http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3028-6663
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ABSTRACT
Political actors use metaphor in their speeches in order to frame political issues [Charteris-Black, J. (2011). Politicians and rhetoric: The persuasive power of metaphor. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan]. If they succeed in imposing a particular (metaphorical) frame, especially when there is no agreement on the definition of certain political issues, this can become the prevailing way for referring to that issue [Semino, E. (2008). Metaphor in discourse. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press]. In this research, we argue that this was the case for the metaphor of the JOURNEY in the Catalan political conflict during electoral periods. To that end we use Critical Metaphor Analysis [Charteris-Black, J. (2004). Corpus approaches to critical metaphor analysis. Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan] to analyse televised campaign ads from the last three elections for the Parliament of Catalonia – from 2010, 2012, and 2015 – in order to identify how political actors’ use metaphors to talk about the Catalan political situation during these years and to verify if JOURNEY metaphor resulted into the dominant narrative. The results show that the political situation has been conceptualized in terms of a ‘process en route,’ although the narratives generated by the political actors that shaped that discourse differ.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
Carlota M. Moragas-Fernández is a postdoctoral researcher at the Department of Communication Studies of the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona, Spain). She is a member of Asterisc Communication Research Group. Her research focuses on the role metaphor plays on political and media discourses. She also studies how the interaction provided by the 2.0 environment has changed the dynamics of action of political parties regarding citizenship.
Marta Montagut Calvo is lecturer at the Department of Communication Studies of the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona, Spain). She is a member of Asterisc Communication Research Group. She has specialized in the relationship between politics and journalism, political communication and news radio production. She also works on media frame analysis and critical metaphor analysis as well as on the field of memory and postmemory in audiovisual production in Spain.
Arantxa Capdevila Gómez is senior lecturer at the Department of Communication Studies of the Universitat Rovira i Virgili (Tarragona, Spain). She is a member of Asterisc Communication Research Group. She is interested in political communication and she has investigated how rhetoric and semiotics can be applied to political discourse analysis.
ORCID
Carlota M. Moragas-Fernández http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3028-6663
Marta Montagut Calvo http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0270-9983
Arantxa Capdevila Gómez http://orcid.org/0000-0003-3030-0488
Notes
1 At the moment of submitting this article, Catalonia had not hold the 21 December 2017 parliamentary election.
2 As one of the reviewers of this article noted, the extent to which a metaphorical expression implies intentionality can vary dependent on the kind of metaphor that is used. For instance, novel metaphors –in which two different concepts are compared, asking users to find what properties do they share and requiring a greater interpretation effort from them– are thought to be intentional or deliberately used because their aim is to provide an alternative view on the topic targeted. On the other hand, conventional metaphors, primary metaphors (Grady, Citation2005; Lakoff & Johnson, Citation1999) and catachresis (Eco, Citation1989) are often perceived as being close to literal language and they are processed through categorization rather than comparison, which entails their persuasive function lies in the fact they go unnoticed (Semino & Masci, Citation1996, p. 244).
3 Because Catalan and Spanish share a romance origin as well as a similar cultural background there were no meaningful differences in the way metaphorical expressions were used in one or another language. When an expression had a specific meaning in Catalan or Spanish or could be misunderstood for some reason, the authors have added a footnote (i.e. notes vii and xiii) that clarifies its meaning according to the definition provided by the before-mentioned dictionaries.
4 The PSC aired five different ads in the 2010 campaign. The metaphor appears in the ad titled Segon spot de campanya that can be seen at https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3TQHu-AVdUo. (Last viewed January 2, 2017).
5 SI aired four ads in its 2010 campaign. Two of them, Pensa un desig: Independència (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Zd9QV8B_GNk) and Ara toca independència; La rauxa intel·ligent (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ndUHP_ju9J8) centre on developing the concept of independence. (Last viewed January 2, 2017).
6 […] Inspira profundament i deixa't emportar pel teu somni; costa al principi, però després tot serà planer; […] llançar-s’hi és difícil, però no pots contenir la teva consciència.
7 The dictionary of the Institut d’Estudis Catalans defines rauxa as a strong emotional force, manifested through extreme actions and little intervening reason, a sudden, unpremeditated decision. One English synonym is ‘outburst.’
8 In the ads Junts estem fent camí (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6FKi78HmWc); La voluntat d’un poble (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8f9krozfmEk); and Junts ho farem possible (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1HPCpxylQuA). (Last viewed January 2, 2017).
9 Junts ho farem possible, ens farem escoltar, tot és possible si fem sentir la voluntat d’un poble, els vostres somnis marcaran les passes de Catalunya.
10 Junts estem fent camí, un camí on encara no hi ha res decidit, un camí cap al futur. Sabem que no serà un camí fàcil, però tot és possible.
11 See http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0TyVE9hO_ig and http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-ihIfjDYQ3M. (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
12 Units guanyem. Platem cara (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QwQqY7FKW_M); Unidos ganamos #Plantemos cara (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SYJEH-HgHeU); and Vídeo oficial de campaña. Unidos ganamos #Plantemos cara (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZN4Jmuv5zsE). (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
13 According to the Real Academia de la Lengua Española, one synonym for plantado is quieto, still. To plant, plantar, is to place something in the ground vertically, to put something in its place so that it can be used. Plantar also means to stop doing something.
14 C's aired two ads: Caminemos juntos (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OUy-iMDVw_Y) and Yo voto a Inés (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uurOfq9tcw0). (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
15 See CSQP's ad, Catalunya sí que es pot (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=t3CizM6Z-mI). (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
16 #VotaPerMi (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJyHqjjhPGU); Junts ho podem tot, la pel·lícula del Junts pel Sí (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RGrVuDGOt1M); Sí, tot és possible (Junqueras) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Yx9WgDuKKKc); Sí, tot és possible (Mas) (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=de1HIbPiVUg); and Hem de canviar perquè no hi ha un altre camí (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=L4DT9NLLEHM). (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
17 Specifically, the ad Anàvem lents perquè anavem lluny (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=GUvo4sjigLM). (Last viewed January 3, 2017).
18 El camí és ple de pedres, les pedres del camí. Aquelles que ens posen els altres i les que ens posem nosaltres mateixos.
19 Opinion Studies Barometer – 3rd Wave 2017: http://ceo.gencat.cat/ceop/AppJava/pages/home/fitxaEstudi.html?colId=6408&lastTitle=Bar%F2metre+d%27Opini%F3+Pol%EDtica.+3a+onada+2017