Article published in:
Metaphor and the Social World
Vol. 6:1 (2016) ► pp. 1–19

Metaphors for ‘good’ and ‘bad’ deaths

A health professional view

| The Open University
| Lancaster University
This paper discusses the metaphors used by sixteen palliative healthcare professionals from around the United Kingdom in semi-structured interviews to describe what they see as ‘good’ and ‘bad’ deaths. The interviews, conducted for the large-scale “Metaphor in End-of-Life Care” project, are set against the background of contemporary practices and discourses around end-of-life care, dying and quality of death. To date, the use of metaphor in descriptions of different types of deaths has not received much attention. Applying the Metaphor Identification Procedure (Pragglejaz Group, 2007) we find that the difference between good and bad deaths is partly expressed via different frequencies of contrasting metaphors, such as ‘peacefulness’ and ‘openness’ as opposed to ‘struggle’ and ‘pushing away’ professional help. We show how metaphors are used to: evaluate deaths and the dying; justify those evaluations; present a remarkably consistent view of different types of deaths; and promote a particular ‘framing’ of a good death, which is closely linked with the dominant sociocultural and professional contexts of our interviewees. We discuss the implications of these consistent evaluations and framings in broader end-of-life care contexts, and reflect on the significance of our findings for the role of metaphor in communication about sensitive experiences.
Keywords: end-of-life care, death and dying, metaphor, good death, medical communication, hospices
Available under the Creative Commons Attribution (CC BY) 4.0 license.

For any use beyond this license, please contact the publisher at rights@benjamins.nl.

Published online: 12 May 2016
https://doi.org/10.1075/msw.6.1.01dem
References
Bennett, A
(2013)  We need a heroic narrative for death . Paper presented at the TEDMED . Retrieved from: https://​www​.ted​.com​/talks​/amanda​_bennett​_a​_heroic​_narrative​_for​_letting​_go​?language​=en
Cameron, L
in press). Using metaphor for peace-building, empathy, and reconciliation. In E. Semino & Z. Demjén (Eds.) The Routledge handbook of metaphor and language Chapter 29 Abingdon Routledge
Cameron, L., Maslen, R., & Low, G
(2010) Finding systematicity in metaphor use. In L. Cameron & R. Maslen (Eds.), Metaphor analysis (pp. 116–146). London: Equinox.Google Scholar
Canter, D
(1988) How do we know that it works? Therapeutic outcome as negotiation. Complementary Medical Research, 21, 98–106.Google Scholar
Carpentier, N., & Van Brussel, L
(2012) On the contingency of death: A discourse-theoretical perspective on the construction of death. Critical Discourse Studies, 9(2), 99–115. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Cipolletta, S., & Oprandi, N
(2014) What is a good death? Health care professionals’ narrations on end-of-life care. Death Stud, 38(1–5), 20–27. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Costello, J
(2006) Dying well: Nurses’ experiences of ‘good and bad’ deaths in hospital. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 54(5), 594–601. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Cottrell, L., & Duggleby, W
(2016) The “good death”: An integrative literature review. Palliative and Supportive Care, 1–27. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Czechmeister, C.A
(1994) Metaphor in illness and nursing: A two-edged sword. A discussion of the social use of metaphor in everyday language, and implications of nursing and nursing education. Joumal of Advanced Nursing, 191, 1226–1233. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Dancygier, B., & Sweetser, E
(2014) Figurative language. New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Deignan, A
(2010) The evaluative properties of metaphors. In Z. Todd, A. Deignan, & L. Cameron (Eds.), Researching and applying metaphor in use (pp. 357–373). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Deignan, A., Littlemore, J., & Semino, E
(2013) Figurative language, genre and register. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Gibbs, R.W., Leggitt, J.S., & Turner, E.A
(2002) What’s special about figurative language in emotional communication? In S.R. Fussell (Ed.), The verbal communication of emotions: Interdisciplinary perspectives (pp. 125–149). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum.Google Scholar
Goatly, A
(2007) Washing the brain: Metaphor and hidden ideology. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kelly, C.M.J
(2014) What is a good death? The New Bioethics: A Multidisciplinary Journal of Biotechnology and the Body, 20(1), 35–52. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Kövecses, Z
(2000) Metaphor and emotion: Language, culture, and body in human feeling. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Kübler-Ross, E
(1969) On death and dying. London: Tavistock.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G
(1996) Moral politics: What conservatives know that liberals don’t. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
(2008) The political mind: Why you can’t understand 21st-century politics with an 18th-century brain. New York: Viking.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M
(1980) Metaphors we live by. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Turner, M
(1989) More than cool reason: A field guide to poetic metaphor. Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Low, J.T.S., & Payne, S.A
(1996) The good and bad death perceptions of health professionals working in palliative care. European Journal of Cancer Care, 51, 237–241. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Maalej, Z
(2007) Doing CDA with the contemporary theory of metaphor: Towards a discourse model of metaphor. In C. Hart & D. Lukes (Eds.), Cognitive linguistics in critical discourse analysis: Application and theory (pp. 132–158). Newcastle: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.Google Scholar
Musolff, A
(2006) Metaphor scenarios in public discourse. Metaphor & Symbol, 21(1), 23–38. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ortony, A., & Fainsilber, L
(1987)  The role of metaphors in descriptions of emotions . Paper presented at the Proceedings of the 1987 workshop on Theoretical issues in natural language processing , 7–9 January, Las Cruces, New Mexico. Crossref
Payne, S.A., Langley-Evans, A., & Hiller, R
(1996) Perceptions of a ‘good’ death: A comparative study of the views of hospice staff and patients. Palliative Medicine, 101, 307–312. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Pragglejaz Group
(2007) MIP: A method for identifying metaphorically used words in discourse. Metaphor and Symbol, 22(1), 1–39. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Reisfield, G.M., & Wilson, G.R
(2004) Use of metaphor in the discourse on cancer. Journal of Clinical Oncology, 22(19), 4024–4027. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Ritchie, L.D
(2013) Metaphor. Cambridge & New York: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Scarre, G
(2012) Can there be a good death? Journal of Evaluation in Clinical Practice, 18(5), 1082–1086. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Seale, C
(1998) Constructing death: The sociology of dying and bereavement. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2004) Media constructions of dying alone: A form of ‘bad death’. Social Science Medicine, 58(5), 967–974. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Semino, E
(2008) Metaphor in discourse. Cambridge, UK: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Semino, E., Demjén, Z., & Koller, V
(2014) ‘Good’ and ‘bad’ deaths: Narratives and professional identities in interviews with hospice managers. Discourse Studies 16(5), 667–685. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Seymour, J.E., Bellamy, G., Gott, M., Ahmedzai, S.H., & Clark, D
(2002) Good deaths, bad deaths: Older people’s assessments of the risks and benefits of morphine and terminal sedation in end-of-life care. Health, Risk & Society, 4(3), 287–303. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Smith, R
(2000) A good death: An important aim for services and for us all. BMJ, 3201, 129–130. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Steen, G., Dorst, A.G., Herrmann, J.B., Kaal, A., Krennmayr, T., & Pasma, T
(2010) A method for linguistic metaphor identification: From MIP to MIPVU. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Steinhauser, K.E., Clipp, E.C., McNeilly, M., Christakis, N.A., McIntyre, L.M., & Tulsky, J.A
(2000) In search of a good death: Observations of patients, families, and providers. Annals of Internal Medicine, 132(10), 825–832. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Thibodeau, P.H., & Boroditsky, L
(2011) Metaphors we think with: The role of metaphor in reasoning. PLoS One, 6(2), 1–11. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Van Brussel, L., & Carpentier, N
(2012) The discursive construction of the good death and the dying person: A discourse-theoretical analysis of Belgian newspaper articles on medical end-of-life decision making. Journal of Language and Politics, 11(4), 479–499. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Vig, E.K., Nathaniel, A.D., & Pearlman, R.A
(2002) Good deaths, bad deaths, and preferences for the end of life: A qualitative study of geriatric outpatients. JAGS, 50(9), 1541–1548. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Walter, T
(1994) The revival of death. London: Routledge. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
(2003) Historical and cultural variants on the good death. BMJ, 3271, 218–220. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Walters, G
(2004) Is there such a thing as a good death? Palliative Medicine, 181, 404–408. CrossrefGoogle Scholar
Zimmermann, C
(2012) Acceptance of dying: A discourse analysis of palliative care literature. Social Science & Medicine, 75(1), 217–224. CrossrefGoogle Scholar

Full-text

Metaphors for ‘good’ and ‘bad’ deaths
Cited by

Cited by 14 other publications

Abaalalaa, Hessah Shajaan & Wesam M. A. Ibrahim
2022. Metaphors of cancer in the Arabic language: An analysis of the use of metaphors in the online narratives of breast cancer patients. Open Linguistics 8:1 ► pp. 27 ff. Crossref logo
Atanasova, Dimitrinka
2018. “Keep moving forward. LEFT RIGHT LEFT”: A critical metaphor analysis and addressivity analysis of personal and professional obesity blogs. Discourse, Context & Media 25 ► pp. 5 ff. Crossref logo
Castaño, Emilia
2020. Discourse analysis as a tool for uncovering the lived experience of dementia: Metaphor framing and well-being in early-onset dementia narratives. Discourse & Communication 14:2 ► pp. 115 ff. Crossref logo
Cotter, Colleen, Danniella Samos & Deborah Swinglehurst
2021. Framing obesity in public discourse: Representation through metaphor across text type. Journal of Pragmatics 174 ► pp. 14 ff. Crossref logo
DAVID, OANA & TEENIE MATLOCK
2018. Cross-linguistic automated detection of metaphors for poverty and cancer. Language and Cognition 10:3 ► pp. 467 ff. Crossref logo
Duckett, Stephen
2018. Aligning policy objectives and payment design in palliative care. BMC Palliative Care 17:1 Crossref logo
Efeoğlu Özcan, Esranur
2022. Pull the weeds out or perish: Using pandemic metaphors to strengthen in-group solidarity in Turkish political discourse. Metaphor and Symbol 37:2 ► pp. 171 ff. Crossref logo
Lai, Huei-ling & Yi-chen Chen
2019.  In Chinese for Specific and Professional Purposes [Chinese Language Learning Sciences, ], ► pp. 189 ff. Crossref logo
Lang, Alexander
2020. The good death and the institutionalisation of dying: An interpretive analysis of the Austrian discourse. Social Science & Medicine 245 ► pp. 112671 ff. Crossref logo
Macagno, Fabrizio & Maria Grazia Rossi
2019. Metaphors and problematic understanding in chronic care communication. Journal of Pragmatics 151 ► pp. 103 ff. Crossref logo
Miller-Lewis, Lauren R., Trent W. Lewis, Jennifer Tieman, Deb Rawlings, Deborah Parker, Christine R. Sanderson & Christopher M. Danforth
2021. Words describing feelings about death: A comparison of sentiment for self and others and changes over time. PLOS ONE 16:1 ► pp. e0242848 ff. Crossref logo
Peters, Joachim, Natalie Dykes, Mechthild Habermann, Christoph Ostgathe & Maria Heckel
2019. Metaphors in German newspaper articles on multidrug-resistant bacteria in clinical contexts, 1995–2015. Metaphor and the Social World 9:2 ► pp. 221 ff. Crossref logo
Potts, Amanda & Elena Semino
2017. Healthcare professionals' online use of violence metaphors for care at the end of life in the US: a corpus-based comparison with the UK. Corpora 12:1 ► pp. 55 ff. Crossref logo
Skrynnikova, Inna V.
2020. Analogical reasoning in uncovering the meaning of digital-technology terms: the case of backdoor. Journal of Computer-Assisted Linguistic Research 4:1 ► pp. 23 ff. Crossref logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 10 april 2022. 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.