 |
[email protected] |
 |
3275638434 |
 |
 |
| Paper Publishing WeChat |
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License
A Study of Deliberate Metaphors in Cyberbullying Language
LI Xiao-yan, ZHOU Jing
Full-Text PDF
XML 1 Views
DOI:10.17265/2159-5836/2025.04.008
Wuhan University of Technology, Wuhan, Hubei, China
Posting and commenting on the Internet has become an important channel for individuals to express their opinions, but it has also given rise to cyberbullying language. Deliberate Metaphors (DMs) refers to the deliberate selection of specific metaphors by speakers in particular contexts to guide listeners to view the source domain from a novel perspective. Despite its deliberate and creative nature, cyberbullying language has rarely been studied in terms of the speaker’s intentions. Therefore, this study adopts a cognitive perspective on DMs and employs qualitative analysis by collecting cyberbullying language on Chinese social media. This study attempts to answer two questions: (1) the classification of metaphorical vehicles in cyberbullying language; and (2) how speakers achieve their violent intentions through DMs. The results show that: (1) metaphorical vehicles in cyberbullying language fall into five main categories—animals, plants, iconic figures, diseases, and waste; and (2) when delivering hurtful posts and comments, speakers often use strategies such as combining multiple metaphors, and broadening the scope of the attack to convey their hatred. This study contributes to deconstructing the deliberate intentions behind the use of cyberbullying language and provides valuable insights for policymakers in regulating and refining strategies for regulating online language.
metaphor, deliberate metaphor, cyberbullying language, violence
Journal of Literature and Art Studies, April 2025, Vol. 15, No. 4, 317-323
Bryson, S. L., & Fissel, E. R. (2025). Adults’ perceptions of emotional pain and seriousness of verbal bullying and cyberbullying incidents. Journal of Aggression, Maltreatment & Trauma, 1-19.
Gibbs, R. W. (2015). Does deliberate metaphor theory have a future. Journal of Pragmatics, 90, 73-76.
Heyvaert, P., Randour, F., Dodeigne, J., Perrez, J., & Reuchamps, M. (2020). Metaphors in political communication: A case study of the use of deliberate metaphors in non-institutional political interviews. Journal of Language and Politics, 19(2), 201-225.
Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (2008). Metaphors we live by. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.
Li, W. (2020). The language of bullying: social issues on Chinese websites. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 53, 101453.
Lu, Q., & Deignan, A. (2024). Unconventional metaphor use in the writing of Chinese learners of English. SAGE Open, 14(2), 21582440241252293.
Musolff, A. (2016). Cross-cultural variation in deliberate metaphor interpretation. Metaphor and the Social World, 6(2), 205-224.
Peter, I. K., & Petermann, F. (2018). Cyberbullying: A concept analysis of defining attributes and additional influencing factors. Computers in Human Behavior, 86, 350-366.
Smith, P. K., Mahdavi, J., Carvalho, M., Fisher, S., Russell, S., & Tippett, N. (2008). Cyberbullying: Its nature and impact in secondary school pupils. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry, 49(4), 376-385.
Steen, G. (2008). The paradox of metaphor: Why we need a three-dimensional model of metaphor. Metaphor and Symbol, 23(4), 213-241.
Steen, G. (2011). From three dimensions to five steps: The value of deliberate metaphor. Metaphorik. de, (21), 83-110.
Steen, G. (2015). Developing, testing and interpreting deliberate metaphor theory. Journal of Pragmatics, 90(1), 67-72.
Van Bruwaene, D., Huang, Q., & Inkpen, D. (2020). A multi-platform dataset for detecting cyberbullying in social media. Language Resources and Evaluation, 54(4), 851-874.
Wang, J., Du, J., Zheng, T., & Sun, Y. (2023). The psychological reality of Chinese deliberate metaphors from the reception side: an experimental approach. Brain Sciences, 13(2), 160.
Zhang, C., Lin, Z., & Jin, S. (2022). What else besides War: Deliberate metaphors framing COVID-19 in Chinese online newspaper editorials. Metaphor and Symbol, 37(2), 114-126.
Zhang, S. (2021). From flaming to incited crime: Recognising cyberbullying on Chinese wechat account. International Journal for the Semiotics of Law-Revue internationale de Sémiotique juridique, 34(4), 1093-1116.
Zhang, S., & Leidner, D. (2018). From improper to acceptable: How perpetrators neutralize workplace bullying behaviors in the cyber world. Information & Management, 55(7), 850-865.
王任华. (2018). 隐喻认知视角的网络语言暴力. 当代外语研究, (4), 58-63.
吴雅菲. (2023). 社会语境下的流行疾病话语分析. 山东外语教学, 44(6), 32-40.