A Comparative Study Of Metaphor In Chinese And American Media Discourse On Global Warming

The Conceptual Metaphor Theory(CMT)believes that metaphor.more than a rhetorical device,is a cognitive mechanism that generates abstract concepts based on concrete bodily experiences.Because of metaphor's persuasive potential in evoking strong emotional responses and constructing ideologies,metaphors in news discourses on environmental issues like global warming play an important role in affecting public attitude of dealing with warming effects.The research answers the following questions:(1)What metaphors occur in Chinese and American media discourse on global warming?What conceptual metaphors and conceptual keys underlie metaphor use in Chinese and American global warming media discourse?(2)What are the similarities and differences of the conceptual metaphors used by Chinese and American media?(3)Are the detected metaphors destructive,beneficial or ambivalent to the reduction of climate change from the ecolinguistic perspective?The present study examines and compares conceptual metaphors and metaphor use in Chinese and American global warming news articles from two Chinese online news media websites,People's Daily,ThePaper.cn,altogether 240,638 Chinese characters and 119,943 words,and two US news sites,USA Today and New York Times,altogether 142,214 words.Following the method of Metaphor Identification Procedure and Critical Metaphor Analysis,the research has identified 12 conceptual metaphors from the Chinese data and 10 from the American data.The research has identified the following conceptual keys in the Chinese corpus:DETERIORATION AND MITIGATION OF CLIMATE CHANGE ARE A WAR;CLIMATE CHANGE IS A JOURNEY;CLIMATE ACTION IS A JOURNEY;AN ECOSYSTEM IS A PERSON;EXPLOITATION OF ECOSYSTEM IS A WAR.The identified conceptual keys in the American corpus are as follows:DETERIORATION AND MITIGATION OF CLIMATE CHANGE ARE A WAR;CLIMATE CHANGE IS A JOURNEY;CLIMATE ACTION IS A JOURNEY;AN ECOSYSTEM IS A PATIENT;CLIMATE CHANGE IS A FICTION.Although there exists an overlapping of conceptual metaphors from the two corpora.Chinese and American metaphors are reported to have different patterns.The most prevailing metaphor in the Chinese corpus is CLIMATE ACTION IS A JOURNEY whereas the most prevailing metaphor in the American corpus is DETERIORATION AND MITIGATION OF CLIMATE CHANGE ARE A WAR.The thesis criticizes the prevailing metaphors identified in the corpora,suggesting a synthetical use of metaphors from different domains to conceptualize global warming.The ecolinguistic critique of metaphors shows that military action metaphors may express the urgency of the climate crisis but present human beings as victims and refugees instead of the culprit who causes climate change.Journey metaphors that conceptualize the humanity intentionally walking to worsening climate may assist in assuming the responsibility of causing global warming.On the other hand,journey metaphors should also be carefully chosen because some may indicate the climate change is still "far-away" from human beings or the progress of tackling the warming is slow.Therefore,we suggest that a diversity of metaphors should be employed by journalists and science communicators to avoid a fixed framing of climate change issues.