A comparative study of metaphor in Spanish and English financial reporting

This paper compares the use of linguistic metaphor and conceptual metaphor in a corpus of English and Spanish financial reports published in newspaper s during the October 1997 stock market crash. The findings indicate much si milarity in conceptual and linguistic metaphors between the two languages, but some differences in the frequency of particular linguistic metaphors. F or example, both languages share conceptualisations of the economy as an or ganism, of market movements as physical movements and of sharp downward mar ket movements as natural disasters. These conceptualisations show in a numb er of similar lexical metaphors relating to, for example, physical conflict , physical and mental health, mood, extreme weather conditions and earthqua kes. However, while in Spanish reporting there is a preference for metaphor s based on psychological mood and personality in English reporting there is a higher frequency of nautically based metaphors. There is consideration o f the implications of these findings for economists, financial experts, tra nslators, ESP students and those interested in comparative research into me taphor and economics. (C) 2001 The American University. Published by Elsevi er Science Ltd. All rights reserved.