A Metaphorical Framing Analysis Of Political Discourse

Political discourse plays a very important role in transmitting political information and constructing national image.On August 10,2022,the Taiwan Affairs Office of the State Council and The State Council Information Office published a white paper entitled The Taiwan Question and China’s Reunification in the New Era(abbreviated as TQCR)in response to US Speaker of the House of Representatives Nancy Pelosi’s visit to Taiwan,which elaborated the mainland’s position and policies on national reunification.Guided by the metaphorical framing theory,this research takes the TQCR English version as the research corpus to analyze the surface frames and deep frames in a qualitative and quantitative way and further help people understand the ideas and social values conveyed in it.Conceptual metaphor is a kind of cross-domain mapping from the source domain to the target domain.People can understand the complex and abstract target domain with the help of the concrete source domain.Lakoff put forward framing theory on the basis of conceptual metaphor theory.Frames can be divided into deep frame and surface frame;surface frame is further divided into metaphorical surface frame and non-metaphorical surface frame,which can be activated directly by language;deep frame is activated by surface frame,which reflects people’s values and ideologies.Based on the analysis of the frames in the English version of the TQCR,the researcher finds that:(1)In terms of surface frames,the white paper mainly constructs six metaphorical surface frames,namely,CONTAINER,HUMAN,BUILDING,JOURNEY,PLANT,COMPETITION and nine non-metaphorical surface frames,namely,GOVERNMENT,INCLUSION,HELPING,CONNECTION,PEOPLE,POLITICS,PEACE,WAR AND DEVELOPMENT.(2)As for the deep frames,there are three kinds of deep frames activated by the above surface frames,namely,the humanitarianism,the thought of shared development and the spirit of struggle.(3)The deep frames reflect the attitude and philosophy of the Chinese government in dealing with the Taiwan question,that is,leave no room for external separatist forces and promote China’s reunification with the idea of the shared development and the ideology of peace.Combining conceptual metaphor theory and framing theory,this research analyzes the English version of the TQCR,which enriches the study of political discourse in cognitive linguistics,helps the public better understand the values and ideologies conveyed in the white paper,and provide reference for the Chinese government to builds a national discourse system and enhance the country’s voice.