DMT and its theoretical framework: A bottom-up approach to the analysis of deliberate metaphor in political discourse

Since its introduction in 2008, Deliberate Metaphor Theory has given rise to a lot of debate: do deliberate metaphors really exist? If so, what characterizes this type of metaphor? Previous research on the identification of deliberate metaphors has often been done in a top-down fashion. However, in order to fully understand deliberate metaphors and what characterizes them, a bottom-up analysis is necessary. This research seeks to further contribute to the investigation on the communicative dimension of metaphor within DMT by analyzing the criteria that potentially characterize deliberate metaphors. To do so, deliberate metaphors are identified by using DMIP in a large political corpus. Based on these quantitative results, this research aims at performing a qualitative analysis which will allow for the identification of characteristics of deliberate metaphor. During the presentation, our quantitative results will be presented as well as an overview of the next steps of the qualitative analysis

Symphonies, houses on fire, wars and Harry Potter: COVID-19 and the importance of choosing metaphors

This presentation focusses on the use of metaphors, mainly by politicians, during the pandemic. More precisely, its aim is to show how metaphors are much more than a mere linguistic tool, and that using certain metaphors can have consequences on a cognitive and communicative level

Het gebruik van de Nederlandse plaatsingswerkwoorden ‘zetten’ en ‘leggen’ door Franstalige leerders van het Nederlands

peer reviewedThis research presents the results of a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the use of the Dutch placement verbs zetten (‘put’) and leggen (‘lay’) by French-speaking learners of Dutch. The experiment consisted of a productive task. The results confirm that the use of Dutch placement verbs is problematic for French-speaking learners, but they also reveal some important tendencies. First, our analysis demonstrates that French-speaking learners tend to underuse these verbs, which can be explained by the fact that placement events in French are often described by means of a neutral verb such as ‘mettre’ (‘put’) as opposed to the more specific verbs in Dutch. Secondly, the learners occasionally also tend to overuse the placement verbs in contexts where such verbs are not allowed, an observation which is seemingly paradoxical to the first one. Thirdly, learners also tend to confuse ‘zetten’ with ‘leggen’ and vice versa

How French-speaking learners of Dutch talk and gesture about placement events

This research presents the results of a quantitative and qualitative analysis of the use of the Dutch placement verbs zetten (‘put’) and leggen (‘lay’) by French-speaking learners of Dutch. The experiment consisted of two parts: a receptive as well as a productive part. The analysis focused on two aspects: speech, but also the gestures made by the participants were both quantitatively and qualitatively analyzed. The results confirm that the use of Dutch placement verbs is problematic for French-speaking learners of Dutch, but they also reveal some important tendencies. First, my analysis demonstrates that French-speaking learners tend to underuse these verbs, which can be explained by the fact that placement events in French are often described by means of a neutral verb such as mettre (‘put’) as opposed to the more specific verbs in Dutch. Secondly, the learners occasionally also tend to overuse the placement verbs in contexts where such verbs are not allowed, an observation which is seemingly paradoxical to the first one. Thirdly, some learners also tend to confuse zetten with leggen and vice versa. These findings are interesting given that the Dutch placement verbs, with a few exceptions, remain a relatively unexplored area within the field of linguistics