CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF COVID-19 ON BBC FUTURE: A WAY OF ‘LOADING’ LANGUAGE WITH MEANING AND EMOTION
CONCEPTUAL METAPHORS OF COVID-19 ON BBC FUTURE: A WAY OF ‘LOADING’ LANGUAGE WITH MEANING AND EMOTION

Summary/Abstract: Information Technology paved the way for the creation of written texts. Along with it, modern journalism has replaced traditional journalism providing new opportunities for all sources of media to connect with their readers. This has come as no surprise since, nowadays’ society bases so much on writing and image. Objectivity and relevance are key elements when it comes to journalistic writing; still, unexpected events like the Covid-19 pandemic, bring forth credible stories which, even though presented from unbiased perspectives, are loaded with expressive emotions such as anger, fear, sadness, sacrifice, fight, shame, etc. They are typical responses brought on by someone’s feeling stressed, depressed, irritated, frustrated, frightened, threatened by the virus. Thus, the reader is plunged into the depths of reality being guided by conceptual metaphors, which build the meaning by integrating the structure that give rise to more than the sum of its parts. Human imagination, as cognitive metaphor theorists (George Lakoff, Lakoff and Johnson, 1980; Mark Turner, 1989; Ray Gibbs, 1994; Fauconnier, 1997, et al.) claim, plays a crucial role in cognitive processes and in what it is to be human. Metaphors not only infiltrate within the language people use to express their emotions but also engage in the process of understanding the way in which emotional experience is being conceptualised.The focus of the present research is to study the conceptual metaphors that emerge from the three articles, which cover the social and emotional effects of the 2020 pandemic on BBC Future. The study’s endeavour is to understand the semantic markers, which project the image of the pandemic and people’s reaction when facing the military measures of social distancing, lockdown, economic redirection, as well as psychological aspects of past and future “normalcy”.

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