Metaphorical Changes In Chinese Ecological Discourse

Cognitive linguistics studies have found that metaphor is an important way for people to understand and represent the world.An in-depth analysis of metaphor in discourse can reveal people’s way of thinking and ideology hidden behind.Adopting Conceptual Metaphor Theory(CMT)in cognitive linguistics and employing Discourse-historical Approach(DHA),this study examined the types and changes of the metaphorical discourse which takes daziran(nature)as the tenor by investigating the self-built corpus of news reports containing the word daziran(nature)in The People’s Daily from 1950 to 2019.The study aims to reveal the interaction between China’s ecological discourse and its socio-economic development so as to provide inspiration for constructing the ecological discourse of harmonious coexistence between man and nature as well as promoting the construction of ecological civilization.In this thesis,qualitative and quantitative methods are used to answer the following three questions:(1)What are the types of metaphorical discourse with daziran(nature)as the target domain in Chinese ecological discourse represented by The People’s Daily?(2)What changes took place in this metaphorical discourse during the period from 1950 to 2019?(3)What is the relationship between the metaphorical changes in Chinese ecological discourse and China’s socio-economic development?The classification and diachronic analysis of the collected data leads to the following three major findings:(1)Metaphors in Chinese ecological discourse from1950 to 2019 can be divided into two types: i.e.,structural metaphor and ontological metaphor.In the category of structural metaphor,daziran(nature)is metaphorically conceptualized as “a living entity” and “a school ”.According to different metaphor images,the former can be further divided into three sub-types,“object to conquer”“man with thought” and “object to care about”.(2)Three stages can be identified in the metaphorical changes in Chinese ecological discourse.The first stage is the period from 1950 to 1979,featuring the metaphor of NATURE IS AN OBJECT TO CONQUER;the second stage lasts from 1980 to 1999,in which Chinese people realized the adverse consequences of the damage of environment and began to take measures to protect nature.This change is well-reflected in the conceptual metaphors like NATURE IS A MAN WITH THOUGHT and NATURE IS AN OBJECT TO CARE ABOUT.The third stage is the period from 2000 to 2019,in which the metaphors like these two continued to develop,but at the same time the so-called “container metaphor” was more representative.(3)These diachronic changes of nature metaphor in the three stages are of great relevance to the political and economic policies and situations in China.In the early days of the founding of the People’s Republic of China(PRC),people tried to conquer nature to meet the need of economic development with great determination showcased by the slogan “man will win the nature”,but in the new century,China is pursuing the construction of ecological civilization characterized by “harmony between man and nature”.This turn reflects the change in their attitudes towards nature and the good development trend of building a discourse of ecological civilization advocating the harmonious development between man and nature.Through the study of the diachronic changes in the metaphorical ecological discourse with daziran(nature)as the target domain,on the one hand,this study has revealed the process of how Chinese people have changed their attitude towards nature from the original limited and even adverse version to the current broad and friendly one.On the other hand,it shows that the socio-economic development has a significant effect on the representation and formation of ecological discourse in China.