Metaphors we Lie by: our ‘War’ against COVID-19

Benzi, Margherita; Novarese, Marco

doi:10.1007/s40656-022-00501-2

Cited by 18 publications

(13 citation statements)

References 47 publications

(61 reference statements)

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“…There is plenty of research concerning war metaphors during the COVID-19 pandemic (Castro-Seixas, 2020 ; Panzeri et al, 2021 ; Semino, 2021 ; Todorova, 2021a ; Benzi and Novarese, 2022 , etc). This contribution originates from discussions within our collective project In Other Words — A Contextualized Dictionary to Problematize Otherness , an online dictionary that can be used as a free resource in different social and educational contexts ( www.iowdictionary.org ).…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“We are at war”: The military rhetoric of COVID-19 in cross-cultural perspective of discourses

Giorgis¹,

Семенець

Todorova

2023

Front. Artif. Intell.

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At the outburst of the COVID-19 pandemic and all throughout its continuation in 2020 and 2021, the metaphor of ‘war' has been one of the most pervasive and recurrent globally. As an international, cross-cultural group of scholars and practitioners, we will analyze critically the communicative strategies enacted and the political agenda that they have meant to serve in Italy, Bulgaria, and Ukraine discussing both the cultural differences and the cross-cultural similarities of such a discourse that has been shaping the perception of our factual reality during the pandemic. Expressions like ‘We are at war', ‘Our heroes are fighting at the forefront', ‘We will win this war' and the like contributed to create symbolical cross-cultural responses that, by playing on emotions such as fear, uncertainty and, in some cases, national pride, contributed to the creation of a new state of reality, that of the “new normality”, calling for specific actions and behaviors. However, the war metaphor assumed different hues according to the country in which it was disseminated, up to the actual appointment of generals as governmental spoke-persons or organizers of the vaccine logistics, often combined with the construction and the mediatization of the archetypical hero fighting against the virus/enemy. To analyze how, all throughout 2020 and 2021, the military rhetoric was implemented and disseminated as the dominant discourse, we draw on Media Representations of the Real, on Rhetoric Studies on Manipulation, on Political Discourse, on Critical Discourse Studies, and on Susan Sontag's fundamental essay Illness as Metaphor. We discuss such rhetorical strategies as they originated from a discussion within our collective project in other words, an online dictionary that, besides critically analyzing contextualized keywords that (re)produce different forms of Otherness, offers creative proposals to reverse such narratives, and can be used as a free resource in different social and educational contexts (www.iowdictionary.org).

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Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“We are at war”: The military rhetoric of COVID-19 in cross-cultural perspective of discourses

Giorgis¹,

Семенець

Todorova

2023

Front. Artif. Intell.

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“…And after countries reopened, having gone through a series of lockdowns, the new normal turned out to look very much like the old normal. War metaphors that positioned doctors as heroes on a battlefield tipped the biopolitical scale in favour of the biological and created a brief impression that social disparities revealed by the pandemic might be accidental (Ajana 2021;Benzi & Novarese 2022;Chapman & Miller 2021;Leonilli 2021). Guided by Foucault, this essay demonstrates that "differential vulnerabilities" should be read as a patent product of the existing social and political arrangements through which power expresses itself rather than the fallout of the pandemic.…”

Section: Taking Biopower and Running With Itmentioning

confidence: 99%

A Crisis to Think with: Mining the Biopolitics of COVID-19 in American Public Discourse

Kovalyova¹

2022

AFS

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The onset of the COVID-19 pandemic put to test medical, political and social systems around the globe. It also probed into our ability to work out coherent explanations of unprecedented situations and to devise effective solutions when operating with grossly insufficient, frequently changing, and often controversial information. Using a Foucauldian lens, this study examines the American public discourse on COVID-19 to reveal the mechanisms through which the crisis was made sense of and managed. It shows that unity in spirit and action in measures against the pandemic did not emerge nor was the virus uniformly affecting the population thus suggesting that “population” as an object of governing is a discursive construction thriving on its partitioning and fracturing the moment it is put together. It concludes that overall, despite the clout of unprecedentedness, COVID-19 produced neither new relations of power nor new subjectivities but further aligned government actions with the interests of the state.

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“…They dramatize and often exaggerate the situation, implying a "life-or-death" emergency that requires drastic countermeasures (Musolff, 2022, p. 308). Previous research (Benzi & Novarese, 2022;Castro Seixas, 2021;Trimble, 2017) has shown that war metaphors are a powerful and widespread framing device in political discourse and reportage, used to discuss a range of issues including elections, poverty, AIDS, as well as the Covid-19 pandemic. Benzi and Novarese (2022, p. 7) argue that such imagery is enthralling as it "identifies an enemy (the virus), a strategy (to 'flatten the curve,' but also to 'save the economy'), the front-line warriors (health-care personnel), the home front (people isolating at home), and the traitors and deserters (people breaking socialdistancing rules)."…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“…315-316). However, previous studies examining the use of war metaphors during the Covid-19 pandemic have discovered that such rhetoric can result in fearful and panicked responses, fuel hatred and antagonism, trigger alienation and division, promote nationalism, legitimise authoritarianism, and is generally unhelpful during crises that call for more inclusive responses (Benzi & Novarese, 2022;Hanne, 2022). While the topic has garnered significant interdisciplinary attention leading to a considerable body of literature, few scholars have yet incorporated a gendered analysis.…”

Section: Introductionmentioning

confidence: 99%

All’s Fair in Pandemic and War? A Gendered Analysis of Australian Coverage of Covid-19

Williams

Greer²

2023

MaC

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The Covid-19 pandemic has repeatedly been framed by politicians and the media alike as this generation’s “Great War.” Metaphors are often used in political reportage as effective discursive tools to influence and persuade readers. War metaphors especially are frequently used in election campaigns, leadership spills, and during times of political unrest to portray politics as a brutal and competitive (masculine) arena. As such, the use of militaristic language and war metaphors to describe the shared challenges during a global pandemic is unsurprising. Framing the pandemic as a war can rally citizens by appealing to their sense of national and civic duty at a moment of crisis. Yet such framing is problematic as it draws on stereotyping cultural myths and values associated with war, reinforcing patriarchal understandings of bravery and service that glorify hegemonic masculinity while excluding women from the public sphere. Using a feminist critical discourse analysis, this article will examine Australian print media coverage of the first six months of the Covid-19 pandemic, focusing on two case studies—the prime minister and “frontline” workers—to further understand the gender bias of mainstream media. We argue that, by drawing on war metaphors in Covid-19 coverage which emphasizes protective masculinity, the media reproduce and re-enforce political and societal gender stereotypes and imbalances.

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Metaphors we Lie by: our ‘War’ against COVID-19

Cited by 18 publications

References 47 publications

“We are at war”: The military rhetoric of COVID-19 in cross-cultural perspective of discourses

“We are at war”: The military rhetoric of COVID-19 in cross-cultural perspective of discourses

A Crisis to Think with: Mining the Biopolitics of COVID-19 in American Public Discourse

All’s Fair in Pandemic and War? A Gendered Analysis of Australian Coverage of Covid-19

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