CORONAVIRUS PANDEMIC IN INANIMATE NATURE METAPHORS OF THE GERMAN MEDIA DISCOURSE

Abstract

The article analyzes the functioning of naturomorphic metaphors in the coverage of the coronavirus pandemic in the German-language media discourse. The purpose of this study is to trace and show the distinctive features of the process of metaphorization within the framework of the emergence of a significant social phenomenon. Metaphors of inanimate nature in the context of describing the COVID-19 pandemic are the object of study. The research material was the online news texts of the German-language press, as well as the electronic dictionary of German neologisms of the Leibniz Institute of German Language. In the process of studying the factual material with a volume of 102 texts, we revealed a significant predominance of metaphors with the conceptual sphere-source of "inanimate nature". In the examples we are considering, the coronavirus pandemic appears as a water element that has flooded the whole world. The identification and description of metaphors-neologisms and metaphors that have acquired new meanings in the context of the description of the COVID-19 pandemic allow us to conclude how the era of the coronavirus was fixed in the language and influenced the development of the vocabulary of the German language.