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Metaphor-based zeugmas in web-based promotional tourism discourse

A formal-functional study

ORCiD logo with link | Ivane Javakhishvili Tbilisi State University
Published online: 18 August 2025
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/prag.24032.iri
Abstract
The article systematically examines metaphor-motivated zeugmatic constructions in web-based promotional tourism discourse, drawing on texts from the official destination websites of Georgia, the UK, and the USA. Employing a mixed-method research design, which combines quantitative data inspection and qualitative discourse analysis, the study identifies formal, functional, and positional peculiarities of zeugmas in the analysed material. These findings corroborate, enrich, and challenge prevailing assumptions in contemporary scholarly literature on zeugma and metaphor (Lanham, Richard A. 1991. A Handlist of Rhetorical Terms. Berkeley: University of California Press. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar; Steen, Gerard J. 2016. “Mixed Metaphor Is a Question Deliberateness.” In Mixing Metaphor, ed. by Raymond W. Jr. Gibbs, 113–132. Amsterdam: John Benjamins. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar; Tartakovsky, Roi, and Yeshayahu Shen. 2023. “The Storm Sank My Boat and My Dreams: The Zeugma as a Breach of Iconicity.” Metaphor and Symbol 38 (2): 162–173. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). The paper highlights that metaphor-motivated zeugmas represent another form of deliberate metaphor, thereby broadening the scope of its manifestation patterns. Furthermore, the study reveals that such zeugmas are often strategically used at key points in promotional texts to frame and emphasise essential messages. These insights may provide valuable guidance for marketers in developing comprehensible, impactful, and emotionally resonant promotional content, which is essential in cross-cultural contexts of tourism promotion.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Zeugma: Literature review
    • 2.1Literature and rhetoric
    • 2.2Cognitive accounts
    • 2.3Discourse-analytical studies
  • 3.Method
    • 3.1Research questions
    • 3.2Data collection and content analysis
  • 4.Results and discussion
    • 4.1Quantitative analysis of metaphor-based zeugmas
      • 4.1.1Frequency distribution
      • 4.1.2Conceptual directionality
    • 4.2Structural and formal properties
      • 4.2.1Structural properties of metaphor-based zeugmatic constructions
      • 4.2.2Formal properties of zeugma
        • 4.2.2.1Governing terms
        • 4.2.2.2Conjoining/contrasting elements
    • 4.3Positional properties
    • 4.4Functional analysis of zeugmatic metaphors
      • 4.4.1Classic zeugmas
      • 4.4.2Extra signalling
      • 4.4.3Repetition of the governing element
      • 4.4.4Juxtaposition of two semantically related governing elements
  • 5.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
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