Religious metaphor in the discourse of illusion: George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden¹

Abstract

Using a combination of models, including the discourse-historical approach, metaphor analysis, and membership categorization analysis, this paper explores a series of speeches given by George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden. It demonstrates how similar rhetorical and linguistic tools are manipulated by people in a position to influence society, as they attempt to depict their individual representations of reality as true and objective. Analysis of the data reveals how both individuals make use of almost identical rhetorical tools in order to objectify two completely subjective and contrasting conceptualizations of reality, whereby each plays the role of 'self' and 'other'. This makes apparent the discourse of illusion which highlights the existence of contested versions of social reality. There is evidence within the data of a conflict between the two versions of reality, originating from their particular subjective and ideological conceptual systems, which generate social categories that depict the 'self' as being constituted by all positive values, and the 'other' as comprising all negative values. The use of religious metaphors in particular serves the purpose of categorizing the 'other' as morally devoid, and the 'self' as being in a position to pass moral judgement. Religious metaphors exploiting constructs such as evil, light and darkness, heaven and hell, barbarism, and moral justice also serve to legitimize the actions of both George W. Bush and Osama bin Laden, interpreting sociopolitical issues as religious events. Consequently, in pursuit of supportive alliances and collective agreement, both endorse Moral Absolutism in the War on Terror, resorting to the 'emotionalization of facts' (Menz, 1989: 237).

Discursive Illusions in Legislative Discourse: A Socio-Pragmatic Study

“…We shall also consider the malleability of constructs such as democracy, individual freedom, and human rights etc., in order to investigate how they are appropriated and adapted by governments in support of particular agendas and actions. This paper focuses on the 'illusive' [7,8] and subjective representations of the constructs of human rights, individual freedom, and democracy within the context of two distinctly different political systems-America, which is a selfproclaimed democracy, and Hong Kong, which is a more nascent democracy, being the nucleus of a novel political arrangement, 'one country two systems', forming China's Special Administrative Region (SAR). In order to illustrate the imposition on democracy, resulting in the impingement on human rights, we shall focus on two specific legislative provisions: the United States Uniting and Strengthening America by Providing Appropriate Tools Required to Intercept and Obstruct Terrorism Act (Patriot Act) and Hong Kong's proposed Basic Law Article 23, which, while highlighting the production of similar legislation by contrasting political systems, raises interesting questions about how distinct political systems can actually be, and how they often become a manifestation of governmental exceptionalism.…”

Creativity and discourse

“…Herein lies the primary difference between approaches that focus on ‘language and creativity’ and the ‘discourse and creativity’ approach I will propose: while the former are concerned with what might be called ‘linguistic creativity’, locating creativity in words and how they are put together to form texts, the latter locates creativity in the concrete social actions that people use these words and texts to perform. So, while ‘language and creativity’ enthusiasts concern themselves with literary works and the ‘literariness’ of everyday speech (Carter 2004), those taking the kind of approach I am suggesting often concern themselves with texts which few would consider literary or necessarily ‘creative’– AIDS prevention pamphlets (Jones 2007), pharmaceutical labels (Jones 1998), corporate disclosure reports (Bhatia 2008), and the speeches of George W. Bush (Bhatia 2007) – but which demonstrate how language can be used in strategic ways in concrete social contexts to create fundamental changes in the world.…”

The bright and dark side of Joseph Fenton: An analysis of narratives describing the man known as Sudharman

“…We took the various narratives and compared them to competing narratives, observing how dark and bright communication was exhibited. Specifically, the way dark and bright communication appeared began to highlight the juxtaposition of good versus evil in terms of a religious metaphor, previously detailed in research examining the use of rhetoric by George W. Bush and Osama Bin Laden (Bhatia, 2007).…”