Identity Construction in Website News Discourse: A Corpus-assisted Comparative Study of Top 10 American and Chinese Banking Corporations
Yong Qin
Hunan Normal University
Page 134-154
Abstract: The post-COVID-19 period has witnessed the fierce trade war between America and China as the two supreme world powers in the global economic meltdown. Under these circumstances, it is essential that banking corporations due to their significant role in economic transformation and resuscitation should construct a strategic identity in the global market. In light of this, this research aims to find out what key attributes of corporate identity are projected for American banking corporations (hereinafter referred to ABCs) and for Chinese banking corporations (hereinafter referred to CBCs) in website news discourse and to highlight their similarities and differences so as to offer insight into future development. To achieve this, this research adopted monologic perspectives and two corpora were built; following MIP, a detailed systematic cognitive metaphor analysis was carried out by application of Wmatrix to examine how the three metaphors in the pyramid hierarchy (concrete metaphors, conceptual metaphors, abstract conceptual keys) collaborate with each other for semantic representation. The findings show that Both ABCs and CBCs attach strategic significance to metaphorical representation of corporate identity, whose different frequency and distribution of concrete metaphors in the semantic field THE BODY AND THE INDIVIDUAL in accordance with USAS demonstrates different attributes of corporate identity; that there is one shared abstract schema: BANKING CORPORATIONS ARE ORGANISMS; that while ABCs are constructed kings who enjoy highest social reputation and projected as doctors who can diagnose their own symptoms, CBCs are constructed as hunks who have saved many people’s lives in emergency and projected as patients who have gone into therapy due to serious illness. The paper also offers empirical and theoretical implications for future research.
Keywords: American banking corporations, Chinese banking corporations, corporate identity, corporate metaphor, website news discourse
DOI: 10.53397/hunnu.jflc.202302010
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