Konzeptuelle Metaphern zum Thema Corona (COVID 19) am Beispiel des online-Nachrichtenmagazins „Der Spiegel“

In our increasingly interconnected world, the global outbreak of the infectious disease COVID-19 was spreading rapidly, resulting in drastic consequences. This is why we decided to analyse the use of conceptual metaphors in the „Corona“- column of the German Spiegel‘s online portal in the three year period (2020, 2022 and 2023). In the centre of this analysis will be ten headlines with subtitles of articles, podcasts and reports on the topics of coronavirus conspiracy theories, measures, the mask affair and the loosening of coronavirus measures. This analysis aims to grasp different concepts related to the topic of the coronavirus discussing following questions: What types of conceptual metaphors are used (e.g. orientational metaphors or ontological metaphors)? Which frames or knowledge structures are present? What source areas do authors use to conceptually represent the target area? The theoretical part about the cognitive background of this article is based on Lakoff and Johnson’s approaches. First, expressions and syntagms will be explored semantically, then analysed conceptually within the context. The analysis will be supported by various online dictionaries (Duden-Online, DO; Digitales Wörterbuch der deutschen Sprache, DWDS). In addition, my own linguistic experience as well as morpho-syntactic and stylistic devices (sarcasm, irony, exaggerations, understatements) will be considered.