A Diachronic Study Of Conceptual Metaphors In New Year’s Editorials

In this present dissertation, the relation between political metaphors and social realities isexplored from the perspective of cognitive linguistics and the research is done in the area ofinterdiscipline. As far as the traditional research of metaphor is concerned, the study of metaphorfocused on the theory of metaphorical cognition, but the research perspective of this presentdissertation is different from the above mentioned. In fact, the study of metaphors from differentperspectives would produce the valuable meaning in various aspects. The study of functions ofmetaphor in political discourse in a diachronic way combined with the knowledge ofinterdisciplinary such as linguistics, politics, communication and so on would play an importantrole in the analysis of the national situation, the ideology of the government and the social situationin the different historical periods.This present dissertation intended to explore the conceptual metaphors in the New Yeareditorials of People’s Daily (1953~2012) in the past sixty years within the framework of cognitivelinguistics. In the research there are three areas as follows:(1) to analyze the definition anddifferent categories of the conceptual metaphors in the New Year editorials of People’s Daily(1953~2012) in the past sixty years;(2) to explore the motivation, the features and the functions ofthe conceptual metaphors used in the New Year editorials of People’s Daily (1953~2012) in thepast sixty years;(3) to elaborate the formation causes for the features and functions of conceptualmetaphors in the editorials.So the focus is put on the analysis of the conceptual metaphors in the New Year editorials inthe whole research process. By doing this, the author in the dissertation intends to highlight theimportance of conceptual metaphors in political discourse which is represented by People’s Daily.The author’s tentative research is inspired by the following factors. On the one hand, the priortheoretical researches on the metaphors in political discourse have some insufficiencies, that is, thesemantic features of metaphors and the analysis of different categories of metaphors in politicaldiscourse in different historical periods are seldom covered in the previous research; on the otherhand, neither the mapping between the source domain and the target domain especially aimed atthe frame of metaphors in political discourse nor the influence of the social reality on politicalmetaphors is analyzed or elaborated in detail. The special research interest derives mainly from theabove mentioned factors which produces a result of leaving a gap in areas about the comprehensivestudy of the features and functions of conceptual metaphors in the editorials of different historicalperiods within the theory of conceptual metaphor.Based on the above mentioned background and the facts of the previous researches, thepresent dissertation puts forward the three research questions as follows:（1）What categories of political metaphors are there in the New Year editorials of People’s Daily (1953~2012) in the past sixty years?（2）What features do the political metaphors in different periods have?（3）What functions do the metaphors in the editorials in different periods have?Based on the above mentioned three research questions, the present dissertation raises threerelative research hypotheses:（1） Within the framework of cognitive linguistics, some specific categories of metaphorsare identified and analyzed with the method of quantitative analysis. The representation manner ofmapping process of metaphors between source domain and target domain are discussed.Meanwhile, based on the key words of metaphors and the instantiations in the editorials and thepeople’s cognitive experience, the metaphors in the editorials are explored in a qualitative way. Thewar metaphor, the building metaphor and so on are identified.（2）The metaphors in the editorials of different periods can be interpreted through cognitiveprocesses. And the metaphors are to be explored whether they are often used in the editorials or not,whether they disappeared in certain period of social development. As far as the metaphors indifferent periods of time are concerned, most of the metaphors can be employed to construct theactive meaning and to reflect the social realities. The above mentioned features of metaphors areclosely related to social realities.（3）The metaphors have the functions of filtering, construction, bridge, inference andclassification and so on in the editorials.The purpose of this present dissertation is four-pronged. Firstly, I mean to identify thedifferent categories of metaphors in the editorials. Secondly, exploring what features do metaphorshave in different periods of time. Thirdly, Following the critical discourse analysis raised byFairclough and the theory of conceptual metaphors provided by lakoff, the dissertation is to analyzethe causes for the formation of the metaphorical features. Enhancing our ability of realizing theideology in the political discourse and inspiring people to understand political discourse deeply viametaphors. Finally, based on the qualitative, quantitative, diachronic and synchronic analysis ofmetaphors in the editorials, I intend to study the functions of metaphors in the editorials.The theoretical basis and methodology of the dissertation: From the perspective of cognitivelinguistics, combined with Foucault’s discourse theory, using critical discourse analysis, sociology,journalism, communications and related knowledge, and through the discussion of Lakoff’stheories of conceptual metaphor, the dissertation proposes a new model of conceptual metaphors inthe editorials. Meanwhile, it explains the definition, motivation, features and functions ofconceptual metaphors in the editorials. According to this model, it takes the New Year editorials ofPeople’s Daily (1953~2012) in the past sixty years as the research object, and applies the combinedquantitative and qualitative research methods and the combined synchronic and diachronic researchmethods to the work of conducting a careful and profound analysis of the metaphorical discoursein the New Year editorials of People’s Daily (1953~2012) in the past sixty years.Through the literary review of related researches, the present dissertation describes the research object and methodology of cognitive linguistics, the developing trend of conceptualmetaphor and the differences between Chinese and foreign researches in metaphor, gives anoverview of the theoretical background of the critical discourse analysis, and give comments on thevarious standpoints of the literary review above. It introduces the theoretical framework of thedissertation, describes Foucault’s discourse theory, Lakoff’s conceptual metaphor theory, and themethodology of Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis in details. It further introduces themethodology of the dissertation, including the collection and analysis of the corpus, and putsforward the combined quantitative and qualitative analytical procedure and the combinedsynchronic and diachronic analytical procedure that are to be used in the dissertation. It screens outmore than ten types of metaphors in the editorials as the objects of analysis via quantitativestatistics. Moreover, it thoroughly describes the relationships and interactions between the nationalconditions, social context, and other closely related political metaphors in different periods. Itspurpose is to summarize the features of metaphors in different historical periods.Based on the categorization and discussion of the different types of conceptual metaphors, thepresent dissertation found the characters of conceptual metaphors in different historical periods andthe functions of conceptual metaphors in editorials. In addition, the relevant knowledge of criticaldiscourse analysis, conceptual metaphor theory, sociology, journalism and communications isapplied to describing the characters and functions of metaphors, and proposes a new model ofanalyzing the conceptual metaphors in the editorials.Based on this research, the dissertation comes to its related conclusion and points out itscontribution, innovation, limits and the envisage of the future research in the field as well. Thedetailed description of its main contribution is as follows:The metaphors in the editorials plays a paramount role in the society. Editorials, as one type ofthe mass media, possess the right of adjusting and controlling the discourse. The usage of politicalmetaphor is a representation of metaphorical functions in the editorials and it will influencepeople’s belief and view on the society. Political situation during different historical periods in turnhave decisive impact on political metaphor. As a result, the application of political metaphoraccords with the political ideal of the Communist Party and the development of the nation.Meanwhile, the audience and the editorials in different periods determine the different types andcharacters of metaphors. The usage of metaphor in the editorials during different periodsdemonstrates the advanced thoughts of the Communist Party, makes them in accordance withpeople’s thoughts, and helps our party encourage people to actively participate in socialconstruction and development.