涉华经济新闻中概念隐喻的评价功能研究

Chapter One Introduction

1.1Research Background
The twenty-first century is an information-enamored age, in which the importance ofnews in people’s life increases by leaps and bounds. As a means of mass communication,news not only reports society in a unique fashion, but also dramatically impacts people’s life.Just like a mentor, it guides public’s opinion and educates the community. Therefore, newslanguage arouses linguists’ interest and it is studied from different perspectives, such ascritical discourse analysis (Fairclough, 1989; Fowler, 1991; van Dijk, 1988), sociolinguistics(Hartly, 1982; Bell, 1991) and pragmatics (Dor, 2003). All of them examine the complexstructures and strategies employed by reporters and reveal the social reality embedded innews, which pave the way for later studies. Moreover, economic news, as a subgenre of news,is also touched upon by scholars in different approaches, such as stylistics (Zhang Jian, 2003)and systemic function grammar (Chen Zhongzhu, 1995; Tian Fen, 2011). Especially, with theemergence of cognitive linguistics, scholars become increasingly interested in conceptualmetaphors in economic news. Until now, they’ve not only investigated the cognitive,socio-cultural, persuasive and textual cohesive functions of conceptual metaphors ineconomic news, but also disclosed the underlying ideologies embodied in them. However,currently few researches are conducted on the evaluative function of conceptual metaphors ineconomic news.In addition, with the surging growth of Chinese economy, China is put under thespotlight of the world. It attracts more and more western media’s attention, but few studiesprobe into conceptual metaphors in China-related economic news which is reported bywestern media, let alone closely examine the attitudes embedded in them. Therefore, in thispaper, under the paradigms of Conceptual Metaphor Theory and attitude system in AppraisalTheory, the evaluative function of conceptual metaphors in China-related economic news isexplored to observe how reporters facilitate potential readers comprehending abstracteconomic phenomena by resorting to conceptual metaphors, and simultaneously achievetheir communicative purpose and show their stances.
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1.2Research Questions
The major goal of the study is to investigate the evaluative function of conceptualmetaphors in China-related economic news by utilizing a corpus-based analysis. To this end,the author collects fifty pieces of China-related economic news from the famous Americanmagazine TIME, identifies, classifies and figures out the metaphorical expressions concernedwith Chinese economic phenomena in line with Lakoff and Johnson’s (1980) ConceptualMetaphor Theory. Afterwards, conceptual metaphors as different attitudinal resources arelabeled, counted and analyzed in accordance with Martin and White’s (2005) attitude systemin Appraisal Theory. Correspondingly, the following threequestions are addressed:(1) What kinds of conceptual metaphors are used in China-related economic news?(2) How do conceptual metaphors as attitudinal resources realize their evaluativefunction in China-related economic news?(3) How do conceptual metaphors as different attitudinal resources distribute inChina-related economic news?
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Chapter Two Literature Review

2.1 A Brief Introduction to Economic News
Economic news, as a subgenre of news, plays a significant role in guiding people’sopinion. From the literal meaning, it is related to the news about business, economy, trade andso on. As to the definition of economic news, so far there isn’t an accurate one. Differentscholars have different opinions. For example, Dong Yuqin (1997: 7) maintains that“economic news reports the latest economic relation, economic activities and latest naturaleconomic phenomena.” Yu Zhengbang and Huang Qizhuang (1997: 28) hold the view that“economic news is valuable information reported by various media which is based on theeconomic activities happening in reality.” Wang Huaqing (2003: 11) defines economic newsas “the reports which are concerned with how people make economic choices.” All of themdefine economic news from different perspectives, which have both advantages anddisadvantages. In this study, considering the above definitions, the author will adopt a morecomprehensive one: economic news is about the latest economic activities and economicphenomena based on reality, which affects people’s economic decision-making. From thispoint of view, economic news covers a wide range of topics, such as industry, agriculture,commerce, finance and so on. What’s more, as a window for people to know about thegovernment’s economic policies, economic originations’ activities, and internationaleconomic exchanges, economic news impacts people’s attitudes towards tax, bond, market,currency etc.
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2.2 Previous Studies of Economic News
Due to its special features, economic news is distinct from other genres of news. Withinthe linguistic field, different approaches are employed to analyze it. For example, Zhang Jian(2003) probes into the features of English economic reports on the lexical and grammaticallevels, and he adopts the view that economic reports share the common stylistics features ofnews like specific, accuracy, and brevity. However, it owns its special features, such aspresenting economic terminologies by common words, employing short and livelycontrastive verbs, using idiom and figures of speech properly, exploiting different kinds ofgrammatical ways to compare developing currents and so on. Besides, differentiatingfrom Zhang Jian (2003) who only examines economic news in a descriptive way, scholarslike Chen Zhongzhu (1995) and Tian Fen (2011) investigate economic news in an interpretiveapproach. On the basis of Halliday’s Systemic Functional Grammar, Chen Zhongzhu (1995)conducts a research on the transitivity, modality and thematic choice in economic news,which reveals the relationship between power and ideology. Tian Fen (2011) contrasts thejudgment system between Chinese and English economic hard news, which is the sub-systemof attitude in Appraisal Theory, and explains the differences between them from the ideologyand culture angles. In addition, unlike domestic scholars, foreign scholar Richardson (1998)touches upon economic news in a macroscopic way. In the book Signs and Wonders:Interpreting the Economy through Television, he explores the factors which influencepeople’s understanding of economic news. After presenting the audience a piece of newswhich is full of ambiguity and indeterminacy broadcasted by BBC, he observes theirresponses. Finally, he finds that special context, social environment, people’s background andsocial value all play crucial roles in their comprehension.
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Chapter Three Theoretical Framework.... 10
3.1 Conceptual Metaphor Theory..... 10
3.2 Attitude System in Appraisal Theory........ 15
3.2.1 Affect...... 17
3.2.2 Judgment ..... 17
3.2.3 Appreciation ..... 18
3.3 The Relationship between Conceptual Metaphor and Evaluation .... 19
Chapter Four Research Methodology ....... 21
4.1 Data Collection....... 21
4.2 Data Identification....... 21
4.3 Research Procedures ........ 23
Chapter Five Results and Discussion.... 25
5.1 Conceptual Metaphors Used in China-related Economic News ....... 25
5.2 Evaluative Function of Conceptual Metaphors as Attitudinal..... 27
5.3 Distribution of Conceptual Metaphors as Different Attitudinal....29

Chapter Five Results and Discussion

5.1 Conceptual Metaphors Used in China-related Economic News
After annotating the data several times, altogether 1,690 metaphorical expressions areidentified, which center on a relatively small set of source domains, namely, LIVINGORGANISM, UP/DOWN, JOUENY, BUIDING, MACHINE, GAME, WAR and LIQUID.All of them play predominant roles in understanding abstract economic terms in the collecteddata. Their distribution can be clearly demonstrated in the following table.From table 5.1, it can be seen that in the China-related economic news, living organismmetaphor is adopted most. By endowing economic organizations with living organisms’characteristics, reporters easily inform readers of the economic phenomena in China as wellas the attributes and states of Chinese economic organizations. Besides, reporters are morewilling to depict the development of Chinese economic agents or the process of economicactivities as a long journey which is full of impediments and travelers’ various movements.What’s more, game and war metaphors can be largely found in the collected data, whichhighlight the confrontation between Chinese and foreign companies. Otherfamiliar domainslike UP/DOWN, MACHINE, BUILDING and LIQUID are also employed by reporters tohandle the complex economic phenomena in China. The extensive use of these conceptualmetaphors in the economic news offers the potential readers an easier way to comprehendabstract economic concepts in terms of familiar concepts. In addition, one aspect in a certaindomain is foregrounded instead of their alternative ones also embedding reporters’ differentattitudes towards various economic topics concerning China. Therefore, it is necessary for usto delve into the evaluative function of conceptual metaphors in China-related economicnews, which will be elaborated in the ensuing two parts.

Conclusion

In this chapter, the major findings of the study are demonstrated first. According to them,both theoretical and practical implications of the present study are given. Finally, limitationsand suggestions for future studies are proposed to further verify the present research andenrich the relevant studies in the future.In this paper, the author, by the application of Conceptual Metaphor Theory and attitudesystem in Appraisal Theory, analyzes the evaluative function of conceptual metaphors in fiftypieces of China-related economic news which are selected from the prestigious Americanweekly magazine TIME. What’s more, both qualitative and quantitative methods are adoptedin this study. Through qualitative analysis, how reporters by the utilization of variousconceptual metaphors as attitudinal resources show their viewpoints and align with thepotential readers is illustrated. By quantitative study, the distribution of conceptual metaphorsas different attitudinal resources is explored. Ultimately, this study comes to the followingconclusions:Firstly, a large number of metaphorical expressions in the collected economic newsmainly focus on the following eight kinds of source domains: LIVING ORGANISM,UP/DOWN, JOUENY, BUIDING, MACHINE, GAME, WAR and LIQUID. Throughprojecting the ontological and epistemic knowledge of the easily comprehensible domains tothe abstract economic domain, reporters make the complicated economic phenomena moreaccessible for potential readers.
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