Recent discussions on the use of metaphor have centered on how it may be used in a way that has been said to require mandatory attention to the fact that it is metaphorical, resulting in what has come to be known as deliberate metaphor (CitationSteen, 2008). While metaphor deliberateness and conventionality/novelty are conceptually distinct, associations are likely to exist in practice. This article focuses on the deliberate use of conventional metaphor in images, by way of examining the use of animate (...) and anthropomorphic metaphors in an instance of corporate branding discourse (i.e., the prospectuses of Singapore's corporatized universities). Through our analysis, we show that deliberate conventional metaphor serves to reinforce particular conceptualizations rather than effect radical conceptual change. Moreover, we discuss visual and multimodal metaphor as deliberate if used in carefully crafted texts and draw on the notion of an image's connotative meaning to point out how such deliberateness can be further accentuated. The article concludes by discussing some implications for how the degree of conventionality is likely to have an effect on how deliberate metaphor achieves its key objective of changing addressees’ concepts of a particular Target. (shrink)

Observations have been made about branding’s shift from a material to conceptual focus. Consequently, corporate branding has become more focused on associating and imbuing corporate brands with supposedly positive values and attributes. This article locates this emphasis in the context of Singapore’s marketized higher education sector, and examines how conceptual values like flexibility, freedom and empowerment are expressed linguistically and, more significantly, symbolized in and through photographic images in corporate brand communication. It is argued that while the circulation of conceptual (...) values in branding has arisen in part due to the imperatives of branding, the privileging of values like flexibility, freedom and empowerment is symptomatic of neoliberal capitalist influence and the subjection of higher education in Singapore to a knowledge-based economic logic. This helps to shape stakeholders’ concepts and expectations of higher education as well as public attitudes towards the neoliberal knowledge-based market system more broadly. (shrink)