{"id":9432,"date":"2008-01-05T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2008-01-05T00:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/wordpress-dev.library.illinois.edu\/funkaces\/08_05\/"},"modified":"2008-01-05T00:00:00","modified_gmt":"2008-01-05T00:00:00","slug":"08_05","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/wordpress.library.illinois.edu\/funkaces\/08_05\/","title":{"rendered":"ACDC News – Issue 08-05"},"content":{"rendered":"

Using the language of war in covering agriculture <\/strong> .\u00a0 We recently added to the ACDC collection an article in Science Communication <\/em> that included a case example of agricultural war language.\u00a0 It involved an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease (FMD) in the United Kingdom.\u00a0 Researchers found that a search of the Lexis-Nexis database using the keyword “war,” for example, identified 159 articles in national UK newspapers from March 20-30, 2001.\u00a0 Here are other militaristic metaphors they found in media and other reporting:\u00a0 Battle. Fight. Strikes. Killer. Marching. Enemy. Invasion. Foreign invader. Fortress mentality. Attack. Siege.<\/p>\n

In this framing, authors noted, the handling of FMD was conceptualized as a war against an invisible and foreign enemy, the virus.\u00a0 Veterinarians and farmers became soldiers. The animals were recast as enemies alongside the virus. Basically, authors found the language of war used consciously for definite political and ideological purposes.\u00a0 “\u2026it acted to mobilize, justify solutions, and exculpate government from responsibility and gave focus and mode of operation.\u00a0 This is the classic war metaphor framing.”<\/p>\n

Title: Metaphors and biorisks <\/a><\/p>\n

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Let’s banish “organic.” <\/strong> Businesses as organic. T-shirts as organic. Shampoo as organic. Computer software as organic. So maybe it is not surprising to see “organic” on the Lake Superior State University 2008 List of Banished Words. You may recall that wordsmiths at this Michigan university annually invite nominations of words to be “banished from the Queen’s English for misuse, overuse and general uselessness.”<\/p>\n

You can see the complete 2008 list – and add your own comments – at:<\/p>\n

www.lssu.edu\/banished\/current.php <\/a><\/p>\n

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Getting a view of the core periodical literature in agricultural communications. <\/strong> The Journal of Agricultural and Food Information <\/em> recently published an analysis of core periodical literature in the Agricultural Communications Documentation Center here at the University of Illinois. Researcher Joe Zumalt identified more than 16,000 articles from scholarly journals, magazines, newspapers and, now, their electronic equivalents.\u00a0 Among his findings:<\/p>\n