ИСТИНА

American presidential discourse has long been investigated by metaphor researchers.A comprehensive framework for analyzing conceptual metaphor in political discourse is proposed by Jonathan Charteris-Black.He called his methodology “critical metaphor analysis”, which involves metaphor identification, metaphor interpretation and metaphor explanation. The comparison of metaphor source domain use in five American presidents' discourses( Ronald Reagan, George Bush Senior, Bill Clinton, George Bush Junior, and Barack Obama) shows that at first among the presidents Ronald Reagan and Barack Obama used metaphor the most frequently, which may be due to their personal experiences and character. Secondly, There are seven most frequently used metaphor source domains in the rhetoric of The seven domains are JOURNEY, RELIGION AND MORALITY, CONFLICT, PERSONIFICATION, LIGHT AND DARNESS, CREATION, REIFICATION. conceptual metaphors in presidential discourse are a potential source of new findings about presidential idiosyncrasies, underlying mindsets and thinking patterns in various communication settings.