.un-t imeni V. Karazina. – Cognition, communication, discourse. International electronic scholarly journal, V.N. Karazin National University, Kharkiv, Ukraine, 6. 47–76. (in Russian). Available from https://sites.google.com/site/cognitiondiscourse/vypusk-no6-2013/zabotinskaa-s-a
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013b) Konceptual'naya metafora v special'nom yazyke: procedura analiza [Conceptual metaphor in a language for specific purposes]. Inostrannye yazyki v vysshej shkole (Ryazanskij gos. un-t imeni S.A. Esenina) – Foreign languages in a higher school, S. Yesenin Ryazan State university, Russia, 3 (26), 24–32 (in Russian).
Zhabotinskaya, S.A. (2013c). Konceptual'naya metafora: kongruehntnoe i nekongruehntnoe kartirovanie vo mnozhestvennyh dannyh [Conceptual metaphor: congruent and incongruent mapping in multiple data] In A.N. Rudyakov (Ed.). Funkcional'naya lingvistika – Functional linguistics, 5. Simferopol', 104–106 (in Russian).
Published
2017-06-10
How to Cite
Жаботинская, С. А. (2017). Conceptual metaphors in the public speeches of Barack Obama and Vladimir Putin (2014-2015). Cognition, Communication, Discourse, (13), 43-91. https://doi.org/10.26565/2218-2926-2016-13-04
Section
Articles
Authors, who publish with this journal, accept the following conditions:
The authors reserve the copyright of their work and transfer to the journal the right of the first publication of this work under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution Non-Commercial Non-Derivs License (CC BY-NC-ND), which allows other persons to freely distribute a published work with mandatory reference to the authors of the original work and the first publication of the work in this journal.
Authors have the right to enter into separate additional agreements for the non-exclusive dissemination of the work in the form in which it was published by this journal (for example, to post the work in the electronic institutions' repository or to publish as part of a monograph), provided that the link to the first publication of the work in this journal is given.
The journal policy allows and encourages the authors to place the manuscripts on the Internet (for example, in the institutions' repositories or on personal websites), both before the presentation of this manuscript to the editorial board and during review procedure, as it contributes to the creation of productive scientific discussion and positively affects the efficiency and dynamics of citing the published work (see The Effect of Open Access).
