A Diachronic Conceptual Metaphor Study Of China’s Image In English Translations Of Annual Government Work Reports

Metaphor is a common way of understanding one concept by comparing it to another.Conceptual Metaphor Theory proposed by Lakoff and Johnson classifies metaphors into the following three types:ontological,structural,and orientational.Previous studies of metaphor have covered both the theoretical and practical levels.Although political metaphors have received wide attention from academia in the political field,researchers have either focused on foreign media coverage—paying little attention on the self-shaping of national image—or adopted government work reports during a few years or even one year;thus,a diachronic conceptual metaphor study of China’s government work reports has not been conducted.Therefore,this study adopts translated government work reports from 2000 to 2022 to study China’s efforts to construct a Chinese image for foreign readers from the perspective of metaphors.Meanwhile,Frame Theory plays a significant role in metaphor explanation;as metaphors are deeply rooted in different cultures,they are combined with various frames to form various systems of metaphors.Scholars in China have started localizing Frame Theory to make it better suited for the country’s context.Consequently,the integration of Conceptual Metaphor Theory and Frame Theory could better reveal the functions of metaphors in China’s image construction.This study adopts a self-built corpus of translated government work reports that have been produced by the China International Publishing Group(CIPG).The research predominantly follows three major steps—namely,(1)metaphor identification,wherein Wmatrix and MIP are integrated to identify metaphors;(2)metaphor interpretation,which classifies metaphors according to Conceptual Metaphor Theory to investigate metaphors’ distribution and diachronic changes;(3)metaphors explanation,which introduces Frame Theory to reveal China’s image constructed by metaphors.This study focuses on three key words and the top 20 key concepts(also called key concepts)generated by Wmatrix.Although most key words and key concepts are the same at different times,some new ones emerge every year alongside different social topics or issues.Second,metaphors are not evenly distributed,but their proportions differ in different keyword or key concept lists.Third,by adopting diversified metaphors,China’s accurate image from various perspectives is highlighted.Fourth,characterized,coherent frames present China’s distinctive image,which is deeply influenced by traditional culture.Finally,the overall trend of metaphors’ relative frequency is relatively steady from the diachronic perspective,though new keywords or key concepts emerge every year.Using corpus and the semantic annotation tool,this study provides a broad analysis of metaphorical expressions in translated government work reports from 2000 to 2022.In this way,it effectively encourages the diachronic study of the selfshaping of national image and provide references for the use of political metaphors.