Cover not available
Article published In:
Issues in Humour Cognition
Edited by Marta Dynel
[Review of Cognitive Linguistics 16:1] 2018
► pp. 254–298
Regular articles

The effect of the Arab Spring on the use of metaphor and metonymy in Jordanian economic discourse

A cognitive approach

| University of Jordan
This study aims to identify the metaphors and metonymies used to describe economic concepts in Jordanian economic discourse pre- and post-Arab Spring in order to examine whether the events of the Arab Spring have had an impact on these figurative devices. This study also examines whether metaphor and metonymy can be affected by the social and cultural setting in which they are used and by politico-economic factors. In addition, this study aims to explore the notion that economic discourse uses many of the same conceptual metaphors regardless of the language and culture. To achieve this, I compiled a corpus of economic articles published in 2005 and 2008 (i.e. pre-Arab Spring) and 2012 and 2015 (i.e. post-Arab Spring) from two daily Jordanian newspapers. Frequency counts of metaphorical expressions representing the source domains and metonymies were compared to assess their saliency in the two periods and the two newspapers.
Keywords: Conceptual Metaphor Theory, metaphor, metonymy, economic discourse, corpus linguistics
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Metaphors used in economic discourse
    • 2.1 the economy is a machine
    • 2.2 the economy is an organism
    • 2.3 the economy is a natural force
    • 2.4 the economy is a journey
    • 2.5 economic activity is warfare
    • 2.6 the economy is a building
    • 2.7 the economy is a game
  • 3.Methodology
    • 3.1Data collection
    • 3.2Stage 1: Preliminary study
      • 3.2.1Metaphor and metonymy identification procedure
    • 3.3Stage 2: Corpus-based study
  • 4.Results and discussion
    • 4.1Metaphors used in Jordanian economic discourse
      • the economy is a machine
      • the economy is an organism
      • the economy is a natural force
      • the economy is a journey
      • economic activity is warfare
      • the economy is a building
      • the economy is a game
      • negative economic factors are supernatural creatures
      • the economy is a meal/kitchen
    • 4.2Metaphors used in Jordanian economic discourse pre- and post-Arab Spring
    • 4.3The conceptual metaphors that exhibit differences pre- and post-Arab Spring
    • a. the economy is an organism
    • b. economic activity is a journey
    • c. economic activity is warfare
    • d. economic activity is a natural force
    • 4.4Metonymies used in Jordanian economic discourse
    • 4.5The impact of socio-political change on metaphor use
      • 4.5.1Changes in metaphorical expressions representing the source domain organism
      • 4.5.2Changes in metaphorical expressions representing the source domain journey
      • 4.5.3Changes in metaphorical expressions representing the source domain warfare
      • 4.5.4Changes in metaphorical expressions representing the source domain natural force
      • 4.5.5Some implications related to the effect of socio-political changes on metaphor use
  • 5.Conclusion and recommendations
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 31 May 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/rcl.00010.zib
References (60)
References
Agresti, A. (1992). A survey of exact inference for contingency tables. Statistical Science, 7(1), 131–153. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Al Ghad Newspaper Archive. [Accessed online 2nd Aug 2016, from: [URL]].
Al Jazeera. Syria’s civil war explained from the beginning. [Accessed online 24th July 2017, from: [URL]].
Al Rai Newspaper Archive. [Accessed online 2nd Aug 2016, from: [URL]].
Amman Chamber of Commerce. (2006). The annual economic report of the Jordanian economy in 2005 compared with 2004. [Accessed online 11th Feb 2017 from: [URL]].
. (2009). The annual economic report of the Jordanian economy in 2008 compared with (2007). [Accessed online 11th Feb 2017 from: [URL]].
. (2013). The annual economic report of the Jordanian economy in 2012 compared with 2011. [Accessed online 11th Feb 2017 from: [URL]].
. (2016). The annual economic report of the Jordanian economy in 2015 compared with 2014. [Accessed online 11th Feb 2017 from: [URL]].
Ansah, G. N. (2014). Culture in embodied cognition: Metaphorical/metonymic conceptualizations of fear in Akan and English. Metaphor and Symbol, 29(1), 44–58. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
BBC News. Arab rising: Country by country. [Accessed online 23rd July 2015, from [URL]].
Boers, F. (2000). Metaphor awareness and vocabulary retention. Applied Linguistics, 21(4), 553–57. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Boers, F., & Demecheleer, M. (1997). A few metaphorical models in (western) economic discourse. In W. A. Liebert, G. Redeker, & L. Waugh (Eds.), Discourse and perspective in cognitive linguistics (pp. 115–129). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bratoz, S. (2004). A comparative study of metaphor in English and Slovene popular economic discourse. Managing Global Transitions, 2(2), 179–196.Google Scholar
Brône, G., & Coulson, S. (2010). Processing deliberate ambiguity in newspaper headlines: Double grounding. Discourse Processes, 47(3), 212–236. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cameron, L. (2008). Metaphor shifting in the dynamics of talk. In M. S. Zanotto, L. Cameron & M. C. Cavalcanti (Eds.), Confronting metaphor in use: An applied linguistic approach (pp. 45–62). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cameron, L., & Deignan, A. (2006). The emergence of metaphor in discourse. Applied Linguistics, 27(4), 671–690. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Charteris-Black, J. (2000). Metaphor and vocabulary teaching in ESP economics. English for Specific Purposes, 191, 149–165. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2002). Second language figurative proficiency: A comparative study of Malay and English. Applied Linguistics, 231, 104–133. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2004). Corpus approaches to critical metaphor analysis. Basingstoke, Hampshire: Palgrave Macmillan. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Charteris-Black, J., & Ennis, T. (2001). A comparative study of metaphor in Spanish and English financial reporting. English for Specific Purposes, 201, 249–266. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Chow, M. V. (2010). A comparative study of the metaphor used in the economic news articles in Britain and Hong Kong. Unpublished PhD thesis, University of Birmingham, UK.Google Scholar
Deignan, A. (2008). Corpus linguistics and metaphor. In R. W. Gibbs (Ed.), Cambridge handbook of metaphor and thought (pp. 280–294). New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2009). Searching for metaphorical patterns in corpora. In P. Baker (Ed.), Contemporary corpus linguistics (pp. 9–31). London: Continuum.Google Scholar
El Refaie, E. (2015). Reconsidering “image metaphor” in the light of perceptual simulation theory. Metaphor and Symbol, 30(1), 63–76. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gibbs, R. W. (1994). Speaking and thinking with metonymy. In K. Panther & G. Radden (Eds.), Metonymy in language and thought (pp. 61–76). Philadelphia: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
(2006). Metaphor interpretation as embodied simulation. Mind & Language, 21(3), 434–458. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gibbs, R. W., & Matlock, T. (2008). Metaphor, imagination, and simulation: Psycholinguistic evidence. In R. W. Gibbs (Ed.), Cambridge handbook of metaphor and thought (pp. 161–176). New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goossens, L. (1990). Metaphtonymy: The interaction of metaphor and metonymy in expressions for linguistic action. Cognitive Linguistics, 1(3), 323–442. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Grady, J. (1999). A typology of motivation for conceptual metaphor: Correlation vs. resemblance. In R. W. Gibbs & G. Steen (Eds.), Metaphor in cognitive linguistics (pp. 57–78). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Henderson, W. (2000). Metaphor, economics and ESP: Some comments. English for Specific Purposes, 191, 167–173. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Herrera-Soler, H. (2008). A metaphor corpus in business press headlines. Iberica, 151, 51–69.Google Scholar
Herrera-Soler, H., & White, M. (Eds.). (2012). Metaphor and mills: Figurative language in business and economics. Berlin: Walter de Gruyter. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Johnson, M. (1987). The body in the mind: The bodily basis of meaning, imagination, and reason. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Kövecses, Z. (2005). Metaphor in culture: Universality and variation. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2016). A view of “mixed metaphor” within a conceptual metaphor theory framework. In R. W. Gibbs Jr. (Ed.), Mixing metaphor (pp. 3–16). Amsterdam: John Benjamins.Google Scholar
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (2003)[1980]. Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Larsen, R. J., & Marx, M. L. (1986). An introduction to mathematical statistics and its applications. Englewood Cliffs, NJ: Prentice-Hall.Google Scholar
Littlemore, J. (2015). Metonymy: Hidden shortcuts in language, thought and communication. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Maalej, Z. (2004). Figurative language in anger expressions in Tunisian Arabic: An extended view of embodiment. Metaphor and Symbol, 19(1), 51–75. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2007). Doing critical discourse analysis with the contemporary theory of metaphor: Towards a discourse model of metaphor. In C. Hart & D. Lukeš (Eds.), Cognitive linguistics in critical discourse analysis: Application and theory (pp. 132–158). Cambridge: Cambridge Scholars Publishing.Google Scholar
(2012). The ‘Jasmine Revolt ’has made the ‘Arab Spring’: A critical discourse analysis of the last three political speeches of the ousted president of Tunisia. Discourse & Society, 23(6), 679–700. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2014). Body parts we live by in language and culture: The raaS ‘head’and yidd ‘hand’ in Tunisian Arabic. In M. Brenzinger & I. Kraska-Szlenk (Eds.), The body in language: Comparative studies of linguistic embodiment (pp. 224–259). Boston: Brill. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Müller, C. (2008). What gestures reveal about the nature of metaphor. In A. Cienki & C. Müller (Eds.), Metaphor and gesture (pp. 219–248). Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Nelson, R. R. (1995). Recent theorizing about economic change. Journal of Economic Literature, 331, 48–49.Google Scholar
Pragglejaz Group. (2007). MIP: A method for identifying metaphorically used words in discourse. Metaphor and Symbol, 22(1), 1–39. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Radden, G., & Kövecses, Z. (1999). Towards a theory of metonymy. In K. U. Panther & G. Radden (Eds.), Metonymy in language and thought (pp. 17–59). Amsterdam/Philadelphia: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Routledge, R. (2005). Fisher’s exact test. Encyclopedia of Biostatistics. Wiley Online Library. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Scott, M. (2012). WordSmith tools version 6. Stroud: Lexical Analysis Software.Google Scholar
Semino, E. (2008). Metaphor in discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Skorczynska, H., & Deignan, A. (2006). Readership and purpose in the choice of economics metaphors. Metaphor and Symbol, 21(2), 87–104. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Steen, G. (2007). Finding metaphor in discourse: Pragglejaz and beyond. Cultura, Lenguaje y Representación/Culture, Language and Representation, 51, 9–25.Google Scholar
Tognini-Bonelli, E. (2001). Corpus linguistics at work. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Upton, G. J. (1992). Fisher’s exact test. Journal of the Royal Statistical Society. Series A (Statistics in Society), 155(3), 395–402. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Vaghi, F., & Venuti, M. (2003). The Economist and the Financial Times: A study of movement metaphors. [Accessed online on 9th May 2015, from: [URL]].
Woodcock, A., & Davis, M. (1980). Catastrophe theory. Harmwondsworth: Penguin.Google Scholar
Zibin, A. (2016a). On the production of metaphors and metonymies by Jordanian EFL learners: Acquisition and implications. Topics in Linguistics, 17(2), 41–58. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2016b). The comprehension of metaphorical expressions by Jordanian EFL learners. SAGE Open, 6(2), 1–15. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
(2017). The effect of the Arab Spring on the use of metaphor and metonymy in Jordanian economic discourse: A cognitive approach. Unpublished Doctoral Thesis. Newcastle: Newcastle University, UK.Google Scholar
Zibin, A., & Altakhaineh, A. R. M. (2018). An analysis of Arabic metaphorical and/or metonymical compounds: A cognitive linguistic approach. Metaphor and the Social World, 8(1), 99–132. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Zibin, A., & Hamdan, J. (2014). The acquisition of metaphorical expressions by Jordanian EFL learners: A cognitive approach. Saarbrücken: Lambert Academic Publishing.Google Scholar
Cited by (13)

Cited by 13 other publications

Abu Rumman, Ronza, Ahmad S. Haider, Sane Yagi & Amer Al-Adwan
2023. A corpus-assisted cognitive analysis of metaphors in the Arabic subtitling of English TV series. Cogent Social Sciences 9:1 DOI logo
Altakhaineh, Abdel Rahman Mitib
2022. Compositionality in N + N compounds in Jordanian Arabic and English. Canadian Journal of Linguistics/Revue canadienne de linguistique 67:1-2 ► pp. 5 ff. DOI logo
Fu, Xiaoling & Xin Ning
2022. Metaphor Recognition of English Learners Based on Machine Learning Algorithm. Wireless Communications and Mobile Computing 2022 ► pp. 1 ff. DOI logo
Younes, Afakh Said & Abdel Rahman Mitib Altakhaineh
2022. Metaphors and metonymies used in memes to depict COVID-19 in Jordanian social media websites. Ampersand 9 ► pp. 100087 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel, Abdel Rahman Mitib Altakhaineh & Hady Jihad Hamdan
2022. love and beloved metaphors in Jordanian Arabic and English songs. Metaphor and the Social World 12:2 ► pp. 318 ff. DOI logo
HASSOUNEH, Isra’ & Aseel ZİBİN
2021. Analysis of complaining strategies on services offered to Facebook users on Zain Jordan. Dil ve Dilbilimi Çalışmaları Dergisi 17:2 ► pp. 1141 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel
2019. A Phonological Analysis of English Loanwords Inflected With Arabic Morphemes in Urban Jordanian Spoken Arabic. Sage Open 9:2 DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel
2020. A corpus-based study of metaphors used to describe Syrian refugees in Jordanian politico-economic discourse. Pragmatics and Society 11:4 ► pp. 640 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel
2021. Blood metaphors and metonymies in Jordanian Arabic and English. Review of Cognitive Linguistics 19:1 ► pp. 26 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel
2022. The type and function of metaphors in Jordanian economic discourse: A critical metaphor analysis approach. Language Sciences 93 ► pp. 101488 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel
2022. Monomodal and multimodal metaphors in editorial cartoons on the coronavirus by Jordanian cartoonists. Linguistics Vanguard 8:1 ► pp. 383 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel & Abdulrahman Dheyab Abdullah
2019. The Conceptualization of Tolerance in the UAE Press Media: A Case Study of ‘The Year of Tolerance’. Open Linguistics 5:1 ► pp. 405 ff. DOI logo
Zibin, Aseel & Khawlah M. AL-Tkhayneh
2019. A sociolinguistic analysis of the use of English loanwords inflected with Arabic morphemes as slang in Amman, Jordan. International Journal of the Sociology of Language 2019:260 ► pp. 155 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 28 october 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.