Brexit as an oven-ready pie? A case study of Boris Johnson’s BREXIT IS A PIE multimodal metaphor

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Brexit as an oven-ready pie? A case study of Boris Johnson’s
BREXIT IS A PIE multimodal metaphor
Pauline Rodet, Université Jean Moulin Lyon 3/Centre d’Études
Linguistiques (UR CEL) (pauline.rodet@univ-lyon3.fr)
Abstract
This paper aims to study Boris Johnson’s conceptualisation of Brexit as an OVEN-READY PIE
during the 2019 General Election campaign in the UK through the prism of cognitive
linguistics. This election was marked by the omnipresence of digital and social media, which
impacted the course of the campaign, but also diversified the modes of communication and
interactions. In the light of the works on multimodal metaphor carried out by Forceville (2009),
the different media through which this metaphorical conceptualisation of Brexit as a PIE was
cued will be thoroughly analysed. The data includes a short video clip, an ad campaign, and
the 2019 Conservative Party manifesto. Additionally, some caricatures of this metaphor will
also be looked at and compared to the original occurrence of the metaphor which appeared in
Boris Johnson’s ad campaign. The objectives, functions, and the meaning conveyed by this
metaphor will be brought to light. This paper will recount how the metaphor was extended
and developed through different modes as the political campaign unfolded.
Ziel des Beitrags ist die kognitionslinguistische Untersuchung der Konzeptualisierung des
Brexits als OFENFERTIGER KUCHEN durch Boris Johnson während des Parlamentswahlkampfs
2019 im Vereinigten Königreich. Dieser war geprägt von der Omnipräsenz digitaler und
sozialer Medien, die den Verlauf des Wahlkampfs beeinflusste, aber auch die
Kommunikations- und Interaktionsformen diversifizierte. Im Lichte der von Forceville (2009)
durchgeführten Arbeiten zur multimodalen Metapher werden verschiedene Medien, durch
die diese metaphorische Konzeptualisierung des Brexits als KUCHEN auf den Weg gebracht
wurde, analysiert. Zu den Daten gehören ein kurzer Videoclip, eine Werbekampagne und das
Programm der Konservativen Partei von 2019. Darüber hinaus werden einige Karikaturen zu
dieser Metapher untersucht und mit dem ursprünglichen Vorkommen der Metapher in Boris
Johnsons Werbekampagne verglichen. Die Ziele, Funktionen und die von der Metapher
übermittelte Bedeutung werden untersucht. Der Beitrag legt dar, wie die Metapher im Verlauf
der politischen Kampagne auf verschiedene Weise erweitert und weiterentwickelt wurde.
1. Introduction
The 2019 UK General Election was decisive for the unfolding of Brexit.
Following Theresa May’s departure, Boris Johnson was appointed as the
leading figure of a divided and weakened Conservative Party. Yet, this General
Election resulted in a smashing victory for the Conservatives, at the expense of
a declining Labour Party led by Jeremy Corbyn, who did not manage to reach
the voters’ expectations by failing to take a stance on the Brexit issue (Rycroft
2020: 3). As opposed to Jeremy Corbyn, his major opponent during this General
Election, Johnson built his electoral campaign around his will to deliver Brexit,
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whatever it takes, in order to honour the result of the 2016 Brexit referendum.
“Get Brexit Done” became the official motto of the Conservative Party in the
run-up to the 2019 General Election, a simple yet effective catchphrase that
reflected Boris Johnson’s rhetoric and echoed the 2016 Vote Leave Brexit
campaign (Bonnet 2020). To reach a wider audience and comply with the evergrowing
importance of social media during political campaigns, the
Conservative Party capitalised on digital platforms such as Twitter and
YouTube so as to increase their visibility and target new supporters, especially
among the young people. They resorted to innovative communication
techniques such as memes and parodies to illustrate their ideas. To depict how
supposedly easy “getting Brexit done” would be if Johnson became Prime
Minister, the Conservative Party launched an advertising campaign in which
Brexit was depicted as an oven-ready meal.
This paper will focus on this specific case of rhetorical metaphor which involved
the conceptualisation of Brexit as a MEAL, and more specifically a PIE, through
the use of multimodal metaphors during the 2019 election campaign in the UK.
The metaphorical representations of Brexit as a PIE will be studied in media from
different sorts. The aim of this paper is to illustrate how a metaphor can be
stretched through different modes, be used for rhetorical purposes, and be
twisted from its initial meaning. To begin with, the links between social media
and political campaigning during the 2019 General Election will briefly be
discussed. Then, the data and methodology used for this study will be
presented. In the third part, an in-depth analysis of the metaphor under scrutiny
is carried out. The aim of this third part is threefold: look at how it is cued in the
data selected, interpret the choice of the source domain, and comment on how
the metaphor was then re-used, extended, and twisted.
2. When politics interacts with social media
2.1 Glimpse on the 2019 General Election
The year 2019 turned out to be another turning point in British politics, and
especially in the unfolding of the Brexit process. The United Kingdom was on
the verge of a Constitutional crisis, with Theresa May racing against the alarm
clock set by Brussels, and the MPs rejecting the deal she had negotiated with the
EU no less than three times. Although she had managed to negotiate an
extension of the 2-year period guaranteed by Article 50 with the EU Parliament,
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she did not succeed in rallying the British MPs behind her Withdrawal bill.
Eventually, Theresa May’s failure to get parliamentary support led her to step
down as Prime Minister in June 2019 after having steered the boat through the
Brexit tempest for just over three years. Thus, time was running out for the
settlement of a deal, and the UK lacked a strong figure to finally deliver Brexit.
This period of uncertainty lasted until 23 July 2019, when Boris Johnson was
elected at the head of the Conservative Party, as a result of Theresa May’s
resignation. This new position allowed him to become one of the frontrunners
for the upcoming General Election, which was planned to be held in December
of that same year since Boris Johnson had called for a snap election.
During the 2019 General Election campaign, Boris Johnson competed against
his main opponent, Jeremy Corbyn, the leader of the Labour Party, and also
against the Lib-Dem, slightly less represented in the media. Most of the issues
at stake during that campaign were related to the delivering of Brexit, which
had started to become a source of weariness and urgency in the country. Public
opinion was fractured over how Brexit should be achieved, and over whether
Brexit should be achieved at all (Vasilopoulou 2020: 82). The Conservative Party
chose to make Brexit the central issue of their campaign, and Boris Johnson
made it his mission to Get Brexit Done – “no ifs, no buts, no maybes”, as he
insisted. In addition to what had already happened during the 2017 General
Election, Brexit had a profound impact on the voters’ behaviour with people
mainly voting in accordance with their stance on Brexit and the EU (Prosser
2020: 10).
Strikingly enough, this time again, the Leave campaign led by Boris Johnson
won the election. What was even more striking was the fact that they won a
landslide majority in Parliament, with 80 seats and 43.6% of the popular vote,
one of the highest percentages ever achieved by the party. This election also
resulted in the disappointing defeat of the Labour Party, likely due to Jeremy
Corbyn’s lack of popularity and his failure to fully grasp the importance of
Brexit during the election campaign. This might have influenced the Labour
voters to migrate towards the Conservative Party or the Lib-Dem, depending
on whether they supported Leave or Remain (Prosser 2020: 9).
However, another decisive point could also account for the crushing victory of
the Conservative Party: How the campaign was fought explains how the
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campaign was won. Yet, the Conservatives manifestly chose the right candidate
and the right communication strategy.
2.2 Johnson’s communication strategy: social media as a new political
tool?
During the 2019 General Election, Boris Johnson’s strategy heavily relied on
social media and the latest internet trends. Nowadays, there is no shadow of a
doubt that social media play a crucial role in almost every aspect of our
existence, whether it be on a personal level, or on society as a whole, and politics
is no exception to that current phenomenon (Wring/Ward 2020: 284).
In the last decade or so, it seems that politicians have started to give more and
more value to their appearance on social media, such as Twitter and Instagram.
These platforms are generally digital places where politicians have room for
improvement as regards their voting base. The use of social media by politicians
facilitates how they interact with their supporters and stimulates public
reactions. It allows them to communicate instantly, share their opinion publicly
and without any filters. Most political entities now own, at least, an official
Twitter account. Twitter has now become a proper political battleground where
politicians try to increase their visibility (Ford et al. 2021: 310). Moreover, the
choice to adopt a horizontal approach on the use of social media allows
supporters to get involved in campaigns, which means that they can contribute
to the rising popularity of a party. According to Bell (2018: 5): “the ‘old politics’
was more likely to use it [digital media] in a top-down way”. Conversely, “the
‘new politics’ used it in a horizontal manner which allowed people to actively
get involved in a political movement”. With this horizontal approach, the socalled
‘new politics’ are able to grant more space to the people in their debates,
and thus gives the illusion that they are closer to the people and more
approachable.
Furthermore, it is interesting to note that social media is also a good means
through which politicians can reach youngsters. The majority of Twitter users
age from 13 to 34 years old (Dixon 2022). Yet, this age range also encompasses
the population who is less likely to cast a vote during elections, and who is less
engaged in politics overall (Russell 1999). Additionally, Iyengar (2011: 124)
argues that social media seem to have a positive impact on younger generations
as regards their engagement in politics since they would be less likely to engage
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in traditional forms of political events (TV debates, canvass, handing out flyers,
etc.). Therefore, reaching out to them directly in a (digital) place where they are
used to spending a lot of time seems to be an effective communication strategy
in order to grasp their attention, and thus, their votes. This is also what the
Conservative Party intended to achieve during the 2019 General Election. To do
so, the party hired two communication strategists – Topham and Guerin – both
under 30, who took care of Boris Johnson’s online campaign (Ritchie 2022: 84).
Not only do they specialize in online campaigns, but also their young age helps
them have a better understanding of their target audience’s expectations, and
how social media can be used effectively.
2.3 ‘Shitposting’ on Twitter
Before being hired by the Conservative Party to improve their digital campaign,
Topham and Guerin had already shown their skills in Australia, where they had
worked with the Liberal Party of Australia, which resulted in the unexpected
victory of Scott Morrison in 2018 (Waterson 2019). Topham and Guerin aroused
curiosity and interest from all parts and became renowned for using
‘shitposting’ as a new form of digital strategy for politicians. Journalist
Waterson (2019) defines this new strategy of ’shitposting’ as follows:
“Purposefully low-quality memes based around popular shows such as Game of
Thrones were used in a bid to drive interactions – good or bad – at any cost, on
the basis that this would boost the reach of future Facebook posts”. In other
words, shitposting is the act of releasing rubbish adverts on social media in the
hope that they will be more likely to be shared and go viral on the internet and
beyond. BBC political editor, Laura Kuenssberg explains:
Political parties or campaign groups make an advert that looks really
rubbish and then people share it online saying, ‘Oh I can’t believe how
shit this is’ and then it gets shared and shared and shared and shared
and they go, ‘Ha ha ha, job done’ (Brexitcast 2019).
Posting seemingly low-quality content on social media aims to target
a wider audience and eventually trigger an emotional reaction on the
part of the audience. The emotional reaction could be anger, laugh,
pride. Besides, emotional arousal is a crucial element of a persuasion
strategy (Zhang/Clark 2018: 43).
Multiple occurrences of shitposting can be found on the Conservative Party’s
Twitter account, especially during the campaign leading to the 2019 General
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Election. The example that made the strongest impression is undoubtedly the
parody of Love, Actually released a few days before Christmas on YouTube and
Twitter. This short video clip, which featured Boris Johnson re-enacting the
famous placard door scene to implore the voters to vote Conservative, went
utterly viral, generating millions of views (Ford et al. 2021: 284). Although
politicians are not used to being framed in comical situations, even more during
election campaigns, Boris Johnson managed to catch the attention of journalists
and voters with this imitation of a widely praised, popular British romantic
comedy. In fact, Johnson’s unique personality and charisma, as shown in this
parody, probably contributed to the victory of the Conservatives in 2019. Bonnet
(2020: 6) argues:
The campaign team tried to control Johnson’s public appearance
carefully to drive home the message encapsulated in the “Get Brexit
Done” slogan. To achieve this, they would capitalise on Johnson’s
charisma and easy-going appearance. To symbolise the fact that he
would literally break the Brexit deadlock, he was photographed
wearing boxing gloves emblazoned with “Get Brexit Done” in
Manchester.
Thus, Johnson and his campaign team focused on illustrating the party’s motto
for the election – Get Brexit Done – through visual content that is as simplistic
and explicit as the message conveyed by the motto. Unlike Theresa May,
Johnson aimed to deliver Brexit as quickly as possible, avoiding lengthy
negotiations and deadline extensions. This sense of urgency to get Britain out of
the EU was also reflected in the multiple mini video clips that flourished on the
Internet. This also applies to the “oven-ready deal” scenario studied in this
paper, as it was also crafted to illustrate the party’s slogan and main campaign
promise.
Therefore, Boris Johnson and his campaign team managed to conquer the realm
of social media, now considered a decisive place to gather public attention and
votes. To do so, they used the latest Internet trends, such as memes and short
video clips, as a new form of political discourse and rhetorical tools. Although
these elements may seem irrelevant, in the end, they helped Boris Johnson to
reach young people, mark a clear distance between his intentions and Theresa
May’s premiership, and transmit the idea that the Conservative Party is able to
adapt to new popular trends, to reach the people. Nonetheless, the Electoral
Commission (2020) claimed that some voters raised concerns about the
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unfolding of the campaign, especially about the content released on social
media and the lack of regulations. The Electoral Commission conducted an
opinion poll in which 58% of the respondents regarded online campaigning as
either false or deceptive.
3. Data and methodology
3.1 Focus on BREXIT IS A PIE
This paper aims to study the BREXIT IS A PIE metaphorical scenario that was built
during the Conservatives’ campaign in the run-up for the 2019 General Election.
This metaphorical scenario, which likened the process of parting from the EU
to the baking of a pie, emerged from Boris Johnson’s claim that he had prepared
a deal to deliver Brexit, and that this Brexit deal was “oven-ready.” According
to Musolff (2017: 643), metaphorical scenarios are defined as some “figurative
mini narratives that carry with them an evaluative stance”. In this context, the
evaluative stance leads toward the idea that Brexit is quick and easy.
Later on, Boris Johnson continued to stretch the metaphor extensively through
various modes of communication. This metaphor ended up being distorted, and
eventually used against himself, especially through numerous images and
drawings of the “oven-ready meal.” One way to stretch that metaphor implied
rendering the target domain, Brexit, through visual representations, and the pie
was carefully chosen as the visual cue for the representation of the source
domain. In that respect, the BREXIT IS A PIE metaphor was first cued verbally and
was then cued through other semantic modes.
3.2 Data presentation
A qualitative analysis of a set of data has been performed. The data encompass
metaphorical occurrences related to the BREXIT IS A PIE metaphorical scenario
during the 2019 General Election campaign. The data collection started with the
Conservative Party manifesto for the 2019 General Election in the UK. Then, the
aim was to find other occurrences that came to illustrate the verbal occurrence.
As a result, eight items will be analysed in this paper. These eight elements have
been parted into three categories, according to the modes they display.
Firstly, the analysis will focus on verbal data only, starting chronologically with
the excerpt from the manifesto, then moving on to two occurrences appearing
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in two speeches delivered by Boris Johnson – an interview and a speech given
at the launch of the Conservative Party’s campaign for the 2019 election.
Secondly, an examination will be conducted on data that combines visual and
verbal modes.
A tweet containing verbal elements as well as a computer-assisted illustration
will also be analysed in the light of the OVEN-READY/READY MEAL metaphorical
scenario. This tweet was released by the Conservatives’ campaign team on their
official Twitter account. It can be considered as one of a long series of memelike
campaign ads posted on social media as part of the digital campaign. Still
focusing on visual and verbal elements, but more specifically moving images, a
short video clip of Boris Johnson’s visit to a pie factory in Derby will be studied.
And finally, three images featuring the metaphor will be dealt with. These three
images – two cartoons and one photograph – provide illustrations in which the
metaphor is also cued verbally and visually, but these data items have been
chosen due to their different connotations. They are linked to the previous
elements since the metaphorical representation of Brexit is built on a similar
metaphorical mapping, which likens Brexit to a pie, but the connotation
mapped from the source to the target domain may differ.
Thus, each piece of data presented in this part features the BREXIT IS A MEAL
metaphor and its variations (BREXIT IS A PIE/BREXIT IS AN OVEN-READY MEAL).
However, they do not resort to the same semiotic modes, and their connotation
may also vary.
3.3 Methodology
As regards the methodology, the Metaphor Identification Procedure (MIP)
elaborated by the Pragglejaz Group (2007) was carried out to establish the
metaphorical nature of the verbal data. This procedure suggests fixed criteria in
order to determine whether a lexical unit should be considered metaphorical.
This can be achieved through a comparison between the basic meaning of the
lexical unit and its meaning in a specific context in which it appears (Pragglejaz
Group 2007: 3).
As mentioned earlier, the aim of this paper is to look at how a metaphor that
first appeared as a rhetorical instrument in a written text, developed through
various semantic modes, with consequences on the connotation of its target
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domain. Consequently, this analysis also relies on the theory of multimodal
metaphors developed by Charles Forceville. According to Forceville (2009: 25),
multimodal metaphors are metaphors whose target and source domains are
cued in different modes. A mode is defined as a sign system that can be
interpreted thanks to a specific perception process often related to the five
senses. The modes include written language, spoken language, visuals, sound,
and gesture among others (Forceville 2009: 22). Therefore, and following
Forceville and Bounergru’s work (2011: 212), if the metaphor is cued both
visually (image, drawing, gesture) and verbally (written text, speech), it shall be
considered a multimodal metaphor.
4. Data analysis
4.1 Verbal data
The first occurrence of the metaphor under scrutiny appeared in the 2019
Conservative manifesto:
(1) With a new Parliament and a sensible majority Government, we
can get that deal through in days. It is oven-ready – and every
single Conservative candidate at this election, all 635 of them,
have pledged to vote for this deal as soon as Parliament returns
(Conservative manifesto 2019).
Thus, the Brexit deal is talked about as if it were some kind of dish ready to be
baked in the oven. The deal, or Brexit deal to be more specific, can be seen as a
metonymy for Brexit since it is part of the process that will allow Britain to exit
the European Union, which is what Brexit is all about. Henceforth, Brexit is
linguistically conceptualised as an “oven-ready” dish through this monomodal
metaphor cued in the verbal mode.
A few weeks after the release of the manifesto, Boris Johnson re-used and
extended the “oven-ready” metaphor in a press interview for Sky News during
a hospital visit (2) and then in a speech delivered at the launch of the
Conservative Party’s General Election campaign in Birmingham (3):
(2) We have an oven ready deal, let's put it in the microwave, as
soon as we get back after the election on 12 December (October
2019).
(3) Whack it [the BREXIT deal] in the microwave, gas mark… I’m not
very good at cooking… Gas mark 4. Prick the lid. Put it in, and
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then we can get on… we can put this deal through Parliament
(November 2019).
These verbal occurrences show that Boris Johnson used and repeated the “ovenready”
metaphor as one of his main talking points during the election
campaign. Besides, it is worth noting that the meal-deal Brexit metaphor can be
considered a creative and unconventional metaphor, as it has been generated in
a specific speech, on a specific occasion. It is still perceived as a metaphor since
it is not lexicalised, and it is not related to any other pre-existing metaphorical
mapping (Dynel 2009: 30; MacCormac 1985). The metaphor is creative, but also
rooted in a basic human activity, that is cooking. Consequently, this makes the
mapping easily understandable for most people, hence accessible to most
people, including young people. However, although cooking a ready meal can
be regarded as a basic human activity, it might not be that obvious for everyone.
Indeed, following these declarations, Boris Johnson was mocked by people
online who pointed out the fact that he got the oven and the microwave mixed
up since there are no gas marks on microwaves.
This verbal metaphor was re-used, extended, and repeated, which fuelled the
mapping between Brexit and the meal deal. It first appeared exclusively
through the verbal mode, so as a monomodal metaphor.
4.2 Verbo-visual meal deal
On 3 December 2019, a week or so prior to the 2019 General Election, the
Conservatives’ campaign team came into action on Twitter with the following
ad illustrating Boris’s oven-ready [Brexit] deal on the Conservatives’ official
Twitter account:
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Fig. 1: Boris’s Brexit deal, @Conservatives, Twitter, 2019
The following verbal tweet: “Ding! Our Brexit deal is ready” is followed by a
computer-generated image that is used as a verbo-pictorial metaphor and
consolidates the mapping between the source and target domains, respectively
a meal deal and Brexit. Here, the occurrence bears the characteristics that
correspond to Forceville’s (2009: 22) definition of a multimodal metaphor. Two
phenomena belonging to different categories are used: BREXIT as the target
domain and COOKING as the source domain, and these two phenomena are cued
in two sign systems: the visual and the verbal systems.
The blue box can be interpreted as a visual symbol of the Brexit deal, so by
metonymic extension, Brexit in itself. This box was designed so as to recall the
boxes containing ready meals in supermarkets. It is not surprising that the
colour blue was chosen, since blue is the official colour of the Conservative
Party. Moreover, the three colours of the Union Jack can be spotted (red, blue,
and white), adding a patriotic tint to this box. This conveys the impression that
the Conservatives are making Brexit theirs, and that they identify themselves
with Brexit and the Brexit deal.
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It is important to mention that without the verbal elements in and around the
picture, the picture would be difficult to understand, and the metaphorical
mapping hardly possible. A parallel can be drawn with the semiotic concept of
anchoring developed by Barthes (1977: 38-41). According to this theory, verbal
elements help the viewer understand the meaning behind an image. Hence, in
a multimodal artefact, the verbal part is used to fix the meaning and guide the
interpretation (Koller 2009: 47). The instruction on the box claims: “Put it in the
microwave”, which echoes Boris Johnson’s speech excerpt studied in 4.1. It
indicates what Johnson intended to do in order to get Brexit done, so the
instructions he would follow if his party were elected. The ingredients section
of the meal deal features the composition of Johnson’s Brexit deal (keeping taxes
low, controlling immigration, etc.). Nonetheless, while the food industry does
verify the nutritional information of food products, no comparable verification
is applied to campaign promises shared on social media. As a result, there may
be reservations about the accuracy and reliability of the content comprising the
Brexit (meal) deal.
Additionally, in the verbal part of the tweet, the onomatopoeia Ding! mimics
the sound of the microwave or oven, which could also add another type of
semantic mode to the multimodal metaphor, as sound also contributes to the
mapping from the source domain.
More than a mere tweet, this can also be considered as an example of
‘shitposting’, since it seems to match the characteristics of the meme-like
campaign ads designed by the digital team led by Topham and Guerin. It is
quite simple, the message is straightforward, and some may find it amusing
(Bonnet 2020: 7). The simplicity of this meme-like campaign advert makes it
easily accessible to all: older voters who are not necessarily familiar with the
meme trend (Bonnet 2020: 7), and younger people who are not familiar with the
current political affairs. This strategy seems to have worked, as the tweet was
retweeted, quoted, and liked thousands of times.
The success of this strategy could also lie in the fact that visual content is more
and more popular on social media, even on platforms initially dedicated to
written content such as Twitter. It has been shown that a tweet which features
a directly viewable image will get more engagement from the audience (Li/Xie
2020). According to Yus (2009: 153), pictures have a more powerful impact and
are efficient devices to visualize concepts. As the expression goes, “a picture is
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worth a thousand words”, especially on social media where people are usually
scrolling without really taking the time to carefully read what pops up before
their eyes.
In summary, this tweet represents an additional stage where the cooking
metaphor was used and extended for rhetorical purpose. It is cued through a
combination of modes: the verbal and visual modes, making it a multimodal
metaphor. The visual part of the metaphor heavily relies on the verbal metaphor
that captions the image, and the multimodal metaphor in its entirety relies on
cultural elements, knowledge of the context, and Boris Johnson’s previous
statements. Boris’s Brexit deal is once again conceptualized as an oven-ready
deal that will promptly be put in the oven, thus likening Brexit to a food item.
On top of that, a couple of days after the tweet was posted, a video was released
in which Boris Johnson was filmed baking a pie and pretending it was Brexit.
Fig. 2: Boris Johnson holding his Brexit pie, S. Rousseau, 2019
This event occurred when Boris Johnson visited a pie factory in Derby, as part
of his campaign. This visit perfectly suited his talking point, and it happened to
be the perfect place to further extend the BREXIT IS AN OVEN-READY MEAL
multimodal metaphor. The following occurrence analysed in the next section is
extracted from a short video clip, so it includes additional modes that help
adding layers to the metaphor: gestures, sounds, visual objects. On top of that,
in the video, Boris Johnson is also putting his gestures into words, hence the
importance of the verbal mode to get a glimpse on the metaphorical meaning
behind this scene.
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Here is the transcript of Johnson’s discourse in the video:
(4) This is the oven-ready pie. We’re here at The Red Olive pie making
facility in Derby where we’ve just made a symbol of what we
intend to do if we are lucky enough to get a working majority
Conservative government and get Brexit done. Put the deal we’ve
got ready to go in the oven, take it out before Christmas and move
our country forward. You put it in, slam it in the oven, take it out,
there it is – get Brexit done, take the country forward, unite, level
up. How could we express this side more succinctly and more
clearly. There it is! (Boris Johnson 2019).
This short video is the epitome of the BREXIT IS AN OVEN-READY MEAL, and more
specifically, BREXIT IS A PIE multimodal metaphorical scenario. In this video,
Boris Johnson is proudly holding a pie. Then, he is being filmed as he is putting
the pie in an actual oven and then taking it out with a large grin on his face,
showing his fresh pie to the cameras. He is wearing an apron emblazoned with
the party’s motto “Get Brexit Done”, which recalls the “Get Brexit Done” boxing
gloves scene in Manchester (Bonnet 2020: 6). Thus, this scene is another symbol
of what he intended to do to “Get Brexit Done”, another visual representation
of his motto. The metaphor is cued verbally, as Johnson is giving a verbal
description of what he is doing and with the motto on the apron. It is cued
visually, through his gestures and actions. The setting and the objects help the
viewer identify the source domain, which is more and more obvious and
delineated. In terms of metaphorical mappings, Boris Johnson is mapped as the
cook, Parliament as the oven, Brexit as a meal (and more specifically, a British
pie), and the voters as those who will enjoy the pie cooked by Boris. This
metaphorical scenario can be connected to the NATION IS A FAMILY scenario,
which was analysed extensively by Musolff (2006, 2016), with Boris Johnson as
the father of the nation, baking a pie to his family, the British citizens.
All in all, this analysis aimed to show how the oven-ready metaphor, which first
appeared verbally in the 2019 Conservative manifesto, was then re-used,
extended, developed through various modes. As time went by, the source
domain used to conceptualise Brexit became more and more definite. It started
as a mere oven-ready meal, and it ended up being symbolised as a British pie.
As for the qualitative interpretation, this metaphor highlights the fact that the
Conservative Party wanted to portray the delivering of Brexit as a simple, basic
process. Getting Brexit done would be resolved in a few steps, as simple as
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putting a pie in the oven. This contrasts with other Brexit metaphors used by
David Cameron and Theresa May who mainly depicted Brexit as a long and
strenuous process with the JOURNEY metaphorical scenario (Jamet/Rodet 2021).
Hence, with his PIE metaphor, Boris Johnson appealed to the voters who
desperately wanted to get over Brexit. Negotiations and debates about Brexit
took up so much time and space in Parliament and in the media, that all the
other issues were swept under the Brexit rug. Nonetheless, this metaphor hides
the potential negative consequences likely to arouse once a Brexit deal would
be put into effect, such as shortages, devaluation of the pound and issues at the
borders with the European continent.
So far in this analysis, the PIE metaphor is positively valued. It was used as a
visual symbol to simplify and illustrate the Conservatives’ motto “Get Brexit
Done”, which was already quite simple. However, Boris’s PIE metaphor was
then re-used and twisted in other contexts with the aim of criticising and
mocking Boris Johnson’s policy and campaign.
4.3 Caricatures of the “oven-ready meal”
Caricatures of Johnson’s oven-ready pie flourished in the media. These
caricatures contributed to the extension of the metaphor and the development
of the mini narrative. Three examples will be studied in this sub-part, starting
with the front cover of the British satirical news magazine Private Eye released
in September 2020:
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Fig. 3: Private Eye magazine, September 2020
The picture chosen to illustrate the issue is an image of an oven that contains a
food item clearly burnt and overcooked to the point where it seems barely
edible. The title preceding the picture indicates that it refers to the latest news
from the oven-ready Brexit deal. The metaphor is cued verbally (via the title)
and visually. The verbal cue helps the reader identify the target domain (Brexit).
This satirised version of the multimodal PIE metaphor conveys the idea that the
deal delivered by Boris Johnson is overcooked, hence a failure. It puts into
question Johnson’s metaphorical cooking skills, thus/hence his skills as the
leader of the nation.
On a different note, freelance cartoonist Royston Robertson also partook in the
redefining of the PIE metaphor with the following drawing:
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Fig. 4: “Prick with a fork”, @roystoncartoons, Twitter, December 2019
The cartoonist seems to have borrowed some elements from the oven-ready
meal advertising campaign released by the Conservative Party on their Twitter
account (see 4.2). In this cartoon, Brexit is also conceptualised as a food
container. It is worth noting that contrary to the Conservatives’ version of the
meal deal, here, the cartoonist labelled it “oven-ready Brexit” instead of “ovenready
deal”, which suggests that the deal can be considered as a metonymy to
talk about Brexit. On this drawing, the use-by date of the meal refers to the date
when the United Kingdom was due to officially leave the European Union.
Below the date, there is a visual rendering of Boris Johnson holding a fork,
followed by the verbal cue “prick with a fork”, which echoes the excerpts from
Johnson’s speech studied in 3.1 (occurrence 3). The word prick here can be
interpreted as a subtle pun targeting Boris Johnson. The warning below
Johnson’s caricature “may blow up in your face” underlines the potentially
detrimental effects of Brexit. Moreover, it recalls the “oven-ready” picture in the
Private Eye. Here, the oven-ready deal multimodal metaphor conveys a
derogatory evaluation, which goes in the opposite direction to what Boris
Johnson’s campaign team intended to do with their image by which this cartoon
is inspired.
Lastly, this political cartoon drawn by Christian Adam for the London Evening
Standard seems to be the pinnacle:
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Fig. 5: “I Never Told any Porkies”, C. Adams, London Evening Standard, 2019
In this cartoon, the multimodal PIE metaphor probably inspired the drawing.
The pie evokes Boris Johnson’s (un)famous oven-ready pie that he baked in
Derby as a symbol of his “Get Brexit Done” motto. In the present case, the
metaphor is cued mainly through the visual mode, but the speech bubble helps
the reader identify the target domain. Here, the target domain is not Brexit, but
it is related to it nonetheless. Here, Boris Johnson himself is encapsulated in his
pie, and more precisely as the stuffing of the pie. This can be interpreted as a
way to denounce the fact that his pie was cooked up with lies, especially since
porkies, or porky pies is Cockney rhyming slang that signifies “telling lies”.
Johnson embodies the porky pie, hence the lie.
Overall, this shows that the multimodal metaphor BREXIT IS A PIE, BREXIT IS AN
OVEN-READY MEAL, which was first used by the Conservative Party for rhetorical
purposes during the 2019 General Election campaign, gradually moved,
evolved, and turned into a parody of Johnson. According to Charteris-Black
(2004: 251): “Since metaphor is a way of creating cognitive and affective
meaning, by changing the metaphor we may change the way we think about
something.” Thus, the different stances endorsed by this multimodal metaphor
change the way we perceive Boris Johnson’s legitimacy as leader of the nation
and his capacity to deliver Brexit. Consequently, this also illustrates the
rhetorical impact metaphors can display as it is “deliberately and consciously
used by speakers or writers to obtain particular effects” (Semino 2008: 29),
(Chilton/Schaffner 2002: 29). On the one hand, it is used by Boris Johnson to
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convey the idea that Brexit is an easy endeavor for its government, and on the
other hand, it is used by cartoonists to mock Boris Johnson’s political campaign.
5. Conclusion
To conclude, this analysis shows how metaphors can evolve and be used to
convey different stances on the same issue, some of these stances can even be
contradictory. The BREXIT IS A PIE metaphor under scrutiny stemmed from a
monomodal metaphor used in the Conservative Party manifesto. As the
metaphor caught attention, it was used as a rhetorical device by Boris Johnson
during the campaign leading to the General Election in December 2019. The
metaphorical mappings between Brexit and a food item were strengthened as
the metaphor was stretched through various modes (visual, verbal, gestures,
sound). As the metaphor turned into a multimodal rhetorical tool, this study
also highlights the fact that its connotation changed and shifted. To begin with,
this metaphor principally highlighted how easy it would be for Boris Johnson
to finally get Brexit done. Then, the PIE metaphor was also used as a means to
trigger an emotional response from those who value traditions, since the pie is
part of the British cultural heritage, which reinforces the identification process
on the part of the voters. Besides, according to journalist Harry Stopes in an
article published in The Newstateman magazine (2020), metaphors tapping into
the domain of food are not uncommon in politics. Brexit was also compared to
a cake, for instance. Boris Johnson also used the expression “have your cake and
eating it” to simplify his policy on Brexit (Charteris-Black 2019: 3). Stopes (2020)
claims that food has the power to symbolise deep feelings about national
identity, especially food items that are considered food specialties in a country,
as is the case of pies, especially pork(y) pies in Britain. However, the connotation
and meaning of the initial metaphor were then twisted and diverted from its
original meaning as it was used by cartoonists and satirists to criticise and mock
the campaign of the Conservatives. The metaphor evolved diachronically, thus
triggering a change in the connotations ascribed to it.
Conversely, comparing Brexit to a ready meal means that Brexit is
conceptualised as a cheap and low-quality meal, usually industrial, and not
recommended due to their poor nutritional value. From this point of view, the
connotation of the metaphor switches from being a positive representation of
Brexit, to considering Brexit as an unhealthy dish served to the British people.
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Nonetheless, ready meals are popular in Britain since they are cheap and easily
accessible in every supermarket, so the choice of the source domain could also
be interpreted as a way to reach every layer of the British population. Therefore,
for further studies, it would be interesting to elaborate on the link between this
metaphorical scenario and the populist approach adopted by Boris Johnson
since the referendum campaign in 2016.
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