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Crises We Live By
A transdisciplinary study of crisis and its metaphors in their cultural context
After an original foreword from Andreas Musolff setting the stage of the book, Crises We Live By offers a series of case studies that highlight different ways of conceptualizing and speaking about crisis, above all metaphorically. Its title echoes Lakoff and Johnson’s famous Metaphors We Live By (1980) and speaks to the unprecedented awareness of the theme of crisis and its conceptualization that has emerged in contemporary media and discourse. The book makes an innovative contribution to crisis studies and to Cognitive Metaphor Theory (CMT) by extending its historical reach back to antiquity and by adopting a transdisciplinary approach that takes into account the specific cultural context and framing of each metaphor for crisis.
[Cognitive Linguistic Studies in Cultural Contexts, 20] 2026. xi, 267 pp.
Publishing status: Available
Published online on 5 February 2026
Published online on 5 February 2026
© John Benjamins
Table of Contents
- PrologueAndreas Musolff | pp. vii–xii
- Crisis in ancient and contemporary uses: A concept at the crossroads of metaphor and metonymy?Irene Leonardis | pp. 1–18
- Section I. Metaphorical linguistic expressions and cognitive metaphors for crisis
- Metaphors for crisis in Polybius’ cycle of constitutions and mixed constitutionAndreas T. Zanker | pp. 20–39
- Are different ‘crises we live by’ metaphorically conceptualised in different ways? A convergent approach to crisis metaphors in media discourseAntonella Luporini | pp. 40–67
- From trauma to reappraising life: Psychological crisis experiences and recovery in first-person accounts of life-changing injuriesSara Vilar-Lluch | pp. 68–89
- Section II. Metaphors of physical harm and existential peril
- Illness and war: Susan Sontag reconsideredAlberto Martinengo | pp. 92–108
- Weathering the storm: Storm metaphors of crisis in LatinWilliam Michael Short | pp. 109–126
- “The house is on fire”: Eco-anxiety and dystopian metaphors during the Cop26Chiara Gagliano | pp. 127–149
- Metaphor and the representation of COVID-19 in online discourse of solidarity: A case study of English language internet memesMaryna Bielova | pp. 150–175
- Section III. Metaphors of imbalance, instability and liminality
- Metaphors of ambiguity, uncertainty, and crisis in Early Greek poetryFabian Horn | pp. 178–199
- Metaphorical expressions of crisis and their role in the legitimation of dissent in Sinic thought: Materials from premodern China and KoreaMarion Eggert and Heiner Roetz | pp. 200–219
- Collapse metaphor in Roman political discourse and its legacyIrene Leonardis | pp. 220–240
- From a protective space to an erupting crisis: Rousseau, Freud and Blumenberg on mathematics and its metaphorsMichael Friedman | pp. 241–260
- AfterwordIrene Leonardis | pp. 261–262
- Index | pp. 263–267