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Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa

Thesis (MA (General Linguistics))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009.

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Main Author: Nothnagel, Ignatius
Other Authors: Anthonissen, Christine
Format: Thesis
Language:English
Published: Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch 2009
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access_status_str Open Access
author Nothnagel, Ignatius
author2 Anthonissen, Christine
author_browse Anthonissen, Christine
Nothnagel, Ignatius
author_facet Anthonissen, Christine
Nothnagel, Ignatius
author_sort Nothnagel, Ignatius
collection Thesis
dc_rights_str_mv University of Stellenbosch
Dissertations -- Linguistics
Theses -- Linguistics
description Thesis (MA (General Linguistics))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009.
format Thesis
id oai:scholar.sun.ac.za:10019.1/1653
institution Stellenbosch University (South Africa)
language English
last_indexed 2026-06-10T12:45:01.662Z
license_str Other — see source repository
provenance_str_mv Harvested via OAI-PMH from SUNScholar — Stellenbosch University Repository
publishDate 2009
publishDateRange 2009
publishDateSort 2009
publisher Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch
publisherStr Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch
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source_str SUNScholar — Stellenbosch University Repository
spelling oai:scholar.sun.ac.za:10019.1/1653 Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa Nothnagel, Ignatius Anthonissen, Christine University of Stellenbosch. Faculty of Arts and Social Sciences. Dept. of General Linguistics. HIV/AIDS Conceptual metaphor Visual discourse South Africa -- Politics and government -- caricatures and cartoons Political cartoons -- South Africa Functionalism (Linguistics) Critical discourse analysis Visual communication -- Political aspects -- South Africa Visual communication -- Social aspects -- South Africa Thesis (MA (General Linguistics))--University of Stellenbosch, 2009. According to Nattrass (2007:138), the denial and questioning of the science of HIV/AIDS at government level by, amongst others, Thabo Mbeki (former State President) and Manto Tshabalala-Msimang (former Minister of Health) resulted in an estimated 343 000 preventable AIDS deaths in South Africa by 2007. Such governmental discourse of AIDS denialism has been the target of criticism in the media and by activist groups such as the Treatment Action Campaign. This study investigates the nature of this criticism, specifically considering the critical use of metaphor in visual texts such as the political cartoons of Jonathan Shapiro, who works under the pen name of “Zapiro”. The purpose is to determine whether the nature of the criticism in visual newspaper texts differs from that of corresponding verbal newspaper texts, possibly providing means of criticism not available to the verbal mode alone. A corpus of texts published between August 1999 and December 2007 that topicalise HIV/AIDS was investigated. This includes 119 cartoons by Zapiro, and 91 verbal articles in the weekly newspaper Mail & Guardian. The main theoretical approach used in the analyses is Conceptual Metaphor Theory, developed by Lakoff and Johnson (1981), and its extension to poetic metaphor, developed by Lakoff and Turner (1989). Because of the socio-political nature of the problem of HIV/AIDS, the study also draws on Critical Discourse Analysis, including complementary concepts from Systemic Functional Linguistics. The study reveals that visual and verbal texts make use of similar sets of conventional conceptual metaphors at similar frequencies, which confirms the predictions of Conceptual Metaphor Theory. The study further reveals that the cartoons enrich these metaphors through four specific mechanisms of poetic metaphor, which the verbal articles do not. This indicates a significant difference between the two types of texts. Furthermore, it is found that the use of such poetic metaphors directly contributes to the critical power of the political cartoons. The study indicates that multi-modality in cartoons, which triggers single metaphoric mappings, adds a dimension to the critical function of the text that is absent in the verbal equivalent. The finding that the visual texts enable a form of cognition that is not available to verbal texts, poses one of the most significant avenues for future research. Thus, cartoons apparently achieve a type of criticism that is not found, and may not be possible, in the verbal texts alone. This makes the political cartoon a text type with an important and unique ability to articulate political criticism. Masters 2009-03-04T10:53:26Z 2010-06-01T08:29:48Z 2009-03-04T10:53:26Z 2010-06-01T08:29:48Z 2009-03 Thesis http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/1653 en University of Stellenbosch Dissertations -- Linguistics Theses -- Linguistics application/pdf Stellenbosch : University of Stellenbosch
spellingShingle HIV/AIDS
Conceptual metaphor
Visual discourse
South Africa -- Politics and government -- caricatures and cartoons
Political cartoons -- South Africa
Functionalism (Linguistics)
Critical discourse analysis
Visual communication -- Political aspects -- South Africa
Visual communication -- Social aspects -- South Africa
Nothnagel, Ignatius
Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title_full Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title_fullStr Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title_full_unstemmed Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title_short Conceptual metaphors in media discourses on AIDS denialism in South Africa
title_sort conceptual metaphors in media discourses on aids denialism in south africa
topic HIV/AIDS
Conceptual metaphor
Visual discourse
South Africa -- Politics and government -- caricatures and cartoons
Political cartoons -- South Africa
Functionalism (Linguistics)
Critical discourse analysis
Visual communication -- Political aspects -- South Africa
Visual communication -- Social aspects -- South Africa
url http://hdl.handle.net/10019.1/1653
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