A cognitive approach to early conservatism
Conservatism is notoriously difficult to define. In the present study, conceptual metaphor theory is used to elucidate the nature of this ideology in its early phase when it emerged in England as a force struggling with the ideas of the French Revolution. It can be shown that conservative authors frequently do not conform to the pattern of orientational metaphors described by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson (1980), according to which “up” is usually regarded as positive and “down” as negative. Conservatives often associate their own ideas with depth or a downward movement, whereas the loathed ideas of the political opponents are related to height or an upward movement. This dichotomy is closely connected to the polarity between solidity, stability and weight on the one hand and gaseity, volatility and lightness on the other. The study bases its analysis on numerous political tracts, pamphlets, and novels from the 1790s and early 1800s.
Article outline
- 1.Introduction
- 2.Metaphors for the political system
- 3.Metaphors for the economy and society
- 4.Metaphors for the nation
- 5.Conclusions
- Acknowledgements
- Notes
-
References
References (53)
Allison, Lincoln
.
32009.
“Conservatism.” In
Oxford Concise Dictionary of Politics, ed. by
Ian McLean, and
Alistair McMillan, 112–115. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Barcelona, Antonio
2000 “Introduction: The Cognitive Theory of Metaphor and Metonymy.” In
Metaphor and Metonymy at the Crossroads, ed. by
Antonio Barcelona, 1–28.Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter.
Bindman, David
2003 “How the French Became Frogs. English Caricature and a National Stereotype.” Apollo. The International Magazine of the Arts 158 (498): 15–20.
Bödeker; Hans Erich, and Ernst Hinrichs
1991 “Alteuropa – Frühe Neuzeit – Moderne Welt? Perspektiven der Forschung.” In
Alteuropa – Ancien Régime – Frühe Neuzeit. Probleme und Methoden der Forschung, ed. by
Hans Erich Bödeker, and
Ernst Hinrichs, 11–50. Stuttgart-Bad Cannstatt: Frommann-Holzboog.
Bowles, John
1792a A Protest against T. Paine’s Rights of Man: Addressed to the Members of a Book Society. In
Political Writings of the 1790s. Vol. 61, ed. by
Gregory Claeys, 38–63. London: Pickering 1995.
Bowles, John
1792b Dialogues on the Rights of Britons, Between a Farmer, a Sailor, and a Manufacturer. In
Political Writings of the 1790s. Vol. 71, ed. by
Gregory Claeys, 247–278. London: Pickering 1995.
Burke, Edmund
1790 Reflections on the Revolution in France. A Critical Edition, ed. by
Jonathan C.D. Clark. Stanford: Stanford University Press 2001.
Cannadine, David
1999 The Rise and Fall of Class in Britain. New York: Columbia University Press.
Cienki, Alan
2005 “Metaphor in the ‘Strict Father’ and ‘Nurturant Parent’ Cognitive Models: Theoretical Issues Raised in an Empirical Study.” Cognitive Linguistics 16 (2), 279–312.
Colley, Linda
2003 Britons: Forging the Nation, 1707–1837. With a New Preface by the Author. London: Pimlico.
Cunningham, Hugh
1989 “The Language of Patriotism.” In
Patriotism: The Making and Unmaking of British National Identity. Vol. 1: History and Politics, ed. by
Raphael Samuel, 57–89. London: Routledge.
D’Israeli, Isaac
1797.
Vaurien: or, Sketches of the Times. ed. by
Nicola Trott, Vol. 81,
Anti-Jacobin Novels. ed.
W.M. Verhoeven. London: Pickering and Chatto 2005.
Dickinson, Harry T
1989 “Counter-Revolution in Britain in the 1790s.” Tijdschrift voor Geschiedenis 1021: 354–367.
Dickinson, Harry T
1990 “Popular Loyalism in Britain in the 1790s.” In
The Transformation of Political Culture. England and Germany in the Late Eighteenth Century, ed. by
Eckhart Hellmuth, 503–533. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Faulkner, John
1997 “Burke’s Perception of Richard Price.” In
The French Revolution Debate in English Literature and Culture, ed. by
Lisa Plummer Crafton, 1–25. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood.
Finlayson, Alan
1998 “Ideology, Discourse and Nationalism.” Journal of Political Ideologies 3 (1): 99–118.
Gerhard, Dietrich
1981 Old Europe. A Study of Continuity, 1000–1800. New York: Academic Press.
Gilmartin, Kevin
2007 Writing against Revolution: Literary Conservatism in Britain, 1790–1832. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Grenby, Matthew O
1998 “The Anti-Jacobin Novel: British Fiction, British Conservatism and the Revolution in France.” History: The Journal of the Historical Association 831: 445–471.
Grenby, Matthew O
2001 The Anti-Jacobin Novel. British Conservatism and the French Revolution. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Hamilton, Elizabeth
1800 Memoirs of Modern Philosophers, ed. by
Claire Grogan. Petersborough, Ontario: Broadview 2000.
Hamilton, William
1792 Letters on the Principles of the French Democracy, And their Application and Influence on the Constitution and Happiness of Britain and Ireland. In
Political Writings of the 1790s. Vol. 71, ed. by
Gregory Claeys, 138–158. London: Pickering 1995.
Hobsbawm, Eric
1975 The Age of Revolution. Europe 1789–1848. London: Weidenfeld & Nicholson.
Johnson, Nancy E
2004 The English Jacobin Novel on Rights, Property and the Law. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan.
Lakoff, George, and Mark Johnson
1980 Metaphors We Live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Lakoff, George
1996 Moral Politics. What Conservatives Know That Liberals Don’t. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Love, Walter D
1965.
“Edmund Burke’s Idea of the Body Corporate: A Study in Imagery.” The Review of Politics 27 (2): 184–197.
McCracken, David
1971 “Rhetorical Strategy in Burke’s ‘Reflections’.” The Yearbook of English Studies 11: 120–124.
Mitford, William
1793 An Additional Proof of the Excellence of the English Constitution Deduced from the Harmony Subsisting Between the Several Ranks of Citizens. In
Association Papers, ed. by Association for Preserving Liberty and Property Against Republicans and Levellers, Part I, Number IX, 14–18. London.
Müllenbrock, Heinz-Joachim
2000 “Edmund Burke’s Reflections on the Revolution in France (1790) as Intercultural Response.” In
English Literatures in International Contexts, ed. by
Heinz Antor, and
Klaus Stierstorfer, 57–62. Heidelberg: Winter.
O’Gorman, Frank
1986 British Conservatism. Conservative Thought from Burke to Thatcher. London: Longman.
Paine, Thomas
1791
Rights of Man
. In Thomas Paine,
Rights of Man, Common Sense, and Other Political Writings, ed. by
Mark Philp, 83–197, Oxford: Oxford University Press 1995.
Paine, Thomas
1792
Rights of Man, Part the Second
. In Thomas Paine,
Rights of Man, Common Sense, and Other Political Writings, ed. by
Mark Philp, 198–331. Oxford: Oxford University Press 1995.
Paulson, Ronald
1983 Representations of Revolution: 1789–1820. New Haven: Yale University Press.
Philp, Mark
1995 “Vulgar Conservatism, 1792–3.” The English Historical Review 110(435): 42–69.
Polzenhagen, Frank
2010 “Kinship Conceptualisations in Models of Politics and of the State.” Presentation at the Workshop “
Metaphor and Ideology” University of Freiburg, 21 June, 2010.
Priestley, Joseph
1772 Directions for Impregnating Water with Fixed Air; in order to Communicate to it the Peculiar Spirit and Virtues of Pyrmont Water, and other Mineral Waters of a Similar Nature. London: J. Johnson.
Proby, William C
1798 Modern Philosophy and Barbarism: Or, A Comparison Between the Theory of Godwin and the Practice of Lycurgus. In
Political Writings of the 1790s. Vol. 81, ed. by
Gregory Claeys, 291–322. London: Pickering 1995.
Sack, James J
1993 From Jacobite to Conservative. Reaction and Orthodoxy in Britain, c. 1760–1832. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
Schissler, Jakob
2000 “Konservatismus” In
Politik-Lexikon, ed. by
Everhard Holtmann, 320–323. München: Oldenbourg.
Schofield, Thomas P
1986 “Conservative Political Thought in Britain in Response to the French Revolution.” The Historical Journal 29 (3): 601–622.
Schubert, Christoph
2008 “Orientational Metaphors in Romantic Poetry: A Cognitive Semantic Perspective on Verticality.” In
Anglistentag 2007 Münster: Proceedings, ed. by
Klaus Stierstorfer, 209–220. Trier: WVT.
Smith, Charlotte
1792 Desmond, ed. by
Janet M. Todd, and
Antje Blank. Petersborough, Ontario: Broadview 2001.
Verhoeven, W.M
2005 Anti-Jacobin Novels. 10 vols1. London: Pickering and Chatto.
Viereck, Peter et al.
152007 “Socio-Economic Doctrines and Reform Movements: Conservatism.” In
The New Encyclopædia Britannica. Macropædia. Vol. 271, 427–433. Chicago: Encyclopædia Britannica.
Viereck, Peter
1956 [Reprint 1978].
Conservatism. From John Adams to Churchill. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood.
Volney, Constantin-François
1788 Travels through Syria and Egypt, in the Years 1783, 1784, and 1785. London: G.G.J. and J. Robinson.
Wagner, Peter
1997 “The Artist at Work: A (De)constructive View of Hogarth’s Beer Street.” In
The Dumb Show: Image and Society in the Works of William Hogarth, ed. by
Frédéric Ogée, 117–127. Oxford: The Voltaire Foundation.
Walker, George
1799 The Vagabond. A Novel, ed. by
W.M. Verhoeven. Petersborough, Ontario: Broadview 2004.
West, Jane
1799 A Tale of the Times, ed.
Amanda Gilroy, Vol. 71,
Anti-Jacobin Novels, ed. by
W. M. Verhoeven. London: Pickering and Chatto 2005.
Western, John R
1956 “The Volunteer Movement as an Anti-Revolutionary Force, 1793–1801.” The English Historical Review 71 (281): 603–614.
Young, Arthur
.
41794 [
11793]
The Example of France, a Warning to Britain. London: W. Richardson.
Cited by (1)
Cited by 1 other publications
Rafoss, Tore Witsø
2019.
Enemies of freedom and defenders of democracy: The metaphorical response to terrorism.
Acta Sociologica 62:3
► pp. 297 ff.
This list is based on CrossRef data as of 5 july 2024. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers.
Any errors therein should be reported to them.