1. METAPHOR AND IDEOLOGY IN MEDIA DISCOURSE ON MIGRATION
Mariana Neagu
University of Galaţi
The XIII th International Conference
Cognitive Modeling in Linguistics,
Corfu, Greece, September 22-29, 2010

2. OUTLINE
Introduction
Some preliminary considerations: CMT and CDA
2. Data and method
3. Findings
Closing remarks

3. Introduction II
Motivation
- The choice of one metaphor rather than another is a sympton of ideology (Stockwell, 2000)
- Although the importance of culture to metaphoric patterns has been underlined, the centrality of ideology to culture has not been enough discussed.

4. 1. Some preliminary considerations: CMT and CDA
Conceptual Metaphor Theory (CMT): Lakoff, 1991; Steen, 1999.
Critical Discourse Analysis (CDA)
“Language is not powerful on its own – it gains power by the use people make of it and by the people who have access to language means and public fora”. Van Dijk (1995):
The aim of CDA is “to investigate critically social inequality, as it is expressed, signalled, constituted, legitimized and so on by language use.” (Wodak and Meyer, 2001)

5. - articles related to immigration in UK, published 2006-2011:
2. Data and method
- articles related to immigration in UK, published :
The Daily Telegraph, The Times, The Guardian, The Daily Mail
Romanian quality papers (Adevărul and Cotidianul)
Searched key words: migration, (im)migrant, Romanian, Britain.

6. - 5 source domains matching the target domain of migration: flood
3. Findings
The British corpus:
- 5 source domains matching the target domain of migration:
flood
container
threat
invasion
exploitation

7. Interim conclusions: The British Corpus
Metaphoric Patterns
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
Total
1. MIGRATION AS FLOOD - 9 4 3 6 26
2.1. UK AS CONTAINER 2 1 5 15 19
2.2. EU AS CONTAINER
3. MIGRATION AS THREAT 10
4. MIGRATION AS EXPLOITATION
5. MIGRATION AS WAR
6. MIGRATION AS INVASION
7. MIGRATION AS FIRE

8. Articles on Romanian emigration to the UK
The Romanian Corpus
Articles on Romanian emigration to the UK
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011 MH
NMH
Adevărul 1 30 4 24 2 7 22 50 23
Cotidianul 3 13 5 11 - 10 43 27
Total no.
of articles 9 35 8 32 93 47 44 36
102 53
Metaphoric Headline = MH
Non-metaphoric Headline = NMH

9. Summing up: British and Romanian Press
Year
Metaphoric Patterns
2006
2007
2008
2009
2010
2011
Total BP RP
1. MIGRATION AS FLOOD - 9 2 4 3 1 6 32
2.1. UK/LONDON AS CONTAINER 5 16 31
2.2. EU AS CONTAINER
3. MIGRATION AS THREAT 18
4.1. MIGRATION AS EXPLOITATION 8 11
4.2. CHILDREN AS GOODS
5. MIGRATION AS WAR
6. MIGRATION AS INVASION
7.1. MIGRANTS AS HUNTERS
7.2. MIGRANTS AS HUNTED ANIMALS
8. MIGRATION AS FORCE
9. MIGRATION AS FIRE
10. ECONOMY AS LIVING ORGANISM
11. EU INTEGRATION AS AN UNREALISTIC ISSUE

10. Conclusions (I)
the FLOOD metaphor
has the highest frequency ->the imminence and force of migration; migrants viewed as an undifferentiated mass.
the CONTAINER metaphor
implies an INSIDE and an OUTSIDE, representing the US and THEM.
can be looked at as a rhetorical legitimization strategy of the right

11. Conclusions (II)
topics discussed in relation to migration: negative socio-economic consequences (unemployment, reduction of social benefits and wages, raise of taxes, human trafficking)
- the attitudes that emerge from the body of English newspapers are mainly negative esp. n conservative tabloids (e.g. Daily Mail)

12. Conclusions(III)
Romanian tabloids do not approach the topic of migration
Romanian headlines are by far less metaphorical than British headlines. However, some metaphors migrate from British newspapers to Romanian newspapers (e.g. MIGRATION AS FLOOD, MIGRATION AS THREAT)
the only new metaphor in Romanian newspapers: MIGRATION AS HUNT (MIGRANTS ARE HUNTERS and MIGRANTS ARE HUNTED ANIMALS)

13. Conclusions (IV)
ideological orientation goes hand in hand with the presence of metaphor
combined metaphors (e.g.FLOOD + THREAT, FLOOD + THREAT + CONTAINER) reinforce ideological positions
conventional metaphor in the jounalistic discourse may determine our way of thinking (and acting) in the social sphere

14. Selected References (I)
Charteris-Black, J Britain as a container: immigration metaphors in the 2005 election campaign. Discourse and Society, vo. 17, no.5, pp
Colipcă, G. I., I. Ivan-Mohor, M. Praisler, G. Dima, A. M. Dumitrascu, M. Neagu National Case Study – National Identity and the Media (WP4): Romania, available online at WP4-Report-Romania-final.pdf.
Fairclough, N Analysing Discourse. Textual Analysis for Social Research. London and New York: Routledge.
Lakoff, G Metaphor in politics. Available at

15. Selected References (II)
Neagu, M “The difference is that Romanians are now Europeans like us”. Functions of intertextuality in hard news reports. In Melanges francophnes. Actes de la conference annuelle “Formes textuelles de la communication. De la production a la reception”. Galati: Galati University Press, pp
Steen, G From linguistic to conceptual metaphor in five steps. In Gibbs R.W. and G. J. Steen. eds. Metaphor in Cognitive Linguistics. Amsterdam: John Benjamins, pp
Van Dijk. T The Mass Media Today. Discourses of domination or diversity? Javnost/The Public (Ljubljana), 2(2), pp
Wodak, R [2001] What CDA is about – a summary of its history, important concepts and its developments. In Wodak, R. and M.Meyer. eds. Methods of Critical Discourse Analysis. London: Thousand Oaks, New Delhi: SAGE Publications, pp

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