A Comparative Analysis Of Conceptual Metaphors In Chinese And American Commencement Speeches

Metaphor is a kind of cognitive style in people's daily life.Traditionally,metaphor has been deemed as tool of decorating language with the purpose of making language more vivid.However,contemporary researchers realize that metaphor is more than a tool of decorating language but a way to help people understand the world.In 1980,Lakoff and Johnson advanced the notion of“conceptual metaphor”.They consider conceptual metaphor as “a systematic way of people's thinking,acting and expressing ideas”.Since then,studies on conceptual metaphors have flourished and covered in many areas,such as political speech,news,literature,etc.In the past,researches were mainly centered on analyzing political speeches.However,few researches gave priority to conceptual metaphors in non-political speeches from the perspective of conceptual metaphor.Commencement speeches,as one of the most important parts of graduation activities deserve to be studied.In this thesis,based on the theory of conceptual metaphor,the researcher tries to make a comparative study of conceptual metaphors used in Chinese and American commencement speeches.This thesis takes 60 commencement speeches as corpora,30 selected from Chinese universities,30 from American universities.All the data are collected from official website of respective university.By the comparative study of conceptual metaphors used in Chinese and American commencement speeches,this study aims to answer the following questions:(1)What conceptual metaphors are used in Chinese commencement speeches?(2)What conceptual metaphors are used in American commencement speeches?(3)What are the similarities and differences in terms of the use of conceptual metaphors in Chinese and American commencement speeches?The result shows that conceptual metaphors used in Chinese commencement speeches include ten kinds: journey,human,war,container,building,nature,orientation,food,game and line.The conceptual metaphors found in Americancommencement speeches also include ten kinds: journey,human,war,nature,orientation,food,container,family,building,game.By comparison,there exist some similarities and differences.The similarities are that(1)the frequency of using conceptual metaphors in Chinese and American commencement speeches is very high.(2)Nine kinds of conceptual metaphors are shared in Chinese and American commencement speeches.(3)The mapping process in some conceptual metaphors is similar in Chinese and American commencement speeches.The differences are that(1)The number and percentage of conceptual metaphors in Chinese and American commencement speeches are not corresponding.(2)Line metaphors only exist in Chinese commencement speeches,while family metaphors only exist in American commencement speeches;It is suggested that the similarities are due to the same bodily experience and thinking patterns,the differences are the result of different national features.