The War Without Smoke

Metaphor is a rhetorical device,it can help users highlight some facts,obscure other facts,and play a role in reconstructing social reality.Metaphors are widely used in international news reports to help us describe international relations and shape their own and other countries' images.This study selected the Global Times's editorials on the theme of "China-US trade disputes" from January 1,2018 to April 30,2019 and finally,within them,identified 64 editorials with war metaphors as research sample by manual screening.Based on the critical metaphor analysis method proposed by Charteris-Black,it conducted analysis from three levels;metaphor identification,metaphor interpretation and metaphor explanation.This research aimed at solving problems at three levels.First,under what circumstances does the Global Times use war metaphors?What are the affiliated metaphors used by the Global Times editorials around the war metaphor?Secondly,how does the Global Times use the war metaphor to describe China and the United States,and build a relationship of rights between them in the Global Times?Finally,what kind of ideological meaning is contained in the metaphor of trade warfare?The study had some findings.The Global Times has anthropomorphized China as a "heroic defender",a warrior image,through a metaphor of trade warfare and a series of subordinate metaphors formed around this metaphor,such as warriors,bullets,fists,and sticks;The war metaphor employed the binary opposition framework to describe the relationship between China and the United States,and completed China's self-construction by shaping the image of the other of the United States,and imagined China as an open and rising power;The Global Times' editorials uses war metaphor to shape absolute enemies and demonstrate blind self-confidence through national personality and binary opposition.It incited nationalism,gave Chinese hegemonic masculinity,and rationalized ideological hegemony;As a market-oriented media,the Global Times also catered to the audience through simplification of complex issues,oral expressions on international issues,and fierce rhetoric to cater to nationalism,expanding the market and meeting capital needs.