Metaphorical conceptualization of Coronavirus in presidential speeches

ABSTRACT

This article addresses the metaphorical conceptualization of the Coronavirus in presidential speeches. The analysis is based on a corpus of four presidential speeches delivered in March 2020, when the virus arrived in South America, and are available on the websites of the Presidencia de la Nación de Argentina, the República Federativa do Brasil, the Presidencia de República de Chile and the Presidencia de República de Colombia. The research adopted a sociocognitive view of language, focused on the line of Cognitive Linguistics, with a conceptual metaphor approach directed to the corpus and discourse. Based on the target domain method to identify the metaphors present on the corpus, metaphorical expressions related to the Coronavirus and connected to some lexemes related to conceptual metaphors, were collected. The analysis showed the persuasive and manipulative strength of some metaphors, such as CORONAVIRUS IS A WAR, CORONAVIRUS IS A GAME, CORONAVIRUS IS A PRISON, among others. These metaphors are based on moral cultural models and have ideological and moral goals. © 2021 Universidad Pompeu Fabra. All rights reserved.