A Metonymic Study Of Anaphora In English Political Discourse

As an important topic of discourse analysis,anaphora and its comprehensive research with metonymy are the research hotpots of contemporary scholars.Therefore,a cognitive-metonymic model is constructed in this thesis,under the framework of Lakoff,Radden and K?vecses’ metonymy theory and Al-Sharafi’s discourse metonymy theory,which aims to analyze the explanatory power of cognitive metonymy on nominals anaphora and predicate anaphora in English political discourse.By means of documentation study and the induction and deduction,this thesis focuses on three questions: under the theory of cognitive metonymy,what is the relationship between anaphora and antecedent in English political discourse? What are the characteristics and rules of the anaphora phenomenon in English political texts? What is the metonymic mechanism of anaphora in English political discourse?This thesis shows that all kinds of anaphora in Obama’s speeches can be exemplified and explained by the cognitive-metonymic model proposed.In the process of analyzing all kinds of anaphora,the idealized cognitive model(ICM)of antecedent must be activated,and the metonymic relationship occurs in antecedent and anaphora.Among them,the main metonymic relationship between anaphora and its antecedent in nominals anaphora is FORM FOR FORM,FORM FOR CONCEPT,CONCEPT FOR FORM and CONCEPT FOR CONCEPT.While in predicate anaphora is FORM FOR FORM and CONCEPT FOR CONCEPT because predicate anaphora has few changes.Besides,nominals anaphora requires more cognitive reasoning steps than predicate anaphora,because nominals anaphora asks the audience to seek the help of cognitive background and specific context.As a result,the metonymic mechanism of the anaphora phenomenon in English political discourse is mainly formal correspondence or conceptual correspondence at cohesion level,and conceptual correspondence at coherence level.Such a cognitive-metonymic relationship is the key to the understanding of English political discourse.It is hoped that this thesis can not only broaden the scope of the study of anaphora,but also enrich the research vision of the theory of metonymy.Moreover,it can enable the addressee to better understand various anaphoric phenomena in political speeches,which helps the addresser to establish a closer relationship with the addressee.