中英医疗新闻语篇的概念隐喻比较研究

论文总字数：57200字

摘 要

纵观历史长河，无论是东方还是西方，隐喻研究都被认为是最重要的修辞格之一。然而，在众多关注隐喻研究的学者中，莱考夫和约翰逊可以说是隐喻发展史上最具代表性的人物。他们在《我们赖以生存的隐喻》一书中首次提出了概念隐喻理论，为隐喻研究开启了新的篇章。

本文以莱考夫和约翰逊的概念隐喻理论为指导，着重研究汉英医疗新闻报道中存在的隐喻表达,,试图找出概念隐喻这一表达现象在中文和英文医学新闻报道中常见的种类，其在两种不同语言的医疗类新闻中应用的异同，及其造成此种异同的原因。本研究希望能够鼓励学者就新闻语料中的隐喻使用进行进一步的研究，试图为媒体专业人员在国际范围内的新闻播报提供一种新的方向。

基于Pragglejaz Group提出的隐喻识别程序理论，本文对24篇报道埃博拉疫情的中英文新闻进行了分析，其中11篇为中文新闻，其余为英文新闻。为了保证所收集数据的有效性，所有新闻样本均选自中美官方媒体。

通过进一步的观察和研究，本文发现，在中英医疗类新闻报道中，最为常见、最易识别的概念隐喻类型是战争隐喻，其次是旅程隐喻、建筑隐喻、机器隐喻等其他类型的隐喻。

概念隐喻应用在中英医疗类新闻报道中最显著的区别在于，在单词总数相同的情况下，汉语样本中概念隐喻出现的总频率要远远小于英语样本中概念隐喻出现的总频率。同时，两种语言样本中存在的概念隐喻类型也不尽相同。例如，中国的埃博拉疫情相关新闻报道中出现了很多魔鬼隐喻，但是在此类英语新闻报道中却几乎没有此类隐喻的出现。这样的一种差别很可能与民国时期基督教作为一种宗教信仰在中国的蓬勃发展有关。

关键词: 概念隐喻；医疗类新闻报道；埃博拉

Table of Contents

Acknowledgment...........................................................................................................I

Abstract........................................................................................................................II

摘 要.......................................................................................................................IV

Chapter I Introduction.............................................................................................1

1.1 Background of the Study...............................................................................1

1.2 Significance and Purpose of the Study..........................................................1

1.3 Layout of the Thesis......................................................................................2

Chapter II Literature Review..................................................................................4

2.1 Definitions of Metaphor................................................................................4

2.2 Previous Studies on Conceptual Metaphor in News Reports........................5

2.2.1 Previous Studies on Conceptual Metaphor......................................5

2.2.2 Previous Studies on Conceptual Metaphor in News Report............8

Chapter III Research Methodology.......................................................................10

3.1 Research Questions.....................................................................................10

3.2 Data Collection...........................................................................................10

3.3 Research Design..........................................................................................11

3.4 Data Analysis..............................................................................................12

Chapter IV Results and Discussion.......................................................................15

4.1 Types of Conceptual Metaphor Used in Chinese and English Medical News Reports.........................................................................................................................15

4.1.1 War Metaphor................................................................................16

4.1.2 Journey Metaphor..........................................................................21

4.1.3 Building Metaphor.........................................................................22

4.1.4 Devil Metaphor..............................................................................23

4.2 Similarities and Differences of Conceptual Metaphor used in Chinese amp; English Medical News Reports and the Possible Causes............................................23

4.2.1 Similarities.....................................................................................23

4.2.1 Differences.....................................................................................24

Chapter V Conclusion.............................................................................................26

5.1 Summary amp; Implications............................................................................26

5.2 Limitations of This Study...........................................................................26

5.3 Suggestions for Further Study.....................................................................27

References...................................................................................................................28

Chapter I Introduction

1.1 Background of the Study

In the middle of the 20^th century, the end of World War II brought the development of the economy back to normal across the globe, as evidenced in the fact that people’s living standards improved sharply. People’s average life expectancy has kept increasing since then and has reached 72 in 2016 according to the research carried out by World Health Organization that year. Being able to support their own lives, nowadays people seem to put more emphasis on how to guarantee themselves and their family members a safer and healthier life, as can be seen in their increasing interest in medical news. Together with the increase in people’s attention on the food and drug safety issues, the number of the news reports on medical problems has also risen year by year.

In order to achieve a better effect of expression, the involvement of metaphor has gradually become the trump card, for proper use of the metaphor would amplify the characteristics of the subject and deepen people’s understanding of the subject described. Conceptual metaphor, always considered as one of the most cognitively representative branches of metaphor, plays an important role in news reports. Metaphor is not to be confused with simile, the difference between which is that metaphor emphasizes the identity between the two things being compared, while simile merely lays emphasis on the similarities (The Columbia Encyclopedia, 2001).

1.2 Significance and Purpose of the Study

In the past two decades, both domestic and foreign media have paid considerable attention to the reportage of medical news. At the end of the 20th century, there were many news reports focusing on newly discovered diseases and technologies in foreign countries. The outbreak of SARS in 2003 began to attract the attention of domestic media to pay attention to medical news. At the same time, the doctor-patient relationship, medical security, and food and drug safety have also become people's most important livelihood issues. In this context, the focus of the media has shifted to the enhancement of their reports' credibility and promotion of their access to the reading public.

This thesis aims at analyzing the types of conceptual metaphors existing in Chinese and English medical news and the reasons for their use so as to deepen people's understanding of the use of conceptual metaphors in news. Thereafter, this paper will discuss the similarities and differences of the metaphorical expressions existing in Chinese and English medical news, aimed at finding out the influence of cultural differences between Chinese and English expressions on language use so as to promote cross-cultural communication and strengthen people's understanding of western culture. Comparing the usage of conceptual metaphor in Chinese and English medical news reports, this thesis hopes to encourage scholars to conduct further research, providing media professionals with novel guidance in broadcasting events on an international scale.

1.3 Layout of the Thesis

This thesis, featuring a comparative analysis of conceptual metaphor in Chinese and English medical news reports, consists of five chapters, including an introduction, a literature review, a research design, the result and discussion, and the conclusion.

Chapter one, the introduction to the whole thesis, briefly summarizes the research background, the significance and purpose of the research, and gives out the overall structure of this thesis, aimed at illustrating the current situation of research and application of conceptual metaphor.

Chapter two, the literature review, is an overview of metaphor theories formulated by scholars, both at home and abroad, including definitions of conceptual metaphor itself and its application in news reports.

Chapter three, the research design, mainly describes factors involved in the operation of the research to prove the credibility of the research.

Chapter four, Results and Discussion, lays emphasis on further analysis of the data collected during the process of the research, trying to sort out the types of conceptual metaphors that are widely used in medical news reports both at home and abroad, and possible causes for the similarities and differences between the two.

Chapter five is the conclusion, which serves as a summary with a brief discussion of the limitations of the research and suggestions for further study in this field.

Chapter II Literature Review

2.1 Definitions of Metaphor

In order to further explore the functions and usage of conceptual metaphor, one must have a clear idea of the concept of metaphor. The definition of metaphor can be classified into two categories, in a broad sense and a narrow sense. Etymologically, the word "metaphor" comes from the Greek word metapherō, the part of meta- meaning "after, with, across" and -pherō meaning “to carry over". Literally speaking, the meaning of the word metapherō is that a word is transferred from its original meaning to another word by some means, revealing the hidden similarities between the two subjects. One of the most highly recognized metaphors in British literature may be found in Shakespeare’s work As You Like It, where Shakespeare says that the world is a stage, men and women being players, owning their entrances and exits (Shakespeare 1623).

Aristotle is regarded as the very first commentator on the essence of metaphor. In his work Poetics, Aristotle points out that “a metaphorical term” involves the transferred use of an independent term, which belongs to something else (Shu 2000: 2). As cited in Kennedy (2007), Aristotle, in his work On Rhetoric, concludes that metaphor is a kind of analogy which uses one word to replace another. The Metaphor As Analogy theory regards the function of metaphor as an additional and optional decoration of language, but Aristotle actually held the idea that considering its form and structure, metaphor is a deviation from the normal language rules (Kennedy 2007: 276).

Around the first century A.D., the famous Roman Rhetorician Quintilian proposed the theory of substitution, which is inherited from Aristotle, suggesting that metaphor is actually a rhetorical phenomenon that uses one word to replace another in his work Institutio Oratoria (as cited in Shu 2000: 3).

While Aristotle’s and Quintilian‘s definitions of metaphor were restricted to the level of pure language, the definition given out by rhetoricians in the early 20th century were already well-developed, focusing on the semantic and cognitive features of metaphor. Rhetorician I. A. Richards (1937) focuses on the semantic study of the metaphor. In his work The Philosophy of Rhetoric, he introduced the two components of the metaphor: the tenor and the vehicle. Richards is the first person who presents the Interaction Theory, arguing that there exist interactions between the tenor and the vehicle to produce an identical meaning (as cited in Ma 2012).

According to Lakoff and Johnson (1980), metaphor is more than just a linguistic phenomenon. Fundamentally speaking, metaphor is “principally a way of conceiving of one thing in terms of another, and its primary function is understanding” (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 37). They believe that it would be more appropriate to regard it as a cognitive phenomenon, and metaphorical thinking is a way of thinking that humans must have a good command of in order to know things and establish a conceptual system (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 247). Categorizing conceptual metaphor into orientational metaphor, ontological metaphor and structural metaphor, Lakoff and Johnson deliver a clear explanation of conceptual metaphor, which serves as the theoretical basis of this thesis.

2.2 Previous Studies on Conceptual Metaphor in News Reports

2.2.1 Previous Studies on Conceptual Metaphor

Enjoying a long history, researches aiming at analyzing the effect of metaphor have experienced a great deal of change in the west. The rhetorical study of metaphor is first carried out by Aristotle 2000 years ago, stating that metaphor makes the learning period more enjoyable, for “to learn something is naturally pleasant to all people”, so “whatever words create knowledge in us are pleasurable” (Kennedy 2000: 218).

The first breakthrough in rhetoric study happened during the 1930s, shifting scholars’ research focus from the idea that only the vehicle acts on the tenor in a metaphor to the feeling that there exist mutual effects between the tenor and the vehicle.

Richards, in his book The Philosophy of Rhetoric, views rhetoric as an artistic approach of matching the language with its expected result, trying to add more vividness to the expression (as cited in Ma 2012).

In the 1980s, the field of metaphor study experienced considerable expansion within the broad discipline of Cognitive Linguistics stimulated by the publication of George Lakoff and Mark Johnson’s work Metaphors We Live By, in which they first carried out the term of conceptual metaphor. In this book, Lakoff and Johnson claim that metaphor plays a significant role in one’s life, for it would influence the way people think and act (Lakoff and Johnson 1980: 4). After conducting comparatively detailed examinations into currently existing types of conceptual metaphor, several researchers, such as Gerard Steen, Alice Deignan and Lynne Cameron, further their studies in the field of metaphor identification, aiming at designing practical tools of investigation. Their hard work result in the invention of different procedures of identification methods such as the Metaphor Identification Procedure (MIP) by the Pragglejaz Group (a group of 10 scholars, the initials of whose first name form the word pragglajaz), and the Metaphor Identification Procedure Vrjie Universiteit (MIPVU), in which researchers add more details to the procedure protocol and identifies other forms of metaphor (Yao 2018).

Almost at the same time when Aristotle’s and Quintilian’s theories of metaphor were carried out, metaphor became an important part of Chinese literary works. Wang (2010) argues that Chinese metaphorical expressions can be dated back to Qin Dynasty, and in masterpieces like Classic of Poetry (“Shijing”), Erya, and Rites of Zhou, metaphor plays a significant role in story telling and description of life. In Chinese study of rhetoric, metaphor is simply regarded as a figure of speech, which is usually compared with metonymy, allegory, megametaphor and allusion (Wang 2010). Liu Hsieh, literary critic in the Southern Dynasties, briefly makes a comparison between metaphor (“pi”) and allegory (“Hsing”) in his work The Literary Mind and The Carving of Dragons that “the pi, or metaphor, is obvious, but the hsing alone is obscure”: “Pi involves reasoning by analogy, and hsing response to a stimulus”, which means that metaphor emphasizes the similarities between the two seemingly different things(Shih 2015: 195).

剩余内容已隐藏，请支付后下载全文，论文总字数：57200字