Exploring pandemic metaphors in educational contexts: a survey on the language of teachers and educators in Reggio Emilia, Italy.

This study aimed to explore how metaphors were used to interpret the pandemic and to address its challenges in primary and secondary schools in Reggio Emilia, Italy. A questionnaire was administered to educators and teachers to understand how languages, images, and metaphors were used by themselves and their students to talk about the pandemic and their experiences of living with it. The goal of the questionnaire was to guide critical reflection and encourage more informed language choices. While the existing literature points out the alleged overuse of war metaphors and military frames in public discourse, our findings show that war metaphors are relatively frequent, with other metaphorical frames widely used by teachers and educators to foster resilient attitudes in students. Moreover, in their professional contexts, teachers and educators mostly use metaphorical frames involving resilient attitudes. Our interpretation of the results supports the hypothesis that the purposeful use and deliberate production of metaphors support the choice of metaphors with positive, constructive implications. Finally, some implications of these findings on the theory of metaphor and the methodology of the research are discussed.

Transformational contribution of technology to studio culture: experience of an online first-year architecture design studio during the COVID-19 pandemic

PurposeDesign studios experienced an unprecedented contribution of technology when it came to organizing studios online, as imposed by COVID-19, which requires exploration of its impacts on the main metaphors of education, learning dimensions, and undoubtedly studio culture.Design/methodology/approachIn order to explore the impacts on the key dimensions of learning, a careful investigation was carried out from organizational, instructional, and learner points of view. The investigation utilized thematic analysis of records of pedagogical actions, as well as online communications, performance, and questionnaire responses of students to infer the conclusions. The freshmen architecture students were found to be an important group for study since they had no previous experiences in on-site design studios and will continue their education based on their first-year experiences.FindingsExploration of indicators—including reflective dialogue, retention, transfer of learned information to decisions, processing feedback as an investment in future performance, and self-regulation—as major contributors to design learning revealed that first-year students exhibited strong presence and interaction during online studio, and students' individuality influenced the teaching environment in terms of content and process. Hence, sense of belonging, which is a revamped feature of authentic context and studio culture, expands toward fortification of bottom-up educational frontiers.Originality/valueDeveloping pedagogies with no concern for the unprecedented impacts of the transformative role of technology on fundamental layers of design education will adversely influence students' chances of personal and professional success. The findings in this paper, regarding the transformational impacts of technology on design studio culture, follow investigation of the direction it has led current and can lead future design education. The study provides unique support for crystalizing new teaching and learning opportunities and pedagogical developments.

An analysis of COVID-19 disease perceptions and metaphors of nurses working in COVID-19 intensive care units

Objectives: Coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) is seen not only as a disease, but it is also defined by a series of met- aphors: mysterious, evil, an invisible enemy, an insidious danger, and a democratic virus. This study was conducted to analyze the nurses' perceptions of COVID-19 through metaphors.Methods: This qualitative research was planned as a descriptive phenomenological approach. Twenty-eight nurses working in the COVID-19 intensive care unit (ICU) participated in the study. The metaphor-based data collection pro- cess was carried out with five open-ended questions. The data were analyzed through a thematic analysis. The Consol- idated Criteria for Reporting Qualitative Research Checklist was used to analyze this study.Results: Most military and fatigue related to the time nurses work in intensive care;Hero and nightmare of patient care with COVID-19;distance and restlessness in family relationships;their mental health darkroom and fatigue;COVID-19 as an insidious enemy and infinity. A total of 128 metaphors were produced.Conclusion: Working during the COVID-19 epidemic, COVID-19 ICU nurses exhibit unfavorable approaches toward their jobs, family relationships, and mental health. Improving the working conditions of ICU nurses and considering their desires will help contribute to a favorable direction.

Migrating Metaphors: Why We Should Be Concerned About a ?War on Mental Illness? in the Aftermath of COVID-19

In the aftermath of the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, there is a predicted (and emerging) increase in experiences of mental illness. This phenomenon has been described as "the next pandemic", suggesting that the concepts used to understand and respond to the COVID-19 pandemic are being transferred to conceptualize mental illness. The COVID-19 pandemic was, and continues to be, framed in public media using military metaphors, which can potentially migrate to conceptualizations of mental illness along with pandemic rhetoric. Given that metaphors shape what is considered justifiable action, and how we understand justice, I argue we have a moral responsibility to interrogate who benefits and who is harmed by the language and underlying conceptualizations this rhetoric legitimates. By exploring how military metaphors have been used in the context of COVID-19, I argue that this rhetoric has been used to justify ongoing harm to marginalized groups while further entrenching established systems of power. Given this history, I present what it may look like were military metaphors used to conceptualize a "mental illness pandemic", what actions this might legitimate and render inconceivable, and who is likely to benefit and be harmed by such rhetorically justified actions.

Siamo in Cura, non in Guerra: WAR metaphors, political discourse, and evaluation during the Covid-19 pandemic

The present paper analyses political tweets regarding the Covid-19 crisis. It focuses on four leaders-Trump, Johnson, Sánchez, and Conte-and in a particular time frame: March 2020. The goal of this paper is twofold: on the one hand, it endeavours to confirm whether war metaphors are pervasive in the discourse of the pandemic, on the other, it seeks to transcend the conceptual approach to metaphor and situate it within the context of evaluation in discourse. In order to do so, once war metaphors are individuated, we identify the evaluative processes implied in their use. Our claim is that war metaphors played an essential role not only by framing a novel situation as a conflict, but also by allowing the situation to be evaluated in a way that would provoke the audience to act. © Peter Lang Group AG, International Academic Publishers, Bern 2023. All rights reserved.

Press language infected with COVID-19. Coronavirus in metaphors

The coronavirus pandemic has changed not only the lives of people around the world, but also the language they use. This paper aims to analyse the metaphors used to describe the SARS-CoV-2 virus and the COVID-19 disease it causes. It furthermore indicates the extent to which these metaphors determine how the pandemic is portrayed in press articles. The cognitive picture of the coronavirus (or pandemic) will be presented with reference to conceptual metaphors, as these are understood by Lakoff and Johnson (2014) and Jakel (2003). The analysis considers the timeframe that starts with the outbreak of the pandemic in December 2019 and ends in March 2022, with the resulting corpus including 278 newspaper articles that were published in Spiegel and that engaged with the pandemic and the coronavirus. With this corpus as basis, the attempt is made to illustrate and analyse conceptual metaphors about the coronavirus pandemic in Germany. Title: Press language infected with COVID-19. Coronavirus in metaphors

Interpersonal-function topoi in Chinese central government's work report (2020) as epidemic (counter-)crisis discourse

Using Systemic Functional Grammar and conceptual framework in the argumentation-oriented approach to discourse, this study analyzes Chinese central government's " Report on the Work of the Government" in 2020 (henceforth the Report) to explore the "interpersonal-function topoi" in the political discourse. The Report was delivered and issued against the backdrop of the surging covid-19 epidemic. This study first calculated the frequency of mood, modality and persons in the Report. The statistics were qualitatively analyzed in relation to various topoi-imagery of the crisis vis-a-vis representing the agency-reflected in the interpersonal metafunction of the language in the Report. These topoi play a vital role in winning popular support for the Chinese central government's anti-epidemic measures and mobilizing the widest public into actions against the covid-19 pandemic. The analysis demonstrates how the analysis of interpersonal metafunction from an argumentation-oriented perspective can shed light on dealing with crisis discourse, especially in the pandemic settings.

Crisis leadership: Principals' metaphors during COVID-19

The roles of school principals changed during the Covid-19 pandemic, alongside all changes in the school system and society. Exploring the metaphors they used, the current qualitative research is an exploration of 42 Israeli Arab and Jewish middle-school principals' interpretations of their leadership role in the time of crisis. Analysis of semistructured interviews yielded three themes: the organizational role, the professional role, and the emotional role. The metaphors expressed the principals' perceptions of what was required from them during the pandemic. Metaphors can simplify complexities and break down that which is and incomprehensible into understandable images, thus illuminating school principals' reflection on their role during the pandemic crisis. This study expands the currently limited knowledge on how principals interpret their role during crisis times and provides implications and further research avenues. © The Author(s) 2023.

COVID-19 as a Framing Device for Environmental Protest: The ECOSYSTEM HEALTH Metaphor

This paper focuses on the ECOSYSTEM HEALTH metaphor which has long prevailed in environmental communication. Following the global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic, we propose a contrastive view on the use of the ECOSYSTEM HEALTH metaphor in environmental discourse: we distinguish the metaphorical expressions used before the pandemic from the ones used during the pandemic. This distinction is aimed at identifying the new arguments promoted by COVID-19 metaphors. The publications released by the international environmental organization Extinction Rebellion are of particular interest. Through a detailed analysis of texts published between January and July 2020, we show that the impact of COVID-19 has modified our understanding of the ECOSYSTEM HEALTH metaphor. While environmentalists used to depict the environment as a SICK BODY prior the pandemic, the occurrences discussed below demonstrate that COVID-19 metaphors highlight the human characteristics associated with the source domain HEALTH.

When the Going Gets Tough, Leaders Use Metaphors and Storytelling: A Qualitative and Quantitative Study on Communication in the Context of COVID-19 and Ukraine Crises

Metaphors and storytelling are important communication tools that play a significant role in leadership and organizational life. Leaders have used metaphors and storytelling to enhance their written and verbal communication from ancient times, since Aristotle, to the modern age. In the present research, we focus on the use of storytelling and metaphors by leaders in times of crisis. We perform a qualitative analysis of the public statements and addresses of the leaders of two different countries in the context of recent worldwide crises: The prime minister of Greece during the COVID-19 health crisis and the president of Ukraine during the outbreak of the conflict with Russia in 2022. Based on existing evidence, their effectiveness in convincing their subordinates and conveying their intended meaning either nationally or internationally during the aforementioned crises has been widely recognized. Our analysis reveals that both leaders have consistently utilized metaphors and storytelling in their efforts to be more convincing and empowering. We also find that the higher the intensity of the crisis, the more pronounced the use of metaphors and stories. We accordingly provide an analysis of the types and frequency of use of the aforementioned communication tools. Reflecting on our findings, we provide specific insight for practice by leaders, discuss theoretical implications, and suggest directions for future research.

Computer Science with Theatricality: Creating Memorable Moments in CS50 with the American Repertory Theater during COVID-19

In Fall 2020, Harvard University transitioned entirely from on-campus instruction to Zoom online. But a silver lining of that time was unprecedented availability of space on campus, including the university's own repertory theater. In healthier times, that theater would be brimming with talented artisans and weekly performances, without any computer science in sight. But with that theater's artisans otherwise idled during COVID-19, our introductory course, CS50, had an unusual opportunity to collaborate with the same. Albeit subject to rigorous protocols, including face masks and face shields for all but the course's instructor, along with significant social distancing, that moment in time allowed us an opportunity to experiment with lights, cameras, and action on an actual stage, bringing computer science to life in ways not traditionally possible in the course's own classroom. Equipped with an actual prop shop in back, the team of artisans was able to actualize ideas that might otherwise only exist in slides and code. And students' experience proved the better for it, with a supermajority of students attesting at term's end to the efficacy of almost all of the semester's demonstrations. We present in this work the design and implementation of the course's theatricality along with the motivation therefor and results thereof. And we discuss how we have adapted, and others can adapt, these same moments more modestly in healthier times to more traditional classrooms, large and small. © 2023 ACM.

Portrayal of the COVID-19 pandemic in political cartoons in Tanzania

Previous analyses of Tanzanian political cartoons unearthed corruption practices, impingement of democratic processes, stereotype representation of gender relations, and power relations between politicians. The outbreak of COVID-19 pandemic opened another avenue to investigate the contents of political cartoons in Tanzania, as had already been reported in Jordan, Nigeria and South Africa. This paper looks into the messages contained in caricatures of Nathan Mpangala and Ali Masound (Kipanya) through the lens of the theory of multimodality, Three pertinent verdicts emerge: (i) the foregrounded messages concern cautions about the spread of COVID-19 pandemic, preventive measures on the onset of coronavirus, control measures after the penetration of the pandemic in Tanzania, and the role of the interim President of Tanzania;(ii) as the traditional of caricatures, satirical and metaphorical styles had been employed by cartoonists to derive the intended messages;(iii) the predominance of Kiswahili (over English) appears to suggest the choice of the language of public communication to be reverted to Kiswahili-only, rather than the presence regulations, which permit both Kiswahili and English. © 2023 The Author(s). This open access article is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution (CC-BY) 4.0 license.

Facemasks, material and metaphors: An analysis of socio-material dynamics of the COVID-19 pandemic

In 2020, not only did the Sars-Cov-2 virus become a global pandemic, but public life also changed in the wake of various infection control measures. Increased use of masks was one of the first clearly visible changes. With the masks came stories about masks. Who wore them, where people should wear them, and why? It quickly became clear, however, that stories about ‘the facemask' also have a metaphorical content, negotiating not only problems of the pandemic as a social crisis, but also other social issues amalgamated through the use of masks and the surrounding narratives. Thus, masks not only prevented infection, but also fed and materialised the public imaginary of the pandemic and its challenges. From this perspective, we explore three exemplary cases from Germany and Finland in 2020 in which the mask played different roles as a socio-material phenomenon, linking theoretical perspectives on materiality and metaphors. Additionally, the analysis presents illustrations done by a visual artist. These illustrations capture the key content of the analysis in the form of drawings. © The Author(s) 2023.

"Thinking about drinking tea but not drinking tea”: Pre-service English teacher education during the COVID-19 pandemic in Turkish EFL context

This phenomenological research aimed to investigate the reflections of 34 pre-service English teachers and 31 lecturers on distance education during the COVID-19 pandemic in Turkey. An online interview form was employed as data collection tool. The participants were sent the online form to collect their reflections on their online learning/teaching experiences during the pandemic. These reflections were analysed using phenomenological research steps. At the end of the analyses, distance education was found to be useful for improving the participants' technological literacy skills and delivering theoretical courses. However, it was found to be inappropriate for practical courses such as teaching practicum and community service practices. Furthermore, the participants used various metaphors to define their online teaching/learning experiences like emergency exit, one-sided mirror, frozen lake, growing in a cage, driving a car, and sky. The participants mostly did not receive any training before using the online platform. In light of the findings, it can be claimed that necessary arrangements should be made to improve the quality of online learning platforms and both pre-service English teachers and their lecturers should receive training to benefit from distance education more effectively. In this way, pre-service English teachers can be better prepared for their future teaching in case of distance education. © The Author(s) 2023.

Metaphorical Representation of Coronavirus in Spanish and Brazilian Cartoons

The worldwide outbreak of Covid-19 epidemic has been profusely covered by the mass media in 2020. This research focuses on the metaphorical content of cartoons from prominent Spanish and Brazilian newspapers published online in March and April 2020. In these satirical drawings the virus is portrayed through two main modes of representation: i) pictorial and ii) verbal. The conceptual metaphors conveyed in each cartoon were identified, analysed, and classified into four source domain scenarios: i) arts and literature, ii) conflicts, iii) sports, and iv) games, and other. Mainly, two theories coming from Cognitive Linguistics, Conceptual Metaphor Theory, and the Multimodal Metaphor Theory, have been used to approach this contrastive study in which the metaphorical representation of Covid-19 serves to offer a humorous and persuasive point of view about the impact of the pandemic in the Spanish and Brazilian society and the way the most important politicians of each country dealt with the sanitary crisis. © 2022, Asociacion Espanola de Linguistica Aplicada. All rights reserved.

All's Fair in Pandemic and War? A Gendered Analysis of Australian Coverage of Covid‐19

The Covid‐19 pandemic has repeatedly been framed by politicians and the media alike as this generation's "Great War.” Metaphors are often used in political reportage as effective discursive tools to influence and persuade readers. War metaphors especially are frequently used in election campaigns, leadership spills, and during times of political unrest to portray politics as a brutal and competitive (masculine) arena. As such, the use of militaristic language and war metaphors to describe the shared challenges during a global pandemic is unsurprising. Framing the pandemic as a war can rally citizens by appealing to their sense of national and civic duty at a moment of crisis. Yet such framing is problematic as it draws on stereotyping cultural myths and values associated with war, reinforcing patriarchal understandings of bravery and service that glorify hegemonic masculinity while excluding women from the public sphere. Using a feminist critical discourse ana-lysis, this article will examine Australian print media coverage of the first six months of the Covid‐19 pandemic, focusing on two case studies—the prime minister and "frontline” workers—to further understand the gender bias of mainstream media. We argue that, by drawing on war metaphors in Covid‐19 coverage which emphasizes protective masculinity, the media reproduce and re‐enforce political and societal gender stereotypes and imbalances. © 2023 by the author(s);licensee Cogitatio (Lisbon, Portugal).

Cartooning and sexism in the time of Covid-19: Metaphors and metonymies in the Arab mind

Using a large-scale corpus of 706 coronavirus cartoons by male and female Arab artists, this study takes a fresh and more cognitive look at sexism in multimodal discourse. Specifically, it examines the role of salience and grammar (and hence of metaphor and metonymy) in gender bias and/or in discrimination against women. It argues that both men and women are vulnerable to the influence of stereotypical and outdated beliefs that create unconscious bias. But this raises the crucial issue of whether we can speak of 'overt' sexism in images. Issues around terminology and conceptualization are thus also investigated. Importantly, this paper makes the following contributions to feminist and cross-cultural pragmatics: (i) it brings a distinctly Arabic perspective to gender and language;(ii) it expands socio-cognitive pragmatics beyond spoken and written communication;(iii) it shows a close coupling between an Arabic grammar and other aspects of culture;and (iv) it has the potential for impact beyond academia, specifically in the sphere of coronavirus care or of health communication. [ FROM AUTHOR] Copyright of Discourse & Society is the property of Sage Publications, Ltd. and its content may not be copied or emailed to multiple sites or posted to a listserv without the copyright holder's express written permission. However, users may print, download, or email articles for individual use. This may be abridged. No warranty is given about the accuracy of the copy. Users should refer to the original published version of the material for the full . (Copyright applies to all s.)

Applying relational frame theory and increased sensory involvement with metaphors to the digital delivery of an act-based coping skill

Metaphor use in ACT is unique in that it is guided by Relational Frame Theory (RFT) and the idea that metaphors assist individuals in stepping outside traditional language traps to bridge the gap between their own previous knowledge/experiences and complex psychological concepts, such as cognitive defusion, in ACT. RFT specifically emphasizes the importance of limiting verbal language within treatment and increasing direct experience, including when using metaphors. Therefore, ACT practitioners are encouraged to increase sensory involvement with the metaphor to decrease reliance on language. However, this results in a myriad of ways in which sensory involvement is increased within ACT such as through more detailed language/guided imagery, using visual aids, and through physical engagement such as acting out the metaphor or using props with little empirical evidence to support doing so. This aim of this study was to empirically evaluate the effects of increased sensory involvement with metaphors in the context of digitally delivering an ACT-based coping skill with individuals experiencing distress related to COVID-19. Participants were randomized to one three metaphor conditions (verbal, visual, or physical) using the ?thoughts as clouds in the sky? metaphor for cognitive defusion, or to a distraction condition. The results showed that all conditions facilitated a reduction in urge to get rid of thoughts and a decrease in distress. However, actively engaging with the metaphor within the physical delivery condition resulted in the greatest improvements in the process of cognitive fusion for exposure to COVID-19 information to skill practice as compared to the remaining conditions. It also showed a difference in changes in distress between physical engagement with the metaphor and verbal engagement with the metaphor only during the same change period. This study provided initial support for RFT?s approach to metaphor use and ACT?s emphasis on experiential engagement with metaphors. Moreover, it lends support for the use of the ?thoughts as clouds in the sky? metaphor more generally and distraction that incorporates defusion exercises for delivery via a digital format. The study provides numerous avenues for future exploration of the experiential use of metaphors both empirically and within clinical practice. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2023 APA, all rights reserved)

University-level EFL students' views on learning English online: a qualitative study.

The main aim of this article is to determine Turkish EFL (English as a foreign language) students' perceptions about learning English through distance education (henceforth DE) during the COVID-19 pandemic. To realize this aim, the study adopted a qualitative research design and used the metaphor elicitation technique, semi-structured telephone interviews, and an online focus group interview to collect data. The results of the analysis show that most of the students prefer face-to-face English education in a classroom setting rather than online education. Despite some positive comments about DE like it being more comfortable for shy students, students' attitudes toward DE were found to be mostly negative because of the challenges they faced like technical problems, health and focus issues, a lack of interaction and speaking practice in the target language, feelings of anxiety and isolation and low motivation, and DE not addressing all learning styles effectively. Using several qualitative data collection tools, this study provides valuable insights into the thoughts and experiences of students about online English language learning, which can be taken into account to enhance future online language teaching and learning efforts. This study also offers some suggestions to make online EFL education more productive and effective.