Ibérica (Oct 2017)
A cognitive-axiological approach to the chairman’s letter of the leading civil aircraft manufacturers
Abstract
In this paper our aim is to look into the dominant axiological values in the aeronautical discourse through the Chairman´s letters included in the annual reports published in 2014 and 2015 of some leading civil transport aircraft manufacturers: Airbus, Boeing, Bombardier, Embraer and Textron Aviation. We will analyse the positive qualities and the way in which they are introduced in this type of discourse through cognitive tools such as metaphor, metonymy and image schemas. This work has been structured according to the Cognitive Theory of Metaphor and Metonymy (Lakoff & Johnson, 1980, 1999) and extended to axiological semantics (Krzeszowski, 1997, 2004) and to specialized discourse (Adams & Cruz García, 2007; Cortés de los Ríos, 2010; Nicolae 2010), among others. However, the specific approach to a technological manufacturing sector does not seem to have been carried out so far and, consequently, this study tries both to bridge this gap and to show new evidence for the correct interpretation of this genre. The results show that the source domains that are regularly used to highlight the positive qualities of the new planes and their manufacturing companies are extremely diverse. Consequently, source domains such as LENS, JOURNEY, CONSTRUCTION, GAME and LIVING ORGANISM, among others, can be found in these corporate letters. However, only two metonymies (INSTITUTION FOR PEOPLE RESPONSIBLE and PART FOR THE WHOLE) are used to communicate positive attributes in this sector and the number of relevant image schemas in the corpus (attribute, space, container and balance) is also limited and occasional.
