#covid is war and #vaccine is weapon? COVID-19 metaphors in India
Mohammed Khaliq, Rohan Joseph, Sunny Rai
Code Available — Be the first to reproduce this paper.
ReproduceCode
- github.com/makflakes/covid-metaphors-of-indiaOfficialIn papernone★ 1
Abstract
Metaphors are creative cognitive constructs that are employed in everyday conversation to describe abstract concepts and feelings. Prevalent conceptual metaphors such as WAR, MONSTER, and DARKNESS in COVID-19 online discourse sparked a multi-faceted debate over their efficacy in communication, resultant psychological impact on listeners, and their appropriateness in social discourse. In this work, we investigate metaphors used in discussions around COVID-19 on Indian Twitter. We observe subtle transitions in metaphorical mappings as the pandemic progressed. Our experiments, however, didn’t indicate any affective impact of WAR metaphors on the COVID-19 discourse.