| Previous studies on discourse are done mainly from the perspective of Critical Discourse Analysis and Pragmatics focusing on the analysis of western political discourses or comparative studies on Chinese and western political discourses with an aim for revealing potential ideology behind the words.But few studies have specifically explored the use of conceptual metaphors in Chinese discourse,especially the coherence function of conceptual metaphors in Chinese discourse.This thesis is based on the Conceptual Metaphor Theory proposed by Lakoff and Johnson in 1980,taking the addresses delivered by General Secretary Xi Jinping as examples,does a study on the coherence function of conceptual metaphors used in Chinese discourses from the perspective of Conceptual Metaphor Theory.This thesis mainly answers two questions:(1)What kinds of conceptual metaphors are mainly used in the addresses of General Secretary Xi Jinping?(2)What are the coherence functions of these conceptual metaphors?The addresses are selected from 2015 to 2017,from the large number of addresses delivered by Xi Jinping in these three years,some addresses that use conceptual metaphors are selected and then 20 addresses are selected randomly as the source of this thesis.Firstly,the selected 20 addresses are analyzed sentence-by-sentence and the place where conceptual metaphors are used are marked,the author classifies the metaphors according to the classification of conceptual metaphor and summarizes and concludes the most frequent metaphorical categories used in Xi's addresses.Then,based on the number of metaphors contained in each discourse that uses conceptual metaphors,discourses are divided into three categories: discourses containing one metaphor;discourses containing two metaphors and discourses containing three or more metaphors.Discourses containing two metaphors can be divided into two kinds: discourses containing two metaphors which share the target domain or the source domain.Finally,based on the Conceptual Metaphor Theory,the author combines the explanations of the systematicity and coherence of conceptual metaphor and analyzes thecoherence function of conceptual metaphors in those discourses that have been classified in the second step: coherence existing in one conceptual metaphor;coherence existing in two conceptual metaphors sharing the target domain or the source domain and coherence existing in different conceptual metaphors in the same discourse.The findings of the study can be summarized as follows:(1)Structural metaphors and ontological metaphors are mainly used in Xi's addresses.Structural metaphor mainly includes family metaphor,war metaphor,journey metaphor and disease metaphor.Ontological metaphor mainly includes container metaphor,building metaphor,machine metaphor and human metaphor.(2)Conceptual metaphors can form a coherence system in the following ways: first,by their shared metaphorical entailment;second,by a basic metaphor;third,by their similar grounding of commonplace knowledge.This study not only can be seen as the supplement for the studies of conceptual metaphor,but also can help the public have a better understanding of the policies. |
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