Collective Body of Protest

Abstract

The paper presents an analysis of the metaphorical concept of collective body of protest which is understood, from the one hand, as multiplicity of collectively acting individual bodies and consciousnesses in situations of protest actions, from the other hand, as multiplicity of intensions and possibilities empowering the civic movement. In the paper the author reconstructs corporal metaphors and body images which demonstrate particularities of contemporary protest culture in Russia, as well as structure cognition of participants of civic rallies, regulate emotions, order collective actions, and provide the opportunity to understand protest experience. Analyzing corporal metaphors, the author aims to recreate semantic interrelations between the key metaphorical concepts paying particular attention to modality and rhetoric.