Cognition of Metaphorical Text in President Muhammadu Buhari’s Inaugural Speech
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Date
2020-09
Authors
Sobola, E
Journal Title
Journal ISSN
Volume Title
Publisher
Language Research Institute, Sejong University, Seoul Korea
Abstract
Political discourse has gained prominence in Nigeria and a crop of
literature has emerged from different fields of study to discuss how
the discourse has presented issues prevalent in the country at
different political epochs. Political discourse uses figurative
language such as metaphor, simile, metonymy, paradox, irony and
antithesis. The use of figurative language raises issues on
interpretation and cognition of political discourse. This study
investigates cognition of metaphors used by President Muhammadu
Buhari in his inaugural speech on his assumption of office as the
president of Nigeria on 29th May, 2015, which was identified as data and collected through media monitoring. Theory of lexical
concept and cognitive model (LCCM) propounded by Vyvyan
Evans was employed for analysis. The study concludes that
metaphors are used in political discourse to encode ideological
belief; interpretation of ideological views in the metaphorical text
contributes towards cognition of the metaphor in political discourse;
a metaphor is an embodiment of ideologies which could not be
easily interpreted in a literal sense; linguistic contents in the
metaphor and their relationships contribute towards interpretation
and cognition of metaphors, and metaphors in Nigerian political
discourse address Nigerian contemporary political issues.
Description
The paper investigates metaphorical text used in the Nigerian political discourse and processes involved in the interpretation of metaphors. It demonstrates that understanding of cultural context plays a vital role in the cognition of metaphorical text.
Keywords
Political discourse , Metaphor , Cognition , Inaugural speech , Text , Nigerian political discourse