Metaphors we are robbed by: a critical discourse analysis of ‘the national cake’ and Nigeria’s prebendal elite

IF 0.8 3区文学 Q3 COMMUNICATION

Text & Talk Pub Date : 2022-03-21 DOI:10.1515/text-2020-0130

U. Bello

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Abstract

Abstract This paper focuses on aspects of Nigerian corrupt practices and how perceptions of public service and leadership responsibilities are framed linguistically, or discursively, around predatory elitist interests. It is based on two premises. The first pertains to the ways in which the national wealth is metaphorically called the national cake, and how it is viewed as an object that elicits consumption. Textual data is generated from 19 national newspapers and blogs that show 85 occurrences of the term the national cake. The surrounding contexts of the term indicate that national wealth is eatable, shareable and is spatially located. The second premise relates to how the Nigerian elite use metonymic associations to make themselves serve as the aggregate of, or shorthand to, the geographical, partisan and religious interests of the country. This stand-for relationship plays a prominent role in establishing contiguous representations which aid (conceptual) proximity to the national cake. This study uses critical metaphor analysis, corpus linguistics and critical discourse analysis to demystify the facts about Nigeria’s national life otherwise overlaid by ideology.

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我们被掠夺的隐喻：对“国家蛋糕”和尼日利亚战前精英的批判性话语分析

摘要:本文重点关注尼日利亚腐败行为的各个方面，以及对公共服务和领导责任的看法是如何在语言上或话语上围绕掠夺性精英利益框架的。它基于两个前提。第一个问题涉及到国家财富被比喻为国家蛋糕的方式，以及如何将其视为引发消费的对象。文本数据来自19家全国性报纸和博客，其中出现了85次“国家蛋糕”这个词。这个词的上下文表明，国家财富是可食用的、可共享的，是有空间定位的。第二个前提与尼日利亚精英如何利用转喻协会使自己成为该国地理、党派和宗教利益的集合或缩写有关。这种代表关系在建立连续表征方面起着突出作用，这有助于(概念上)接近国家蛋糕。本研究运用批判隐喻分析、语料库语言学和批判话语分析来揭开被意识形态覆盖的尼日利亚国民生活的神秘面纱。

本文章由计算机程序翻译，如有差异，请以英文原文为准。

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来源期刊

Text & Talk Multiple-

CiteScore

1.70

自引率

16.70%

发文量

期刊介绍： Text & Talk (founded as TEXT in 1981) is an internationally recognized forum for interdisciplinary research in language, discourse, and communication studies, focusing, among other things, on the situational and historical nature of text/talk production; the cognitive and sociocultural processes of language practice/action; and participant-based structures of meaning negotiation and multimodal alignment. Text & Talk encourages critical debates on these and other relevant issues, spanning not only the theoretical and methodological dimensions of discourse but also their practical and socially relevant outcomes.