Article

Name: Perceptual Metaphor in the Internet Discourse of the Covid Era

Authors: Elena G. Basalaeva

Novosibirsk State Pedagogical University, Novosibirsk, Russian Federation

Abstract:

The article reveals the features of perception and production of smells verbalization in the Internet discourse of the latest period associated with the COVID-19 pandemic, analyzes the dynamic processes in the odoric subsystem. It is noted that the states of hyposmia, anosmia, and parosmia are most often the object of Internet users’ description. All processes are comprehended and verbalized as a way out of the comfort and safety zone, accompanied by emotional and physical exhaustion that can lead to insanity or death, which in general is an indisputable argument for recognizing the importance of olfactory perception in human life. The author of the article pays special attention to three groups of odorically marked statements in covid discourse, which contain 1) linguistic reflection of communicants regarding the choice of an adequate linguistic unit capable of conveying an olfactory impression; 2) various metaphorical and metonymic new formations, representing both the smell itself and the situation of olfactory perception as a whole; 3) lexico-sematic and word-forming derivatives used to describe new smells and sensations. It is concluded that a peculiar odor system is formed in covid discourse, which includes a fairly stable, repetitive circle of standards of new odors. This causes, on the one hand, the appearance of some stereotype in the description of odor sensations, and on the other hand, the activation of creative speech activity, i.e. creating atypical odoric images in order to describe the unusual state as adequately as possible. An active search for the most adequate means for describing the smell is also manifested in the use of various metaphor-metonymic means and new formations based on different mechanisms of usual and occasional derivation. It is possible to speak about the discursive specificity of a number of metaphorical models: somatic and sound metaphors are the most regular and frequent, while water, light, and tactile metaphors are the least in demand.

Keywords: vocabulary of olfactory perception, metaphor, Internet discourse, covid discourse, active processes in the language

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