..................................
2 Literature Review
2.1 Critical Cognitive Linguistics
Regardless of various views on the concept of “discourse”, the majority of disciplines agree on the significance of the relationship between discourse and society in discourse studies. A general consensus is that discourse not only reflects social reality but also plays a crucial part in the construction process of social reality, which is the primary focus of both Critical discourse studies and Cognitive linguistics. In recent years, with the flourishment of Cognitive linguistics (CL) and Critical discourse studies (CDS), “cognitive turn” has emerged in CDS. Cognitive approaches are adopted in CDS by many scholars in recent relevant researches, leading to the emergence of Critical Cognitive Linguistics(CCL). Compared with traditional CDS, CCL focuses on the interpretation stage of discourse analysis. CCL emphasizes the conceptual nature of meaning construction and is concerned with modeling the conceptual structures and processes which, invoked by text in the course of discourse, constitute an ideologized understanding of the situations and events being described[6]. Without restriction to specific theories, cognitive linguistics provides a tool box for subdisciplines of linguistics. Accordingly, various cognitive theories could be adopted as research paradigms in Critical Discourse Analysis. Thus, different theoretical frameworks employed in CL are introduced into CDS, such as Image Schema analysis, Conceptual Metaphor Theory[7][8], Mental Space Theory[9], and Conceptual Blending Theory[10] and Discourse Space Theory[11]. Among these endeavors, the socio-cognitive approach proposed by van Dijk[12], with the focus on the cognitive mediation between discourse and society, has attracted intense interests since its inception. At present, the theoretical frameworks of CCL present diversified characteristics. Hart[6]80 puts forward three classifications of CCL: Image Schema Analysis, Metaphor Analysis, and Discourse World Analysis. Zhang and Yang[13] further supplement the socio-cognitive approach and other construal operations. Given that imagery schema serves as the source domain in conceptual metaphors in relevant researches, the author puts image schema analysis and metaphor analysis into the same category within CCL, namely, critical metaphor analysis. Thus, in present thesis, the most developed and widely applied approaches within CCL are divided into four types, including Critical Metaphor Analysis, other construal operations, Discourse World Analysis, and socio-cognitive a
