摘要

  认知语言学的研究表明，隐喻不仅是一种修辞手段，更是人类的一种思维方式，是人类基本的认知方式。它广泛存在于日常生活中，存在于任何学科领域。政治术语和政府的经济政策对民众来说是相当抽象、陌生的，为了让民众接受政党的价值观、形成共同的意识形态，美国总统奥巴马在其就职演说词中通过隐喻说服民众接受自己的观点。演说中旅程隐喻、建筑隐喻和冲突隐喻的巧妙运用积极发挥了隐喻的说服功能。
  本文以概念隐喻理论为基础，通过对奥巴马就职演说词中隐喻的分析，探讨概念隐喻的理解机制，旨在提高英语学习者对概念隐喻的解读能力，加强听众对演讲语篇的深层理解。

关键词：概念隐喻理论；说服功能；奥巴马就职演说

Abstract

The studies of cognitive linguistics show that metaphor is not only a means of rhetoric, but more importantly it is a way of thinking, a fundamental cognitive style of human beings. It is pervasive in every subject area as well as in everyday life. As it is rather abstract for most people to understand the political terminologies and the economic strategies of a government, metaphor is applied as a mapping to illustrate Barack Obama’s beliefs and values in his inaugural address.
Based on the theory of conceptual metaphor, this thesis exemplifies a number of metaphors used in Obama’s inaugural address. The mechanism of conceptual metaphors are discussed with three of them ― “journey metaphor” , “building metaphor”, “conflict metaphor” ―being elaborated, and the persuasive functions of conceptual metaphors are concluded, in an effort to enhance English learners’ interpreting ability of conceptual metaphors and facilitate audiences’ understanding of public speaking discourses.

Key words: conceptual metaphor theory; persuasive function; Obama’s inaugural address

1 Introduction

Metaphor is a universal phenomenon. British rhetorician I.A. Richards once said, in every three sentences of our daily conversation, there is a possible metaphor (quoted in Shu Dingfang 2000:1). According to Aristotle’s view, metaphor is mainly, and for most people nowadays, a device of the poetic imagination and the rhetorical flourish. When a new view of metaphor, later known as the cognitive linguistic view of metaphor, was first developed by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson in the book Metaphors We Live By in 1980, it is no longer seen mere as a figure of speech, it’s a thing which has much to do with our thought patterns, reasoning modes, and even our conceptual system.