CORONA IS AN ATTACK, ELECTIONS ARE BATTLES AND SPORTS IS WAR: UNIVERSALITY OF WAR METAPHOR AND EMBODIMENT OF COGNITION

Abstract

The human conceptual framework is metaphorical and plays an important role in giving meaning to our everyday reality. The publication of the book Metaphors We Live By (1980) by George Lakoff and Mark Johnson brought out a paradigm shift in the traditional conceptualisation of metaphor as a linguistic, ornamental phenomenon, as they argued that metaphors are conceptual in nature, pervasive in thought and govern our everyday reality. Generally, disease, sports, and elections are presented in terms of war in popular media as well as in other public discourses. Thus, in our discursive domains, the Covid-19 pandemic is often portrayed as an attack, sports competitions are wars, elections are battles, and this conceptualisation makes complete sense to people globally regardless of language or cultural background. This article examines, with recourse to the theoretical formulation of Cognitive Cultural Theory, the reasons for the universality of the war metaphor in popular discourse. The study employs the notions of conceptual metaphors, embodiment of cognition, primary metaphors, and mirror neurons as theoretical tools for the analysis.