How American is German Politics? E-Book

Stephan Vierkant

• Herausgeber: GRIN Verlag
• Sprache: Englisch

Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2007

Beschreibung

Seminar paper from the year 2006 in the subject Speech Science / Linguistics, grade: 2,3, Free University of Berlin (Deutsche und Niederländische Philologie), course: Conceptual Metaphor Theory, language: English, abstract: In MORAL POLITICS George Lakoff (2002) claims that political orientations are based on family structures and functions. These are expressed by metaphors. This paper discusses the possibility of detecting political metaphors on the base of the Lakoff approach. The German TV discussion of MERKEL and SCHRÖDER in 2006 serve as the corpus. Several fields of metaphors are discussed: WAR, SPORTS, etc. An interesting American approach is tested on a European corpus.

Leseprobe

Table of Content

1. Introduction

3. Metaphors in use

6. Conclusion

7. References

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Freie Universität Berlin HS: Conceptual Metaphor Theory SS 2006

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Abstract

This paper will discuss conceptual metaphors in politics. Different approaches to the phenomenon of metaphor will be explained firstly. Then different areas of metaphors will be presented. Furthermore, the moral and sportive character of politics will be discussed. For the practical part serves a political German TV-debate. The analysis will provide evidence for the discussion of the usability of the moral and sportive approach. It will become clear that the results generally seem to fit the moral approach but they are not fully convincing.

1. Introduction

Throughout our lives spoken language accompanies us wherever we find are. We are surrounded by spoken language right from the beginning of our live in the womb to the famous last words before death. Even in dreams language occurs. Thus, spoken language is not only a phenomenon of real life but also of the unconscious state of mind. Although it is still not provable what dreams are, scientists try to identify the nature of human thinking by studying human dreams. This is also done by interpreting dream images and their metaphorical meaning. In this case metaphors are used to trace back the cognitive structures. Not only in psycholinguistics metaphors are an object of study but in cognitive linguistic itself metaphors play a big role. Chomsky as one of the main representatives of cognitive scientists has started his revolutionary work on syntax trying to define the universal grammar. Though his success is notable, something his generative grammar approach does not explain is the origin of metaphors. Why do metaphors exist in literature and spoken language? This will not be answered in this paper but one way to find out more about the nature of metaphor is to reveal different types of it in the whole spectrum of all day language. In 1980 George Lakoff and Mark Johnson publishedMetaphors we live byopening a field of study that until then has been seen mostly from a literary point of view. Although the ancient Greeks and afterwards many other philosophers have speculated about metaphors, Lakoff and Johnson’s book gives the first hints about how important metaphorical thinking is for language. Since politicians should talk about the most important matters of society it would be interesting to see how they convince electorate. InMoral PoliticsLakoff (1996) tries to show the metaphor usage of conservatives and liberals in relation to family concepts in the U.S. His findings seem to fit into the political two-opponent-system of the US, but how does his schemes correspond to European politics? In this paper I will first present a spectrum of definitions of metaphor. This is followed by a chapter which gives an overview on where

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metaphors occur mainly. Further down the metaphor in political discourse is examined. The practical part of this paper will be the examination of the Berlin speech of Roman Herzog in 1997. The final part is about to find out if the theoretical American basis of Lakoff can be applied on European political discourse.

2. Metaphor - an overview

2.1 The Ancient Definition

When the ancient Greek developed a high political culture the culture of metaphors seems to start. Aristotle defined metaphor as an event where a word is substituted by another one; today this approach has been titled the substitution theory1. By Aristotle’s definition the substituting word is actually not really fitting the position of the substituted word. The metaphor is seen out of context but still bound to the literal word by similarity or analogy. This view on metaphor has been seen as the traditional one. It dominates the definition until today. However, traditions have to be challenged and even more when logical mistakes rule the principal of such an approach. A main mistake is to see metaphor out of any context. To decide whether a word is meant literally or metaphorically one has to be aware that these are not properties of words but properties of utterances. Utterances can be made in different places at different times with different intentions and therefore will have different meanings. It is obvious that the traditional view is problematic but a more recent approach seems to be promising.

2.2 The Conceptual Approach

Metaphors we live byby Lakoff and Johnson is a response to the Chomskyan generative grammar approach which lacks an explanation for metaphors. The two authors claim that metaphors are not exclusively a matter of literature. The daily use of metaphor does not come from the literary function but the other way around.

According to them, metaphors are a product of the structure of our conceptual system. They believe that “most concepts are partially understood in terms of other concepts.”2We are able to conceptualize abstract words only because we use a metaphorical way of describing them. Kövecses describes “metaphor as understanding one conceptual domain in terms of another conceptual domain.”3Such domains are based on experience. The conceptual domain people

1See Kurz. 2004. Page 8.

2See Lakoff and Johnson. 2003. Page 56.

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try to understand in metaphors are called target domains. The conceptual domain people use to understand is called the source domain. The process of understanding the target domain by the application of the source domain is called mapping. Kövecses gives an example concerning the concept of LOVE4:

“Theybuilt a strong marriage.”

Here the concept of building is mapped onto the concept of LOVE in order to make it understand more easily. Kövecses explains that “…conceptual metaphors are unidirectional.”5This assumption is based on the fact that conceptual metaphors go from concrete to abstract domains. So, one function of metaphor is to serve to understand concepts which are difficult to understand. The function of metaphor behind the human thinking is called cognitive function. Conceptual metaphors can be classified according to cognitive functions they perform. Three kinds of conceptual metaphor exist:

First, the structural metaphor of which the source domain provides a vast knowledge about the target concept.

Second, the ontological metaphor which serves to assign an ontological status to general categories of abstract target concepts.

Third the orientational metaphor, which are based on basic human spatial orientations. This kind of metaphor serves to render a set of target concepts more coherent in our conceptual system.

These three kinds of metaphors are omnipresent in our all-day-language. The spectrum of concepts is mainly influenced by one factor: Our spatial experiences structure our spatial concepts. By interacting with our physical environment we build up an elementary knowledge about our world. From the first day a human being is confronted with physical laws and somehow it has to deal with them. For surviving the child has to learn the consequences of physical actions. These experiences form the pattern of the spatial concept of human beings. Thus, basic cognitive concepts influence for the creation of metaphors. But where do they actually occur?

3See Kövecses. 2002. Page 4.

4Ibid. Page 23.

5Ibid. Page 25.

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3. Metaphors in Use 3.1 Science

We can find metaphors in several communicative areas. They all serve the idea to convey a message that is more easily to comprehend. What would science be without metaphorical thinking and metaphorical language? Complex Processes and states of being are difficult to understand. For example, electricity becomes comprehensible when the metaphorical expression ofFLOWis used. Although a scientist could say that electrons are simply moving, he still uses the concept of liquid substance as the source domain. Again a concrete, touchable issue is mapped on an invisible or abstract matter. Metaphors do no only occur inside teaching and learning but even the structure of science itself includes metaphorical expression. A subcategory of a science is called branch, recalling the conceptual metaphor ofSOCIAL ORGANIZATIONS ARE PLANTS.Even in the abstract wordsubcategorythe prefixsubmeaning under could be explained by the spatial orientation approach. Here subcategory is seen as a part of the base for the main category. Thus also the apparently abstract expression has also a metaphorical background. Furthermore in language about scientific issues contains many metaphorical expressions. Lakoff gives the following examples6:

As in science also in law concerns metaphorical language is not only useful but often even necessary. Abstract ideas need to be concretized by metaphors in order to realize them.

3.2 Law

Forensic texts constitute the order of a society and need to be graspable by common man, thus politicians and jurists cannot but revert to metaphor. This most comprehensible way of transmitting important information is necessary, otherwise laws would be difficult to understand. Here we can find the most advantageous context where the principle of unidirectionality is apparent. A very central metaphorical expression is the first article of the European Charter of Fundamental Rights of the Union7.

6See Lakoff and Johnson. 2003. Page 46.

7See http://europa.eu.int/constitution/download/part_II_EN.pdf