earticle

영어

This paper examines the current affairs terms characterized as ‘euphemisms with attitude’ in the economy sections of four Korean newspapers. A euphemism with attitude is defined as an euphemistic expression employed, particularly from the perspective of the speaker/writer, for intentionally hiding negative aspects of social realities. The impetus of this research is that the euphemism with attitude can reproduce social inequality among people if it hides negative social realities which everyone should be aware of. From the viewpoint of Critical Discourse Analysis, current affairs terms were analyzed to find out whether they can hide negative social realities, and as a results they can help reproduce and reinforce unequal power relations among various social groups. Based on the analysis, it can be argued that some of the familiar terms —‘labor market flexibility’, ‘sharing economy’, ‘ride sharing service’, ‘clean diesel’, and ‘shareholder activism’—can be categorized as euphemisms with attitude because they are all related to recent changes in neo-liberal capitalism societies, and tend to make negative social realities of the changes unrecognizable.