Framing Fragile and Stable States through War Metaphors in Divisive Narratives
Abstract
The United Nations and its specialised agencies are incentivised to use bias-free language by a fundamental human rights law which prohibits discrimination of any kind. However, it is also true that these organisations are often accused of taking sides despite wanting to remain impartial in times of crisis. While accusations of bias may be greater during conflicts between member states, this paper reveals that hegemonic discourse is also apparent in reports unrelated to conflicts and published by the World Health Organisation (WHO), a specialised agent of the United Nations. This study examines war metaphors in WHO reports, focusing on how language constructs, and perpetuates the identities of stable and fragile states. Drawing on two specialised corpora, and using a concordance software, metaphorical expressions of war were analysed within their contextual environment to investigate the use of purposeful and ideological metaphors in global health narratives. The examination of metaphorical expressions revealed that fragile states were depicted as vulnerable and dependent, reinforcing stereotypes of instability. Conversely, the same metaphors framed stable states as competent leaders and global saviours. These polarised representations contribute to legitimising existing global hierarchies and power disparities. The results offer insights into the manipulative use of nuanced language in seemingly objective reports which in turn serve to maintain the constructed realities of stable and fragile states. By exposing bias in WHO reports, the research advocates for greater accountability and transparency in global health communication. These findings provide valuable insights into the intersection of language, power, and global health governance.
Keywords: war metaphor; stable and fragile states; discursive strategies; purposeful metaphors, ideological metaphors
Full Text:
PDFReferences
Abdel-Raheem, A. (2021). Where Covid metaphors come from: reconsidering context and modality in metaphor. Social Semiotics, 33(5), 971–1010. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2021.1971493
Adam, M. (2021). Corpus Analysis of War Metaphor To World Health Organisation COVID-19 Press Briefing Transcripts. Ethical Lingua: Journal of Language Teaching and Literature, 8(2), 319-332. https://doi.org/10.30605/25409190.285
Almeida, C., Braveman, P., Gold, M. R., Szwarcwald, C. L., Ribeiro, J. M., Miglionico, A. & Viacava, F. (2001). Methodological concerns and recommendations on policy consequences of the World Health Report 2000. The Lancet, 357(9269), 1692-1697. https://doi.org/10.1016/s0140-6736(00)04825-x
Auvinen, T. P., Lämsä, A. M., Sintonen, T., & Takala, T. (2013). Leadership manipulation and ethics in storytelling. Journal of Business Ethics, 116(2), 415-431. https://doi.org/10.1080/10350330.2021.1971493
Baxter, J. (2016). Positioning language and identity: Poststructuralist perspectives. In S. Preece (Ed.), The Routledge Handbook of Language and Identity (pp. 34–49). Routledge.
Bednarek, M., & Caple, H. (2014). Why do news values matter? Towards a new methodological framework for analysing news discourse in Critical Discourse Analysis and beyond. Discourse & Society, 25(2), 135-158. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926513516041
Benjamin, E. (2021). Trump, the coronavirus pandemic, Asian American xenophobia, and humanistic psychology. Journal of Humanistic Psychology, 61(2), 244–259. https://doi.org/10.1177/0022167820979650
Baker, P. (2006) Using Corpora in Discourse Analysis. London: Continuum.
Carlsen, L., & Bruggemann, R. (2017). Fragile state index: Trends and developments. A partial order data analysis. Social Indicators Research, 133, 1-14. https://doi.org/10.1007/s11205-016-1353-y
Charteris-Black, J. (2004). Corpus Approaches to Critical Metaphor Analysis. Basingstoke: Palgrave. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230000612
Charteris-Black, J. (2012). Forensic deliberations on ‘purposeful metaphor’. Metaphor and the Social World, 2(1), 1-21. https://doi.org/10.1075/msw.2.1.01cha
Charteris-Black, J. (2017) “Competition Metaphors and Ideology: Life as a Race” In Wodak, Ruth; Forchtner, Bernhard (Eds) The Routledge Handbook of Language and Politics. Routledge: New York. 201-217.
Charteris-Black, J. (2018) Analysing Political Speeches: Rhetoric, Discourse and Metaphor. Basingstoke & New York: Palgrave-MacMillan.
Chapman, C. M., & Miller, D. M. S. (2020). From metaphor to militarized response: the social implications of “we are at war with COVID-19” – crisis, disasters, and pandemics yet to come. International Journal of Sociology and Social Policy, 40(9-10), 1107-1124. https://doi.org/10.1108/IJSSP-05-2020-0163
Checkland, K., Hammond, J. O. N., Allen, P., Coleman, A., Warwick-Giles, L., Hall, A., & Sutton, M. (2020). Road to nowhere? A critical consideration of the use of the metaphor ‘care pathway’ in health services planning, organisation and delivery. Journal of Social Policy, 49(2), 405-424. https://doi.org/10.1017/S0047279419000400
Chiang, W. Y., & Duann, R. F. (2007). Conceptual metaphors for SARS: 'War' between whom? Discourse & Society, 18(5), 579-602. https://doi.org/10.1177/0957926507079631
Cotter, C., Samos, D., & Swinglehurst, D. (2021). Framing obesity in public discourse: Representation through metaphor across text type. Journal of Pragmatics, 174, 14-27. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pragma.2020.12.015
Deignan, A. (2017). From linguistic to conceptual metaphors In Elena Semino, Zsófia Demjén (Eds.) The Routledge Handbook of Metaphor and Language. (102-116). London: Routledge.
De la Rosa, M. V. M. (2008). The persuasive use of rhetorical devices in the reporting of “Avian Flu.” Vigo Int. J. Appl. Linguist. 5, 87–106. https://doi.org/10.11113/lspi.v10.20228
De Saint Preux, A. D., & Blanco, O. M. (2021). The power of conceptual metaphors in the age of pandemic: The influence of the WAR and SPORT domains on emotions and thoughts. Language & Communication, 81, 37-47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2021.08.003
Ferreira, I. A. (2017) Measuring state fragility: a review of the theoretical groundings of existing approaches, Third World Quarterly, 38(6), 1291-1309. https://doi.org/10.1080/01436597.2016.1257907
Fairclough, N. (2001). Language and power (2nd ed.). London, England: Longman.
Fairclough, N. (2003) Analysing Discourse: Textual Analysis for Social Research. London: Routledge.
Fabiszak, M. (2007). A Conceptual Metaphor Approach to War Discourse and Its Implications. Cambridge Scholars Publishing.
Flusberg, S. J., Matlock, T., & Thibodeau, P. H. (2018). War metaphors in public discourse. Metaphor and Symbol, 33(1), 1-18. https://doi.org/10.1080/10926488.2018.1407992
Gallagher, K. M., & Updegraff, J. A. (2012). Health message framing effects on attitudes, intentions, and behavior: a meta-analytic review. Annals of Behavioral Medicine, 43(1), 101-116. https://doi.10.1007/s12160-011-9308-7
Ho, J.M, Li Y.T., & Whitworth, K. (2021) Unequal discourses: Problems of the current model of world health development. World Dev. Jan; 137:105176. https://doi.10.1016/j.worlddev.2020.105176
Hagstrom, J. (2020, April 20). Stop calling covid-19 a war. The Washington Post. Retrieved from https://www.washingtonpost.com/outlook/2020/04/20/stop-calling-covid-19-war/
Huang, C. (2022). Metaphor Analysis in Political Discourse Based on Discourse Dynamics Framework for Metaphor: A Case Study. Theory and Practice in Language Studies, 12(1), 96-102. https://doi.org/10.17507/tpls.1201.11
Hu, C. & Xu, Y. (2017). WAR Metaphor in the Chinese Economic Media Discourse. Higher Education Studies, 7(1) https://doi.10.5539/hes.v7n1p94
Ivic, S. (2021). International organizations and Covid-19 discourse In Faiz Ayat Ansari & Ms. Shruti Chaturvedi (eds.) International Law and Contemporary Framework, 1–8. London: Research Culture Society and Publication.
Kaplan, S. (2014). Identifying truly fragile states. The Washington Quarterly, 37(1), 49-63. https://doi.org/10.1080/0163660X.2014.893173
Kellner, D. (1995) Media culture: Cultural studies, identity and politics between the modern and the postmodern. London and New York: Routledge
Kohler, J. C., & Bowra, A. (2020). Exploring anti-corruption, transparency, and accountability in the world Health organization, the United Nations development programme, the world bank group, and the global fund to fight AIDS, tuberculosis and malaria. Globalization and health, 16, 1-10. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-020-00629-5
Kickbusch, I., & Liu, A. (2022). Global health diplomacy—reconstructing power and governance. The Lancet, 399(10341), 2156-2166. http://doi.10.1016/S0140-6736(22)00583-9.
Kitis, E., & Milapides, M. (1997). Read it and believe it: How metaphor constructs ideology in news discourse. A case study. Journal of Pragmatics, 28(5), 557-590. https://doi.org/10.1016/S0378-2166(97)00075-1
Kheovichai, B. (2022). Collocation and discursive construction of Covid-19 in WHO Director General’s discourse: A corpus-based study. LEARN Journal: Language Education and Acquisition Research Network, 15(1), 10-32.
Koley, T. K. & M. Dhole (2020). The COVID-19 Pandemic: The Deadly Coronavirus Outbreak. Boston: Taylor & Francis.
Krijgsman, B. A. et al., (August 2020). “Impact of the Oil Crisis and Covid-19 on Iraq’s Fragility, UN Development Programme in Iraq,” UNDP 24, https://www.iq.undp.org/content/dam/iraq/docs/UNDP_IQ_Impact_of_the_Oil_Crisis
Larson, B. M. H., Nerlich, N., and Wallis, P. (2005). Metaphors and biorisks: the war on infectious diseases and invasive species. Sci. Commun. 26, 243–268. https://doi.org/10.1177/1075547004273019
Lidén, J. (2014). The World Health Organization and global health governance: post-1990. Public Health, 128(2), 141-147. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.puhe.2013.08.008
Liu, W., & Wang, Y. (2020). The role of offensive metaphors in Chinese diplomatic discourse. Discourse, Context & Media, 37, 100418. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.dcm.2020.100418
Musu, C. (2020, April 8). War metaphors used for COVID-19 are compelling but also dangerous. The Conversation. Retrieved from https://theconversation.com/war-metaphors-used-for-covid-19-are-compelling-but-also-dangerous-135406
Okina, Y. (2020). What Can We Learn from Germany’s Response to COVID-19? Nira Opinion Paper 54: 1-18.
Olimat, S. N. (2020). Words as Powerful Weapons: Dysphemism in Trump's Covid-19 Speeches. 3L: Southeast Asian Journal of English Language Studies, 26(3), 17-29. http://doi.org/10.17576/3L-2020-2603-02
Pragglejaz Group (2007). MIP: A method for identifying metaphorically used words in discourse. Metaphor & Symbol, 22 (1), 1–39. https://doi.org/10.1080/10926480709336752
Panzeri, F, Di Paola S, Domaneschi F. (2021). Does the COVID-19 war metaphor influence reasoning? PLoS ONE 16(4): e0250651. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0250651
Putnis, N., & Burr, J. (2020). Evidence or stereotype? Health inequalities and representations of sex workers in health publications in England. Health, 24(6), 665-683. http://doi.10.1177/1363459319833242
Ranjan, P. (2020, April 15). OPINION: Why using the „war‟ metaphor for fighting the COVID-19 pandemic is dangerous. The Week. Retrieved from https://www.theweek.in/news/india/2020/04/15/opinion-why-using-the-war-metaphor-for-fighting-the-covid-19-pandemic-is-dangerous.html
Semino, E., Demjén, Z., & Demmen, J. (2018). An integrated approach to metaphor and framing in cognition, discourse, and practice, with an application to metaphors for cancer. Applied Linguistics, 39(5), 625-645. https://doi.org/10.1093/applin/amw028
Serhan, Y. (2020, March 31). The Case Against Waging „War‟ on the Coronavirus. The Atlantic. Retrieved from https://www.theatlantic.com/international/archive/2020/03/war-metaphor-coronavirus/609049/
Schnepf, J., & Christmann, U. (2022). “It's a war! It's a battle! It's a fight!”: Do militaristic metaphors increase people's threat perceptions and support for COVID‐19 policies?. International Journal of Psychology, 57(1), 107-126. http://doi:10.1002/ijop.12797
Shahin, S. (2023). News, nations, and power relations: how neoliberal media reproduce a hierarchical world order. Critical sociology, 49(2), 201-216.https://doi.org/10.1177/08969205211072455
Suzuki, K. & Kentaro, S. (2021). Japan's response to the Covid-19 pandemic: A cautious and self-restraint-based approach. In Moon, MJ and D. Y. Kim, Eds. International Comparative Analysis of COVID-19 responses. KDI school: Sejong.
Saint Preux, d. & Blanco, A. M. (2021). The power of conceptual metaphors in the age of pandemic: The influence of the WAR and SPORT domains on emotions and thoughts. Language & Communication. 81. 37-47. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2021.08.003
Slater, M. D. (2007). Reinforcing spirals: The mutual influence of media selectivity and media effects and their impact on individual behavior and social identity. Communication Theory, 17(3), 281-303. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1468-2885.2007.00296.x
Spicer, N., Agyepong, I., Ottersen, T., Jahn, A., & Ooms, G. (2020). ‘It’s far too complicated’: why fragmentation persists in global health. Globalization and Health, 16, 1-13. https://doi.org/10.1186/s12992-020-00592-1
Stark, J., Reif, J., & Schiebler, T. (2021). What leaders tell and employees hear – an intention-perception model of storytelling in leadership. Organization Management Journal. Advance online publication. https://doi.org/10.1108/OMJ-02-2021-1156
Van Dijk, T. (1998) Ideology: A Multidisciplinary Approach. London: SAGE.
Van Dijk, T. (2006) Discourse and manipulation. Discourse & Society 17(3): 359–383. http://doi.org/10.1177/0957926506060250
Van Dijk, T. (2008). Discourse and power. Macmillan International Higher Education.
Van Dijk, T. (2017) How Globo media manipulated the impeachment of Brazilian President Dilma Rousseff. Discourse & Communication 2017, Vol. 11(2) 199–229. https://doi.org/10.1177/1750481317691838
Wallis, P., and Nerlich, B. (2005). Disease metaphors in new epidemics: the UK media framing of the 2003 SARS epidemic. Soc. Sci. Med. 60, 2629–2639. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.socscimed.2004.11.031
Weisser, M. (2016). Practical corpus linguistics: An introduction to corpus-based language analysis. London: John Wiley & Sons.
Wilkinson, A. (2020, April 15). Pandemics are not wars. Vox. Retrieved from https://www.vox.com/culture/2020/4/15/21193679/coronavirus-pandemic-war-metaphor-ecology-microbiome
DOI: http://dx.doi.org/10.17576/3L-2024-3004-24
Refbacks
- There are currently no refbacks.
eISSN : 2550-2247
ISSN : 0128-5157