Conceptual Metaphors in Official Documents of International Organizations

Guo Zhen

doi:10.54691/v7mxkm64

Conceptual Metaphors in Official Documents of International Organizations

Guo Zhen

Frontiers in Humanities and Social Sciences, (2025), Vol.5, No.9, pp.177-194

Published: September 18, 2025

DOI: 10.54691/v7mxkm64

PDF: Download Full Text PDF

Abstract

The 2030 Agenda for Sustainable Development is the most important agenda of the United Nations. However, previous research on UN documents from the perspective of conceptual metaphors is still limited. This study identifies and analyzes conceptual metaphors in the Agenda, and employs qualitative and quantitative approaches to construct a CMA framework. The study finds that: First, conceptual metaphors are abundant in the documents, with a total of 5905 occurrences. Second, the text delineates 17 conceptual metaphors: orientational metaphor, target metaphor, biological metaphor, team metaphor, architectural metaphor, journey metaphor, war metaphor, stage metaphor, identity metaphor, moral metaphor, dialogue metaphor, factory metaphor, body metaphor, game metaphor, color metaphor, nature metaphor, and burden metaphor. Third, the CMA recursive model of context analysis can critically analyze the above 17 metaphor types with effect.

Keywords: Conceptual metaphor, critical metaphor analysis, the United Nations documents.

APA Citation: Guo Zhen (2025). Conceptual Metaphors in Official Documents of International Organizations. Frontiers in Humanities and Social Sciences, 5(9), 177-194. https://doi.org/10.54691/v7mxkm64

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