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Metaphors in election night television coverage in Britain, the United States and Germany

2007; John Benjamins Publishing Company; Linguagem: Inglês

10.1075/pbns.160.06sch

0922-842X

Rut Scheithauer,

Digital Storytelling and Education

Based on Lakoff and Johnson's (1980) cognitive constructivist theory of metaphor, this paper presents a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the metaphors used by nine television stations covering the 1997 British general election, the 1998 German parliamentary election and the 2000 US presidential election. The analysis shows great similarities across cultures in terms of the occurring conceptual metaphors and their frequency. All channels use a lot of metaphors that intensify the controversial nature of elections (from the domains WAR, SPORT, and CONTEST), but there is also a considerable number of non-sensational metaphors (JOURNEY, NATURE). Clear differences exist between national channels and international channels. Differences between public-service stations and commercial channels are minor. The study also suggests that some metaphors are gender-biased.