How visual metaphors can contradict verbal occurrences A cross-linguistic and multimodal analysis of the IMPRINT of climate change

Anaïs Augé

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    8 Citations (Scopus)
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    Abstract

    We investigate the different interpretations related to the metaphorical IMPRINT of climate change in English and French media discourses. This cross-linguistic perspective is motivated by the particularities of both languages which have been assumed to promote different understandings of climate change-related concepts. We focus on the metaphor CARBON FOOTPRINT whose meaning can be compared to another climate change metaphor in English: FINGERPRINT. These two source domains share a highly specific and concrete meaning interpreted from lexical constructions enabled by the English language. In French, however, such a specification cannot be interpreted from the meaning of the metaphor EMPREINTE CARBONE (CARBON IMPRINT) which defines a similar concept. We rely on visual representations of these metaphorical expressions in English and French to discuss the characteristics associated with each source domain: we show that visual metaphors can contradict expectations emerging from the interpretations of verbal metaphors.

    Original languageEnglish
    Pages (from-to)1-22
    Number of pages22
    JournalMetaphor and the Social World
    Volume12
    Issue number1
    Early online date1 Nov 2021
    DOIs
    Publication statusPublished - 22 Mar 2022

    Keywords

    • Carbon footprint
    • fingerprint
    • Climate Change
    • English
    • French
    • multimodality
    • Media
    • imprint
    • media variation of meaning
    • climate change
    • multi-modal metaphor

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