METAPHORICAL VERBALIZATION OF THE CONCEPT DOMESTIC POLITICS IN THE UK PARLIAMENTARY DEBATES

Abstract

Introduction. Political discourse is characterized by a high role of metaphorical representations as it is formed by the number of metaphorical concepts. Such concepts can be universal, ethnical, group and individual, they are usually socially and culturally marked. Understanding such basic concepts and getting into their language representation through language signs help to deepen the knowledge of other cultures and ethnos. Purpose of this article is to analyze the basic political metaphors used for the verbal representation of the macro concept DOMESTIC POLITICS in the political discourse of the UK parliamentary debates. Methods. The basic methods used in this paper are the metaphoric modelling that helps to better understand the mechanism of source and target domains’ integration and the propositional modelling that helps to define the structures of propositions in the domains. One more method is the contextualinterpretational analysis used to interpret the text fragments that contain metaphoric lexemes. Results. The basic concepts in the political sphere are predetermined by the peculiarities of the ideology, moral, norms, evaluations and values accepted by the society as well as the political, economic and social situation on a certain stage of the ethnos’ development. Thus, the basic macro concept DOMESTIC POLITICS is verbalized in the political discourse of the UK parliamentary debates by a set of metaphorical representations, the most widespread of which are the politics as plant and politics as way / road. These metaphors reflect the urgent problems concerning the whole nation and discussed during the debates in the UK parliament. The development of the economic policy is typically associated with growth. Thus, metaphorical model POLITICS as PLANT is widespread both during the Conservative and Labour lead in the parliament. Usually growth is compared to the economic development of the country. Metaphorical representation of politics as way / road is reflected in different fragments of participants’ interactions during the debates and expresses the possibility to implement new laws, avoid discussing some issues and taken steps to solve the existing problems. Conclusions. Detailed analysis of the metaphorical representation of politics as plant and way / road demonstrates that they can contextually bear both positive and negative evaluation. These metaphors are primarily used by the opponents in the political communication for positive selfrepresentation and critical remarks towards the others.