UC Berkeley Dissertations, Department of Linguistics Title Beyond the Issues: A Linguistic and Conceptual Study of American Public Discourse Permalink https://escholarship.org/uc/item/4hf688zv Author Morgan, Pamela Publication Date 1998 eScholarship.org Powered by the California Digital Library University of California Beyond the Issues: A Linguistic and Conceptual Study of American Public Discourse by Pamela Sue Morgan B.A. (University of Tulsa) 1974 B.A. (University of Arizona) 1976 M.A. (University of California, Santa Barbara) 1981 M.A. (University of California, Berkeley) 1993 Ph.D. (University of California, Santa Barbara) 1985 A dissertation submitted in partial satisfaction of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics in the GRADUATE DIVISION of the UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA, BERKELEY Committee in charge: Professor George Lakoff, Co-Chair Professor Eve Sweetser, Co-Chair Professor Robin Lakoff Professor David Collier Spring 1998 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Beyond the Issues: A Linguistic and Conceptual Study of American Public Discourse © 1998 by Pamela Sue Morgan Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. The dissertation of Pamela Sue Morgan is approved: Date 18 /f?8 Co-Chair Date ^ /h^. Date o =oJ2 ^ ^ ' ? £ s' Date University of California, Berkeley Spring 1998 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Abstract Beyond the Issues: A Linguistic and Conceptual Study of American Public Discourse by Pamela Sue Morgan Doctor of Philosophy in Linguistics University of California, Berkeley Professor George Lakoff, Co-Chair Professor Eve Sweetser, Co-Chair Cultural cognitive models (CCMs) are learned and shared by members of cultural communities and serve as shortcuts to the presentation and understanding of communicative events, including public discourse. They are made up of "frames," here defined as prototypical representations of recurrent cultural experiences or historical references that contain culturally-agreed-upon sets of participants, event scenarios, and evaluations. The frames in turn evoke full models, complete with presuppositions, entailments, and other patterns of reasoning and cognition. These prototypical CCMs have both linguistic and non-linguistic components, which by means of conventionalized contextualization cues (Gumperz) evoke the CCMs for those with cultural competence. We can fruitfully study CCMs using linguistic methodologies: cognitive linguistics (including metaphor theory), frame semantics, pragmatics, discourse analysis, and attention to context. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. Once a CCM has been evoked, it is used as the basis for further reasoning. CCMs can thus become subject to manipulation, since, like any other less-than-complete schematized representation of events and experiences, they necessarily selectively hide and highlight aspects of the experience. The first case study presented here is an examination of the major CCMs used for political self-presentation by Newt Gingrich in his January, 1995, "inaugural" speech as Speaker of the U.S. House of Representatives. The second looks at metaphorical CCMs and linked behavior, specifically with respect to the domain of "business" as understood in the 1980s and early 1990s by two prominent American business schools, Harvard and Wharton (University of Pennsylvania). The third case study briefly examines, for comparison, some CCMs found in public diplomacy and newspaper reporting related to the Northern Ireland peace process. The next chapter looks at our CCM for manipulating CCMs, namely, that of "propaganda." Rosch's prototype theory helps explain the simultaneous accuracy and inaccuracy of the propaganda analysts' repeated assertion that there are no important differences between political propaganda and product advertisements. The work begins and ends with a comparison to previous single­ issue-focused analyses of public discourse, showing how a CCM-based analysis can both systematically explain earlier observations and extend• them into a wider view of sociocultural cognition and behavior. Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. TABLE OF CONTENTS List of Figures ............................................... v List of Tables ............................................... vi Chapter 1 Introduction: Cultural Cognitive Models and Language.. 1 Part I: Case Studies: CCMs in Public Discourse ................ 39 Chapter 2 Self-Presentation and Sociocultural Cognitive Models: A Political Speech (Newt Gingrich, 1995) .............. 40 Appendix 1: NewtGingrich, U.S. House of Representatives, January 4, 1995 ....................... 116 Appendix 2: The "Contract with America," TV Guide, October 1994 ........................ 136 Chapter 3: "All's Fair in Business and War": Metaphor-Based Models and the Harvard Business School in the 1980s and Early 1990s ................................... 138 Chapter 4: CCMs in Northern Ireland: Some Brief Comments on Gerry Adams and the Newspapers .................... 220 Appendix: Gerry Adams, National Press Club Luncheon Address, Washington, D.C., October 4, 1994 253 Part II: Propaganda and the Manipulation of CCMS: Analysis and Metanalysis ....................................... 264 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. iv Chapter 5: CCMs, Categorization, and Contested Concepts: Advertising, Political Advertising, and Propaganda ... 265 Appendix 1: Television Commercial, Bayer Aspirin (November, 1996).... .................... 337 Appendix 2: Television Commercial, Spa Shoes (November, 1996).... ................... 341 Appendix 3: Television Commercial, Pro-Riggs/Anti- Alioto (November, 1996) ............... 344 Appendix 4: Television Commercial, Anti-Proposition 211 (California) (November, 1996) ....... 346 Part III: Conclusion ........ :.............................. 348 Chapter 6: Conclusion .............. 349 Bibliography ................................................ 374 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. LIST OF FIGURES Figure 2-1: Models Connected to the Spokesman Model ........ 67 Figure 5-1: The Radial Category of 'Mother*: The Central and Some Non-Central Members ........................ 273 Figure 5-2a: The 'Propaganda' CCM: Underspecified Core Model ... 282 Figure 5-2b: The 'Propaganda" CCM: American Folk Model ........ 282 Figure 5-3: The Composite/Blended "(Political) Television Commercial' C C M ................................. 296 Figure 5-4: Alternative Display of Rosch's Categorization Levels ........................... 302 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. vi LIST OF TABLES Table 1-la: Types of Context ................................... 34 Table 1-lb: Linguistic and Non-Linguistic Contexts ............... 35 Table 2-1: Gingrich's Self-Presentation CCMs ................... 43 Table 2-2: Gingrich's Model 1: “The Professor* ................ 50 Table 2-3: Gingrich's Model 2: "Just Plain Folks* ............. 58 Table 2-4: Gingrich's Model 3: “The Spokesman for Traditional American Values* ................................... 65 Table 2-5: Gingrich's Model 4: “The Leader" ................ ... 71 Table 2-6: Gingrich's Model 5: “The Authoritarian" ............ 75 Table 2-7: Gingrich's Model 6: "The Fighter" .................. 90 Table 2-8: Gingrich's Model 7: "The Cooperator* ............... 98 Table 2-9: Gingrich's Model 8: "The Visionary* ................ 102 Table 3-1: Linguistic Expressions of the Conceptual Metaphor "Love is a Journey* ................................ 141 Table 3-2: Some Mappings of the Metaphor "Love is a Journey* ... 143 Table 3-3a: The Competition Metaphorical Family: Frame-Schema and Core Metaphors ................................. 148 Table 3-3b: The Core Metaphors of the Competition Metaphorical Family ............................................ 150 Table 3-4: The Competition MF: The Frame Semantics of the Core Members ........................................... 153 Table 3-5a: Dominant Harvard Business School Cultural Cognitive Model: "Business is War* .......................... 167 Table 3-5b: The CCM Prototype of War in Anglo-American Culture -- 168 Reproduced with permission of the copyright owner. Further reproduction prohibited without permission. vii Table 3-5c: 'Business is War": Special Case: The Harvard Business School .................................... 170 Table 3-6: Linguistic Examples: "Business is War" ............. 171 Table 3-7: Harvard Business School: "Business is Religion' .... 180 Table 3-8: 'Business is (Artistic) Creation' ................... 198 Table 3-9: The CCM Prototype of The Artist .................... 199 Table 4-1: A Chronology of Some Events in the Northern Ireland Peace Process, 1994-1996 ........................... 226 Table 4-2: Adams's CCMs of Self-Presentation .................. 228 Table 4-3: Adams's Model 1: "Victim of British Oppression' (Simplified) ....................................... 229 Table 4-4: Adams's Model 2: "Irish Roots" (Simplified) ....... 235 Table 4-5: Adams's Model 3: 'The (Nationalist) Revolutionary' (Simplified) ......................................