CHESS METAPHOR IN SPORTS MEDIA TEXTS

Abstract

The purpose of this article is to analyse the use of chess metaphors in Ukrainian-language sports media texts devoted to various sports. The relevance of the study is determined by the popularity of sports in Ukraine and the attention of a wide audience to sports content, the emotionality and imagery of which is provided by authors of sports news and analytical articles, in particular, through secondary nomination. The chess metaphor is often used in socio-political texts, but the specifics of its functioning in the segment of sports journalism remain insufficiently covered, which justifies the scientific novelty of the chosen topic. The main methods used to identify and systematise instances of metaphorical use of chess terms, record their figurative meaning and determine their functions in sports media texts include contextual analysis, metaphorical modelling, as well as general scientific descriptive methods and generalisation. As a result of analysing texts devoted to sports other than chess and published in five sports media outlets, namely “TSN. Prosport”, “Futbol 24”, “Champion”, “SPORTARENA”, and “UA-Futbol”, the functioning of such chess terms as “gambit”, “grandmaster”, “debut”, “endgame”, “checkmate (scholar's mate)”, “stalemate”, “castling”, “time trouble”, “zugzwang”, “check” and “chess”. Most often, such cases were recorded in news and articles about football and boxing. To systematise the identified metaphors, we propose considering the metaphorical model SPORT IS CHESS, the structure of which includes the frames “Chess game”, “Stages of a chess game”, “Crisis positions” and “Chess player”. Conclusions. Chess metaphors encourage the reader to think associatively and perform content-creating and evaluative functions in sports media texts, as they are used to emphasise certain characteristics of sporting events or episodes, competition results or intermediate positions, sports figures and related situations. Given the systematic use of chess metaphors by authors in a number of their publications, there is reason to consider such linguistic units as elements of the authorial idiolect of sports journalists. We consider further analysis of the semantics and functions of chess metaphors in texts of various styles and genres to be promising.