A Study Of English Neologisms About Covid-19 From The Perspective Of The Conceptual Blending Theory

The breakout of coronavirus or Covid-19 at the end of 2019 has not only threatened human health but also greatly influenced the whole world’s culture,politics and commerce.This thesis studies 99 neologisms about Covid-19 based on the Conceptual Blending Theory proposed by Fauconnier and Turner in a bid to unveil their word formation and meaning construction.It intends to solve the following problems:(1)What formation devices are mainly used by these words?(2)What kinds of roles conceptual blending theory play in their meaning construction? Through analysis,it can be found that:(1)Blending and compounding far outnumber other devices in word formation;(2)In meaning construction of simplex network,only one frame works as the organizing frame and the other frame provides a value to form a role-value match;Words of single-scope network are mainly endocentric which consist of two frames but only one of them works as the organizing and the other provides some elements;Doublescope network appear more complicated as it not only involves two frames but also clash and competition between them in blending;Words of mirror network includes two frames and through blending they combine together.