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Article published In: Journal of Language and Politics
Vol. 21:3 (2022) ► pp.413–434

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Migrants are not welcome

Metaphorical framing of fled people in Hungarian online media, 2015–2018

ORCiD logo with link | Corvinus University of Budapest
ORCiD logo with link | Centre for Social Sciences
Published online: 16 July 2021
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.20042.ben
Abstract
Figurative framing, in the form of metaphorical expressions, is especially effective in carrying conceptual content on an issue and affecting public opinion. One topic that has been heavily debated in contemporary Hungarian media is migration. Framing starts with the label that journalists select to refer to fled people: bevándorló (“immigrant”), migráns (“migrant”) or menekült (“refugee”). Depending on the label, different associations emerge, resting upon differing (metaphorical) conceptualizations evoked by the labels. We analysed metaphorical compounds based on the keywords in a media corpus of approx. 15 million words. Our results indicate that while all three keywords evoke predominantly negative frames and evaluations that build on stock metaphorical conceptualizations of fled people as also identified in the international literature – such as flood, object, business, war and crime –, the distribution of these metaphors does vary, depending on a) the selected keyword; and b) the political agenda of the media source.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.The metaphorical framing of fled people
  • 3.Methodology
  • 4.Analysis and discussion
    • 4.1Source domains occurring with the keywords
    • 4.2Distribution of source domains across time periods
    • 4.3The effect of political leaning on the use of keywords and source domains
  • 5.Conclusions
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
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