The University of Split Dr. Danica Skara e-mail:dskara@ffst.

hr

THE SEARCH FOR NEW MENTAL IMAGES: POLITICAL CORRECTNESS, EUPHEMISMS OR SEMANTIC ENGINEERING

The following issues will be discussed:

Language, power and politics Euphemism as a mirror of social and cultural realities Political correctness: euphemism with attitude metaphors and THE SEMANTIC FIELD OF WAR Verbal hygiene

We are daily exposed to different situations in our life. Some experiences are too sensitive to be discussed, e.g. death, sexuality, race, ethnicity, disability, etc. Some experiences are strategically defined with specific vocabulary> politics, e.g. euphemisms, metaphors>political correctness (PC), e.g. The Third World, underdeveloped, less developed, developing countries, emergent nations, HIPCs (highly indebted countries) > a Western point of view

We will examine how very personal linguistic choices are actually products of social and cultural pressures, e.g. to have sex with = to sleep with, race=diversity, fat=fully figured or husky. Terms used in legal terminology are carefully chosen. During a trial, the lawyers might take advantage of different connotations of terms, e.g. The fetus was aborted. The baby was murdered

Words such as fetus, abortion, and termination assume a medical frame of reference, rather than criminal one (e.g. murder). These words are of foreign origin without any association with the unpleasant referent. These sentences refer to the same external reality, but very different moral points of view are encoded, and different assumptions about offence and guilt are implied.

Words cut more than swords

Language also might be connected with an ideology. A very significant issue is the interplay of language, power and politics..
Words can be used as a shield or a weapon.

As the purpose of political rhetoric is persuasion, or the manipulation of the public, figurative speech and specific verbal hygiene practices are often used euphemisms metaphors political correctness.

Politeness shares certain similarities with PC.

Euphemisms We use euphemism to avoid stressful reality, connecting one term with negative associations to the other which is positive. Where there is an unwelcome truth to be hidden from others, euphemism flourishes, e.g. death-to pass away Metaphors What makes an utterance metaphorical is the fact that it is intended to make someone notice a likeness between objects ordinarily considered to be different. Metaphors allow us to make connections across domains and to find coherence between unrelated or not necessarily similar events, e.g. invasion>operation, bombing raids >surgical strikes
G. W. Bush: But our responsability to history is already clear: to answer these attacks and rid the world of evil. (evil=terrorists)

Political correctness (PC)

PC is a term used to describe language behaviour which is intended to provide a minimum of offense, particulary to racial, cultural, or other identitry groups.(Chilton, 2004), e.g. Feminist campaign against sexist language, e.g. chairmanchairperson Thus, PC can be viewed as an attempt to enforce and legalize linguistic behaviour that was previously governed by the rules of politeness.

Euphemisms

Euphemism has been a key word in the debate on politically correct language.
The term euphemism means primarily the substitution of the words. The purpose of a euphemism is to present a situation or an object in a more agreeable or politer light. They are often used to deliberately cloud an issue or to misdirect attention. Most euphemisms are used to make a concept less offensive and more acceptable, e.g. physically challenged-handicapped, disadvantaged poor, diversity - race.
somatic cell nucleur transfer (Harward University)> human cloning

Aging Mention of age and the aging seems to have been unpleasant from time immemorial and, under certain conditions, has required euphemisms. old person = the elderly, senior citizens, advanced in age, golden years, not in his/her first youth, of mature years, etc. Poverty Since poverty is often considered humiliating, harsh reference to it must be constantly softened with euphemisms, e.g. poor>underprivileged, deprived, disadvantaged. Law The language of the law welcomes the euphemism. To depersonalize the law, judges refer to themselves as the bench. In the USA, prisons are correctional facilities and prison wardens are institutional superintendents.

Death, illness We are all afraid of illness and death, and we often try to replace these words with some euphemistic terms to soften harsh reality. In many languages, expressions for sicknesses are often replaced by less offensive and more acceptable terms, e.g. cancer = long incurable illness, the big C, temporary insanity = balance of the mind disturbed, insane = mentally handicapped, mentally deprived In Roman times, epilepsy was attributed to the influence of the Gods, and it was called MORBUS SACER (the sacred disease). A nuclear explosion may cause heavy causalities among your leaders. To take part in an activity with the enemy. Death is referred to as having passed away or departed. Sometimes the deceased is said to have gone to a better place. death, to die = pass away, pass on, go to sleep, meet ones maker, go to rest, kick the bucket, the big D. We lose our relatives. In many languages a common way of saying If I die is If anything happens to me. Our pets are put to sleep, put away. Euthanasia also attracts euphemisms. One may put him out of his misery. It might be considered as mercy killing.

Political correctness: euphemism with attitude*

According to K. Burridge (1966) PC is another label for euphemism. D. Cameron (:: ) says that there is a lot more to the political correctness debate than just civility and sensitivity. Terms like African American emphasises not genetics, but the historical roots of the negro population. Similarly, Asian American, etc. PC can be seen as a cognitive modification acording to the needs of the context. The word colored, once discouraged as a racist term, was replaced by Negro, than Negro was replaced by black; black was again replaced by people of color, and, most recently in the US African American has gained ground against other terms. Thus, it is probably safe to assume that all atempts of language purification will be shattered against the ability of words to acquire new pragamtic connotations in new contexts.
In a more focused and linguistic sense, the principal function of PC is often viewed as replacing biased judgemental expressions deevaluating individuals race, sex, sexual orientation, age, health, social status, appearance, etc. with neutral units, which do not posses negative connotations. PC is a policy of prescribing certain types of linguistic behaviur. Over the past two decades PC ha stimulated many questions, much cotraversy, and criticism. Perhaps peoples reluctance to view PC as euphemisms is because of the term euphemism itself. IN modern usage it is typically associated with bureaucratic doublespeak or language for covering up reality that stinks.

Lutz (1990, p.34) views PC as 'a blanket term for language that pretends to communicate, but doesn't; that makes the bad seem good, the negative sound positive, and the unpleasant appear attractive, or at least tolerable.

Metaphors

Deliberate departures from conventional usage are meant to bring new relations of words. New relations are expressed in the form of metaphors and euphemisms. We often use these forms in order to avoid direct reference or to voice our opinion without being strictly accountable for it. In politics, the explanatory function of metaphors is often subjected to the goal of manipulation, which means that metaphors are often primarily selected for their emotional and strategic effect. Furthermore, there are metaphors we live by: Prime candidates in political speeches in general are metaphorical links with familiar words, e.g. WIND (e.g. the new breeze, wind of change), ILLNESS metaphors: our country can be healthy; it has friends, allies and enemies.

Daisy cutter=bomb Smoking Gun & Mushroom Cloud

The Axis of Evil

Metaphors in Recent Political Language

According to E. Partridge (1948) War is the greatest excitant of new vocabulary. the language of journalists and diplomats: Their choice of words often creates the kind of enemy image essential to provoking and maintaining hostility that can justify war, e.g. Saddam Hussein has been often described as a war criminal, lunatic, bloody dictator his regime as an outlaw regime, or part of the Axis of Evil.

WAR preventive initiatives, strategic bombing, the management and application of controlled violence. operation enduring freedom, military operation, a battle of good and evil, armed struggle, appropriate response, peace campaign, struggle for national existence, active defense,

War

conflict, confrontation, counter force attack, intervention, limited action, defensive measures, peace keeping action, selective response, self defense, surgical strike, anti-terror campaign.

War: Verbal hygiene

concentration camp >pacification centers, bombing raids >surgical strikes terrorists> fredom fighter These carefully targeted actions are designed to disrupt the use of Afganistan as a terrorist base of operations, and to attack the military capability of the Taliban regime. We are supported by the collective will of the world. If any goverment sponsors the outlaws and killers of innocents, they have become outlaws and murderers, themselves.

Japanese euphemisms

Japanese Ministry called Japanese invasion of China: 'the Japanese advance, an advance of Japanese forces, and the establismnet of a supervisory government. military comfort women- It refers to women of various ethnic and national backgrounds and social circumstances who became sexual laborers for the Japanese troops before and during the Second World War Japanese apology: We regret that there was an unfortunate history. (war)

Given such a view, Americans have a task of high justice to prepare Operation: Iraqi freedom. The president of the US says that the US is in the gulf to protect freedom, protect the future, and protect the innocent. On the other hand terrorists strike at the heart of America's commerce and government.

A missile attack on Iraq in 1993 was called self defense against armed attack The concept of the rogue state is applied to states which are considered to be a treat to world peace: Iraq, Afganistan, Libya, Iran and North Korea.

Here we have rhetorical strategy or verbal hygiene and its prime target is to provoke positive connotations. Like cosmetic surgery, political euphemism tries to hide the ugly face of political deeds, and seeks to be a major means of reality control. WAR medical frame of reference Enemy criminal frame of reference

"The administration's framings and reframings and its

search for metaphors should be noted. The initial framing was as a "crime" with "victims" and "perpetrators" to be "brought to justice" and "punished." The crime frame entails law, courts, lawyers, trials, sentencing, appeals, and so on. It was hours before "crime" changed to "war" with "casualties," "enemies," "military action," "war powers," and so on.

In political and military double-talk, euphemism is mostly designed to deceive or to improve our mental image of offensive reality. Such an attitude provokes conceptual engineering which easily changes an invasion into a rescue mission. killing = neutralizing an enemy, bombing = surgical strikes, killing of civilians= collateral damage, heavy casualties, bombs=daisy cutters, etc.

If our side has to take a military action, we land on someone's territory, but if our opponents do, they invade. The same group of people might be referred to as terrorists or freedom fighters. The Pentagon names military action in the Gulf: Iraqi freedom, a legitimate target, Showdown Iraq. Words like atrocity and massacre were absent from the headlines. Genocide, ethnic cleansing have continued in Rwanda and Bosnia.

Because the concept of "war "doesn't fit, there is a franatic search for metaphors. First, Bush called the terrorists "cowards"but this didn't seem to work too well for martyrs who willing sacrificed their lives for their moral and religious ideals. More recently he has spoken of "smoking them out of their holes" as if they were rodents, and Rumsfeld has spoken of "drying up the swamp they live in" as if they were snakes or lowly swamp creatures. The conceptual metaphors here are Moral Is Up; Immoral Is Down and Immoral People Are Animals (that live close to the ground)....

Most of these words consist of attempts to diminish people's awareness of the degree of violence being used somewhere. According to Leech (1990:46) 'The choice of term embodies a point of view, a political argument () it is a label chosen with strategic tact, to pick out the optimistic and progressive aspect of the phenomenon labeled'

The most frequent fields of reference of euphemisms used in English language are the following: war, death, illness, body, gender issue, aging, poverty, race, lying, etc. The occurrence of euphemisms reveals areas which the society finds distasteful or alarming. They act like a mirror of social and cultural realities.

According to the results of our analyses common causes of euphemisms are: to make a difficult or emotional situation more tolerable; to minimize the painful impression on the listener, to soften tragic news, e.g. death = pass away, breathe ones last, etc. respect for the person addressed, or a desire to make a favorable impression, to lend social acceptability: e.g. garbage collector> sanitation engineer, mortician> funeral director. to provoke positive connotations, e.g. war on Iraq > freedom operation, liberation of Iraqi people to deceive (conceal the truth), political double-talk, e.g. slum > culturally deprived area to deal with social or moral taboos, e.g. to go to the toilet > to powder ones nose, to wash ones hands to deal with superstitious taboos and religious terms The word is God; speech has a mysterious power; the name evokes the thing. These three points of view explain many ancient and modern euphemisms: e.g. cancer>long and incurable illness, the big C, Good luck! >Break your leg. Mention of certain diseases has often been avoided by many persons. In many European languages speakers avoid using words such as devil (Cro. crni, neastivi, Sp. malo, enemigo) for reasons of superstitions (e.g. Speak of the devil).

When we speak , we exercise the power of language to transform reality. Persuasively promoting American values and culture will work better than either carrots or threats to influence the Middle East (By Joseph S. Nye Jr. in Los Angeles Times, April 25, 2004)
Could we consider euphemisms, metaphors and PC as: an attack on cognition an abuse of perception a loss of reality