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Article published In:
Metaphor and the Social World
Vol. 9:2 (2019) ► pp.221–241

Metaphors in German newspaper articles on multidrug-resistant bacteria in clinical contexts, 1995–2015

A computer-assisted study

| Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
| Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
| Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg
| Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg | Department of Palliative Medicine, CCC Erlangen-EMN
| Friedrich-Alexander-Universität Erlangen-Nürnberg | Department of Palliative Medicine, CCC Erlangen-EMN

The study investigates the usage of metaphorical structures in the German press discourse on multi-resistant pathogens in the clinical context by applying methods of qualitative discourse analysis to a corpus of 900 newspaper and magazine articles published between 1995–2015. The study shows that metaphors are of key importance for the processes of knowledge transfer, emotion production and persuasion. Metaphors are assigned to one of three general principles (mechanising explanation patterns, gain and loss of control, agentivity and personification) and to seven dominant source domains which structure the discourse through frequent argumentation structures: war, economy, space, machines, water, police and crime, sports and games. The occurrence of metaphor is – as previous research in other areas has shown – universal to all examined press texts; variation is limited to the thematic focus of individual argumentation structures between the different texts.

Keywords: metaphor, discourse linguistics, qualitative data analysis, health communication, antimicrobial resistance, nosocomial infections
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Related work
  • 3.Methodological setting
  • 4.Source domains for metaphors
    • 4.1War
    • 4.2Economy and manufacturing
    • 4.3Space
    • 4.4Machines
    • 4.5Water
    • 4.6Police and crime
    • 4.7Sports and games
  • 5.Metaphor functions
    • 5.1Knowledge transfer
    • 5.2Control
    • 5.3Agentivity and personification
  • 6.Summary
  • Note
  • References
Published online: 5 November 2019
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/msw.18006.pet
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