Abstract

Political speech plays a very important role in western countries. It has become a powerful tool for politicians to propagate ideas and get support because of its inspiring infection. The annual SUA(State of the Union Address) made by President of the United States has a great impact and historical significance on the whole world, so it becomes the focus for scholars to study political discourse. But the political world is complex and full of values, it is far away from the everyday life both in cognition and in perception. So metaphor becomes an essential language strategy in political discourse for people to understand politics.

This paper, taking Obama’s SUA as a corpus, tries to explore how Obama uses conceptual metaphor to make the abstract and complex political issues become specific ones which are easily understood and accepted by people. Lakoff’s conceptual metaphor theory points out that metaphor is not only a purely rhetorical phenomenon, but also a cognitive phenomenon, which is not only perceived by people to understand the world around them but also used to formulate concepts. It is an important way of thinking in human cognitive activities. Based on this theory, this paper aims to find out and divide the conceptual metaphors in the SUA into the following categories: journey metaphor, person metaphor, war metaphor, orientational metaphor, building metaphor, machine metaphor. According to the analysis of the characteristics of the metaphors, Obama’s covert intentions of using these metaphors can be found— to summarize the achievements since he has been in office and point out the difficulties the United States has been facing and the action he has taken to alleviate the plight. Meanwhile, another finding is that Obama’s ingenious application of the metaphors in his political speech can make his speech more powerful and win people’s support.

Keywords: political speech; conceptual metaphor; Obama;

State of the Union

Contents

Abstract

摘要

1.Introduction.1

1.1The background of the study1

1.2The purpose and significance of the study...1

1.3The organization of the paper...2

2.Literature Review3

2.1 Study of political speech abroad...3

2.2 Study of political speech at home.4

2.3 Study of the State of the Union Address..5

3. Conceptual Metaphor Theory.6

3.1 Definition of conceptual metaphor...6

3.2 Categories of conceptual metaphor..7

3.3 Working mechanism of conceptual metaphor..8

4. Conceptual Metaphors in Obama’s SUA.10

4.1 Data sources10

4.2 Major categories of conceptual metaphors in Obama’s SUA.10

4.3 Analysis of key conceptual metaphors in Obama’s SUA...13

5. Conclusion...18

References20