A Study Of The Conceptuel Metathphor Of The Naming Of OPEX After The Second World War

"Metaphors can kill." This famous remark by George Lakoff demonstrates concisely the implication and the main role of metaphor as a linguistic phenomenon in the military realm.A universal cognitive phenomenon and fundamental state of existence of thought,the conceptual metaphor exerts influences on human perception and human behavior as a result of their cognitive actions.It also influences military vocabularies and languages and particularly the denomination of military operations.Based on the theory of cognitive linguistics,international politics and military science,this work summarizes the conceptual metaphors contained in denominations of France?s foreign military operations since World War II.It tries to find the source of and the mechanism behind these metaphorical denominations while exploiting their characteristics under various frameworks.This work first introduces theories of conceptual metaphor and fundamentals of France?s foreign military operations.It collects and classifies all the metaphors that have appeared in the dominations of France?s foreign military operations since WWII using the three-step analysis proposed by Lynne Graham.Then according to the semantic classification of the source domain,five cases are selected for an in-depth and multidimensional analysis of the domination mechanism.Finally,motivations behind these metaphorical denominations are explored combining the international political model proposed by Lakoff with the metaphor in power relationship,by summarizing the principles underlying the domination of France?s foreign operations and its relationship with France?s foreign military policy.This study concludes that the French military systematically used conceptual metaphors in its denominations of foreign operations to guide the cognition of the public,to the effect that soldiers were motivated,public opinion was influenced and support secured from the international community.At the same time,being influenced by international politics,the metaphorical denominations of operations evolves with France's foreign military policy,reflecting the characteristics of the time.