Do South Asian Politicians Use More Metaphors Than Western Politicians? A Corpus-Based Comparative Study Of Metaphor In Bangladesh, British, And American Political Discourse

Abstract

Several studies have investigated the relationship between metaphor and politics; however, no research has specifically focused on the use of metaphors by Bangladeshi politicians. This study aims to address this gap by analyzing the use of conceptual metaphors by Prime Minister of Bangladesh Sheikh Hasina Wazed, drawing from the three major source domains of CONFLICT, JOURNEY, and RELIGION. The findings are then compared to those from a study by Charteris-Black (2004), which examined variations in metaphor choice in the inaugural speeches of American Presidents and the party political manifestos of two British political parties from 1974-1997. Since there are no available corpora in the Bangladesh context, I compiled a corpus with 91 speeches from PM Hasina Wazed, containing a total of 101,490 words. Data was analyzed using AntConc software. As Bangladesh is a developing country where religion holds a significant influence, this paper sheds light on how economic development programs have impacted the use of metaphors, while surprisingly religion has not. Additionally, there are some shreds of evidence of family and personal elements appearing in the data.