Cognitive Approaches to Specialist Languages

Are (Polish) Politicians Out of this World? 63

GOD

HUMANS

ANIMALS

PLANTS

INORGANIC THINGS

The Great Chain of Being reflects a geocentric and anthropocentric
worldview fostered by scientific theories as well as myths. Yet, how
anthropological or animalistic are aliens? Or, are they god-like creatures
(superior to us and awe-inspiring)? Where should they be placed if
included in this hierarchy? The answer cannot be a simple one, as:

(t)hey don’t have to be interstellar visitors. They could be the next

generation of computers (...). They could be apes or dogs or dolphins after

we have fiddled with their brains. They could be human beings shaped by a

strange environment, or altered by genetic experiments (Niven, 1987).

In fact, the term 'extra-terrestrial life' might denote a wide, albeit
hypothetical, range of life from single-celled organisms to highly intelligent
beings forming more advanced civilisations. This variety of imageries
leads to confusion and apprehension, or even ‘alienophobia’. Ideas of
outer spaces rooted in the public psyche present a mixture of scientific
facts, artistic imagery and myths as far as the physical and mental
characteristics of extraterrestrials are concerned, and largely, aliens
depicted in popular fiction represent the dangerous, the unpredictable, the
“other”. Such “notions of alien anxiety have, historically, permeated
Western culture” (McLeod 2003: 337). Csicsery-Ronay (2007: 12)
observes that “traditionally, SF's aliens have been modelled on certain
practical categories of otherness that fascinate the regulators of culture:
children, women, machines, marginalized peoples, animals, and
'anomalous genders'.” Being an alien seems therefore synonymous with
social exclusion and a stigma of strangeness.

The MANNER OF ACTION IS MANNER OF MOTION

and CENTRALITY IS IMPORTANCE metaphors

To begin with, an elaboration of MANNER OF ACTION IS MANNER OF
MOTION metaphor (Lakoff 1993) in descriptions of unsuccessful political
careers or a lack of cooperation is evident in (4)-(6):

(4) “W politycznej orbicie lawirowaá od dawna.”

(He swerved back and forth in the political orbit).