e Language of Emotions: A Study on Metaphors and Semantic Fields in Venezuelan

Migrant Women’s Discourse

Carolina Gutiérrez-Rivas

El lenguaje de las emociones: Un estudio sobre metáforas y campos semánticos en el discurso

de mujeres migrantes venezolanas

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

e language of emotions: A study on metaphors and semantic elds in Venezuelan

migrant women’s discourse

RESUMENRESUMEN

ABSTRACTABSTRACT

More than 7.3 million Venezuelans have le their

country since 2014 (UNHCR, 2023). In some South

American countries, more than 50% of Venezuelan

migrants are women and girls who are vulnerable to

violence in their host communities. is article explores

the connections between violence, forced migration

and language expressing emotions that derive from that

experience. e main corpus is Venezuelan migrant

women’s testimonials. e scope of the analysis is

based on generative metaphors and semantic elds

theories. Testimonials were classied in three main

types: testimonials that revolve around the semantic

eld of warfareand survival; testimonials that express

otherness; and testimonials about sexualization and

dehumanization. All of the types showed metaphors

(or the expression) of war. e conclusion is that

hardship and trauma have molded these women’s view

of the world so they now understand it as a battleeld.

Palabras clave: Venezuelan migrant women; generative

metaphors; semantic elds; language and violence

Más de 7.3 millones de ciudadanos venezolanos han

abandonado su país desde 2014 (UNHCR, 2023). En

algunos países de Suramérica, más del 50% de los

venezolanos migrantes son mujeres y niñas, quienes

son vulnerables a la violencia en sus comunidades

receptoras. Este artículo explora las conexiones

entre violencia, migración forzada y el lenguaje

para expresar las emociones que derivan de dicha

experiencia. El corpus principal son testimonios de

mujeres migrantes venezolanas. El análisis se basa

en las teorías de la metáfora generativa y los campos

semánticos. Los testimonios se clasicaron en tres

tipos: los que giran en torno al campo semántico de

la guerra y la sobrevivencia; los que expresan otredad

y los que expresan sexualización y deshumanización.

Los tres tipos de testimonio mostraron metáforas

(o expresiones) de guerra. La conclusión es

que la adversidad y el trauma han moldeado la

visión del mundo de estas mujeres y es así como

lo entienden ahora, como un campo de batalla.

Keywords: mujeres migrantes venezolanas; metáforas

generativas; campos semánticos; lengua y violencia

El lenguaje de las emociones: Un estudio sobre metáforas y campos semánticos en el discurso

de mujeres migrantes venezolanas

RECIBIDO: 20/02/2024

ACEPTADO: 15/04/2024

Carolina Gutiérrez-Rivas

Central Michigan University, USA

gutie1c@cmich.edu

https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1606-4696

DOI: https://doi.org/10.54753/eac.v13i2.2166

INTRODUCTIONINTRODUCTION

Communicating emotions, whether verbally

or non-verbally, is an action most humans engage in

frequently. Usually, disciplines such as psychology

and biology have approached the topic of speech and

emotions from dierent angles and methodologies.

However, it has been argued that speech research from

the linguistic point of view is also “capable of making

a distinctive contribution […] into the mainstream

research on emotion” (Cowie & Cornelius, 2003).

is idea is connected to linguists’ function in society:

linguists are supposed to be agents for social change;

they are in a unique position to tackle questions

that intersect with the social aspects of language

behavior (Charity, 2008). It seems then, worthwhile,

to explore how humans express emotions that emerge

when dealing with violent circumstances and violent

behavior from others.

In the context of this article “violence” is

dened as follows:

Violence [is] an act of physical force that

causes or is intended to cause harm. e

damage inicted by violence may be physical,

psychological, or both. Violence may be

distinguished from aggression, a more general

type of hostile behaviour that may be physical,

verbal, or passive in nature […] violence

is multicausal […] violence results from

a combination of factors, including those

originating in the violent person’s social or

cultural environment and those representing

immediate situational forces. (Encyclopedia

Britannica, n.d.)

Moreover, regardless of its cause, violence

has a negative impact on those who experience it or

witness it. Many psychological disorders, including

post-traumatic stress disorder, are associated with

experiencing or witnessing violence. Psychological

symptoms such as depression and anxiety are common

in victims of violence (Encyclopedia Britannica, n.d.).

Given the consequences violence can have for

those who experience it, this paper will explore and

analyze the discourse patterns of testimonials from

Venezuelan migrant women. e connections between

violence and forced migration are several, and the way

these women express the emotions derived from them

will be the focus of this paper.

Some of the Venezuelan displaced and refugee

women have had terrible lives and hard journeys.

e testimonials come from women who were once

prosperous but whose businesses went broke, as well

as women who had barely enough to eat and feed

their children. Mistreated not only by their own

government, but also by the governments and peoples

of the receiving countries, these women have become

“warriors who overcome.” ey speak with strong

conviction about how one day they will get the better

lives in quest of which they le Venezuela.

As mentioned above, the main objective of

the study is to show how this particular group of

women communicate emotions that arise because

of the situations consequent to their being migrants.

A secondary purpose is to raise consciousness about

these women’s lives and the dehumanization they face

for being poor, displaced and women. Studying and

exposing topics about the human condition can help

combat ignorance and preconceptions about groups

of people who are seen as “the other.”

e paper is structured as follows: e rst part

is an overview of what caused the large displacement

of people from Venezuela to other countries. e

second part consists of a theoretical frame that draws

from the notions of generative metaphors (Hardman,

2006; Hardman et al., 2013), and semantic elds

(Gao & Xu, 2013). Next, there is a description of

the methodology and analysis of the testimonials

of women who migrated to other South American

countries, classifying them in three groups. Finally,

there are concluding remarks.

e Venezuelan Crisis: An Overview

e Venezuelan crisis is lling the headlines

and it truly deserves the world’s attention. It is a

wake-up call to all as it holds relevant lessons for both

developing and developed countries. Venezuela is

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

suering a severe humanitarian crisis which makes

it “the second country of origin for people displaced

across international borders aer Syria, which has

been immersed in a civil war since 2011” (Van Praag,

2019). Its economy has declined at a faster pace

than any other peacetime economy worldwide. Just

between 2014 and 2021, under the authoritarian rule

of Nicolas Maduro, Venezuela’s economy contracted

by 80% (Wordliczek, 2022, p. 24). Fundamental

human rights in Venezuela were infringed also by

its previous president, Hugo Chavez, but with only

domestic consequences. Since Maduro took power,

the violation of human rights and the deepening of

an economic and humanitarian crisis has created

mass emigration to neighboring countries, potentially

destabilizing the entire region (Wordliczek, 2022, p.

24). Hardship and repression have led millions to

ee the country creating a refugee crisis in Colombia

and other neighboring countries. Millions more are

expected to ee unless conditions improve.

Venezuela has long had a unique economy

based on the world’s largest crude oil reserves; for

decades its economy has been dependent only on oil

exports (Stetz, 2022). “is economic position led

Venezuela to be South America’s most prosperous and

promising democracy during the 20th century” (Stez,

2022, p. 2). Hugo Chavez rose to power in February

1999 aer winning the December 1998 presidential

election in a landslide, promising to deliver salvation

to a weary, crisis-battered citizenry by rooting out

corrupt elites and delivering prosperity to the virtuous

“people” (Cf. Andrews-Lee, 2022). Venezuelan &

Ausman (2019) summarize the problem well:

Venezuelans gave all the power to one man,

Hugo Chavez, who generated the illusion of

prosperity through short-sighted populism

and sank the country into communism and

lawlessness by abolishing property rights and

the rule of law, by expanding the government’s

footprint in the economy, by over-regulating

whatever is le of a private sector, by

destroying all institutions that are key to a

civilized society, and by allowing corruption

to contaminate all government’s functions. It

is also the story of the rise and decline of a

revolution that went from being applauded by

many in the world to becoming an illegitimate

dictatorship.

Aer Chavez’s death in 2013, Nicolas Maduro

became the new president. e list of President

Maduro’s anti-democratic actions is very long and

includes government interference in the operation

of democratic institutions in Venezuela, political

prosecution of the opposition, restriction of freedom

of speech, seizing control of the media, elimination

of separation of powers, suspected cooperation

with drug criminals, and rejection of international

humanitarian aid (Wordliczek, 2022, p. 24).

Venezuelan Migration and the Experience of Gender-

Based Violence

e UN General Assembly’ Declaration on

the Elimination of Violence against Women (1994),

Article 1, denes “violence against women” as:

any act of gender-based violence that results

in, or is likely to result in, physical, sexual or

psychological harm or suering to women,

including threats of such acts, coercion or

arbitrary deprivation of liberty, whether

occurring in public or in private life (p. 3).

Amnesty Intentional (2022, p. 4) states,

“Gender-based violence is violence directed against

a person or which aects them disproportionately

because of their gender or sex. Gender-based violence

can take multiple forms and is found in all contexts

where people interact.” Women who have been

displaced from their country of origin, as it is the

case of many Venezuelan women, can be particularly

vulnerable.

Migration has important eects on the lives

and health of people; it can increase inequalities

and exposure –mainly of women and adolescents–

to violence.  Among migrant women, the main

perpetrators of violence are people who are close to the

assaulted women, and the situation of displacement

could aggravate previous abuse. In shelters, the

perpetrators may be intimate partners, relatives or

acquaintances or military and police forces, and

perpetrators outside the shelters may also be strangers

who take advantage of their vulnerability (Makuch et

al., 2021, p. 2).

e United Nations High Commissioner for

Refugees’ website provides the following statistics:

By the end of 2022, 108.4 million people

were forcibly displaced worldwide as a result

of persecution, conict, violence or human

rights violations. is includes: 35.3 million

refugees; 62.5 million internally displaced

people; 5.4 million asylum seekers; 5.2 million

people in need of international protection, a

majority from Venezuela. Alarmingly, more

than 7.3 million Venezuelans have le the

country since 2014. is is the largest exodus

in Latin America’s recent history and one of

the largest displacement crises in the world

(as of February 2023). e vast majority of

Venezuelans, 6 million, are hosted by countries

in Latin America and the Caribbean (as of

March 2023). 20 percent of the population

has ed the country and people continue to

leave at an average of 2,000 per day (UNHCR,

2023).

According to del Campo (2022), more than6.1

million people have ed Venezuela since 2015, with

ve million going to other countries in Latin America

and the Caribbean. More than three million are in

Colombia and Peru, and more than 50% of them

are women and girls. A press release by UN Women

(2020) categorized gender-based violence as a “shadow

pandemic” throughout the region, but there are certain

conditions that leave these Venezuelan women in

situations of greater vulnerability. ese conditions are

not the same everywhere.For example, in Colombia,

migrants, especially women and girls, are particularly

exposed to violence in their host communities, and

oen suer from symbolic violence in which they are

assumed to be prostitutes or sex workers. Furthermore,

in focus groups for some studies, women generally

talked about sexual and gender-based violence inicted

by their partners and families even before leaving

Venezuela (Cf. Calderón-Jaramillo, 2020).

In Peru, Venezuelan female migrants suer

higher rates of nationality-, gender-, and age-based

discrimination than their male counterparts. ey

are devalued, both in public and work settings,

through hyper-sexualization and criminalization, via

interpretations of moral integrity and stereotypes at the

intersection of gender, sex appeal, nationality, age, and

condition as migrants (Cf. Perez & Freier, 2022).In

Brazil, domestic violence is a common situation

at the shelters. Women suer frequent episodes of

physical aggression, psychological threats and verbal

aggression from their husbands and intimate partners

(Cf. Makuch et al., 2021). Ecuador and Chile also

receive a great number of Venezuelan migrants;

women constitute 51% of Venezuelan migrants

in Chile. Latin American immigrants, including

Venezuelans, suer dicult living conditions in

Chile: an estimated 29.6% of migrant households live

in poverty and 18.9% in overcrowded conditions. In

most cases, these are irregular migrants who might

have experienced violence, intimidation or political

prosecution (Cf. Gonzalez-Agüero & Burcu, 2024).

THEORETICAL FRAMETHEORETICAL FRAME

is study is based on the concept of metaphor.

Lako and Johnson (1980, p. 15), who created a

taxonomy of metaphors, write about “conceptual

metaphors,” which are gures humans use to

understand and experience ideas or facts in terms

of another. e authors state that “Primarily on the

basis of linguistic evidence, we have found that most

of our ordinary conceptual system is metaphorical in

nature” (Lako and Johnson, 1980, p.15). eir study

was aimed at identifying why metaphors structure

how we perceive things, how we think, and what we

do. e authors argue that metaphors are concepts

through which humans structure everyday activities.

e implication of this is that we are constantly using

metaphors to think and to talk about our experience.

In other words, metaphors can be oen explained

with a formula such as A is B, in which concept A is

understood in the terms of concept B.

e main denition of metaphor I will

use throughout this paper is the one developed by

Hardman (2006) and Hardman et al. (2013), who

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

call this kind of gure the “generative metaphor.”

According to Hardman (2006), “generative metaphors”

are “those that allow a whole sluice of metaphors that

everybody understands because the generative one

underlies the general thinking patterns; e.g., war, or

sports, or business, etc.” (Hardman 2006, personal

communication). In their book, Hardman et al. (2013)

explain that this kind of metaphor is a “basic structure

of ordinary language use” and that “any generative

metaphor is specic to a given language or cultural

complex” (p. 59). ree examples in U.S. English that

Hardman et al. (2013) give of generative metaphors

derive from the concepts of war (violence, battle),

sports, and sex. In a sense, to understand generative

metaphors, one can link them to the notion of “lexical

eld or domain,” which refers to a set of words (or

lexemes) related in meaning (Nordquist, 2019).e

theory of semantic elds or eld-theory was originated

by German and Swiss scholars in the 1920s and 1930s

(i.e. Ipsen, 1924; Porzig, 1934; and Trier, 1934). e

most prominent of eld-theories is Trier’s, who stated

that some words could form a semantic eld under a

common concept. For instance, by including cat, dog,

horse, tiger, elephant and so on within the concept

of “animal,” one can form a semantic eld. Trier

also proposed that the meanings of words in

the same semantic eld are interdependent and

underdetermined (Cf. Wangru, 2016). In other

words, a semantic eld is “a combination of a group of

words that interact, dominate, distinguish and depend

on with each other” (Gao & Xu, 2013, p. 2031). In

any given language, some words, under the domain

of a certain concept, when combined together form

a semantic eld. For example, under the common

concept of furniture, words such as table, closet, bed,

etc. could be generated as a semantic eld (Gao & Xu,

2013, p. 2031).

Out of the three domains prevalent in U.S.

English (i.e., war, sports and sex) according to

Harman et al. (2013), the most prominent one in

the analyzed testimonials was the warfare metaphor.

is is not surprising at all, given that these displaced

peoples have been victims of harsh treatment by their

own partners, their government and, in many cases,

by their host society. Mey (2001, p. 203) gives us one

of the best images to describe how war metaphors

work: “[M]etaphors are always charged with high

pragmatic explosives.” Metaphors are rooted very

deeply within a culture and may serve to express deep

states of mind and emotions. ey are a mechanism to

digest circumstances that can be hard to describe with

plain language. As Carter et al. (2001 in Nordquist

2019) put it: “Cultural attitudes to particular areas

of human activity can oen be seen in the choices

of metaphor used when that activity is discussed.”

erefore, metaphors of survival are also found in the

corpus analyzed here, since it is what these women

feel happened to them: they have been to war and

came out of it wounded but alive. Taylor (2021, p.464)

argues that one of the components of a metaphor’s

persuasive power lies in its ability to evoke emotions. I

will add that metaphors also have the power to convey

emotions, and are one of the main ways humans

express deep emotions and feelings verbally.

Finally, in order to deal with other aspects of

these refugees’ discourse, this paper also draws from

the Discourse Analysis methodology. Discourse may

refer to an instance of text or talk in its social context

(van Dijk, 1989) or to a sociological phenomenon—

the ideological process of constructing knowledge

about a topic (Foucault, 1978). e term may also

be “used abstractly to mean statements in general or

to refer to a particular group or type of statements”

(Philo, 2007, p. 176).

Heras Monner Sans & Foio (2007) explain the

following about the creation of discourse:

there are frameworks or contexts created

by our discursive practices, which, in turn,

provide meaning to our actions, and engender

(make possible) specic actions, ways of

acting and perceiving realities on their own

[…erefore] one can support the premise

that social imagery, discursive practices and

actions and interactions, constitute specic

communities’ resources and become cultural

ways of understanding the world (p. 4).

For the most part, the discourse of these women

revolves around sexualization and dehumanization,

pain and embarrassment, and grief and hopelessness.

In all of them, metaphors of war and survival appear.

METHODOLOGYMETHODOLOGY

e testimonials analyzed in this paper belong

to real women who were displaced from their country

of origin, Venezuela, and now live elsewhere in South

America. Most are found in “Pies para que te tengo,

testimonios de personas venezolanas refugiadas

y migrantes” (Feet, What Do I Have You For:

Testimonials of Venezuelan Refugees and Migrants)

published by RED CLAMOR, ACNUR, in 2020. e

testimonials derive from interviews that took place

in eleven cities in four counties: Colombia, Ecuador,

Panama and Peru. e information was cross-checked

with e Interagency Coordination Platform for

Refugees and Migrants (R4V), which is made up by

over 200 organizations (including UN Agencies, civil

society, faith-based organizations and NGOs, among

others) that coordinate their eorts under Venezuela's

Refugee and Migrant Response Plan (RMRP) in 17

countries in Latin America and the Caribbean.

A few other testimonials come from other

humanitarian organizations, Care.org and Amnesty

International, two reputable, non-prot organizations

based all over the world. Care.org is a nonsectarian

organization whose advocates have prevented

deadly cuts to U.S. foreign assistance funding that

delivers lifesaving interventions for mothers and

their babies, feeds children and families, and allows

millions to li themselves out of poverty. In 2016,

and again in 2022, CARE Action advocated for

the passage and subsequent reauthorization of the

Global Food Security Act, which ensures the U.S.

keeps its commitments to ghting global hunger and

malnutrition through supporting women smallholder

farmers (Cf. CARE Action Two Page Brief, 2023).

Amnesty International is aglobal movement of more

than 10 million peoplewho ght for universal human

rights. It is based on global voluntary membership.

On their webpage, they state that their vision is that

of a world where everyone can enjoy the human

rights enshrined in the Universal Declaration of

Human Rights and other international human rights

mechanisms. To achieve this vision, their mission is to

undertake research and action focused on preventing

and ending grave abuses of these rights (Cf. Amnesty

International).

e translations for the testimonials in the

RED CLAMOR, ACNUR book are mine. Care.org

and Amnesty International provide testimonials in

Spanish and in English translation. English translations

were used aer being checked for accuracy.

Even though some of these testimonials were

published in a book (with no mention of names), and

others are publicly available on the organizations’

websites (with the names of the sources), they will

be treated all as anonymous testimonials. erefore,

as shown in Table 1, each testimonial will be coded

with the letter “W,” for woman, a letter to identify the

country they are at, a number and the source of the

testimonial:

Table 1

Codication of Participants

Code Meaning

Letter W Means “woman.”

Number Assigned at random to each testimonial,

starting with one (1).

C Colombia

CH Chile

E Ecuador

P Peru

AI Amnesty International

Care Care.org

Clamor Red Clamor, ACNUR

For instance, the rst testimonial is from Care.

org, given by a woman in Colombia. erefore, it is

coded as W1C-Care.

Aer a close reading of the book and

web testimonials, those given only by women

were extracted. ose with substantial generative

metaphors of war and survival were then identied.

Even though there are other heart-rending stories, this

paper is based on the analysis of ten testimonials that

stand out in that regard. e scope of the analysis is

linguistic, and it is based on generative metaphors and

semantic elds theory, as mentioned above. e aim is

to provide a qualitative analysis on how these women

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

describe themselves and their experience throughout

the journey of leaving their country and arriving in

newsocieties which are, more oen than not, hostile

towards them.e aim is to explore how these women

talk about their emotions and communicate their

experience of the violence that comes with being

displaced from one’s home country.

ANALYSIS AND DISCUSSIONANALYSIS AND DISCUSSION

Testimonials that revolve around the Semantic Field of

Warfareand Survival

W1C-Care migrated to Colombia from

Barquisimeto, Lara State, in Venezuela, with

hermother, son and three nephews. She declares:

It was tough becausewhen you leave

Venezuela, you leave everything. But my

biggest motivation was my son. I fought for

him because in Venezuela, when I had to take

him to his pediatrician, I had no way to cover

those expenses, especially because he gets

seizures, and it was very dicult for me to buy

[his medication] there (Care.org).

is woman speaks from a place of

abandonment and desolation when saying she le

everything behind. During her testimonial, she

makes it clear that the reason to move on to the next

“battle” is her son. e verb “to ght” emphasizes this

feeling of coming from a battleeld: she speaks as if

she were a soldier returning from a war and, possibly

going to another one because now, in Colombia, on

the other side of the combat zone, she still does not

feel she is in the clear. W1C-Care is tentative about the

new society she is learning to navigate, but it feels like

a potential mineeld “[ My hope is] that [people] do

not undermine us, even though we are immigrants,

we are human beings just like them” (Care.org).

However, and in spite of the hardships she

has endure, W1C-Care still has strong condence

in herself. Metaphors of survival and perseverance

sprinkle her speech: “I value myself. I consider myself

a warrior woman.” She still has strength to keep going

and encourages her family in Venezuela to do the

same in spite of the hardships: “e situation over

there hit hard, but carry on, that’s what I say.”

W2C-Care’s speech also falls within the

semantic eld of war and survival. She decided to

leave her country because her son has a psychomotor

delay and, in Venezuela, a medical, neurological,

pediatric consultation is very expensive.is woman

has been a victim of domestic violence and it seems

that by eeing the country, she has also managed to

escape that situation:

I continue in the ght with him and supporting

him day by day. Also, I experienced domestic

violence from my son’s father […]. But since

I have been here for a year and a half,I have

managed to overcome my barriers and thank

God I am still ghting to get ahead (Care.org).

As with W1C-Care, this woman (W2C-Care) ends her

account from a place of empowerment in spite of all

the diculties she has encountered.

W3C-Care also migrated to Colombia because

the situation was very hard. She and her ex-husband

had to close their business. A weapon metaphor

describes what prompted them to leave:

e trigger [for leaving] was the economic

situation. My business was not enough

anymore. We did not know whether to buy

merchandise or buy food, because every

day the [prices] went up. One leaves, more

than anything, aside from hunger, for our

children, so that they have a better future

(Care.org).

us her journey was a like a detonation set

o by the two powerful causes: hunger and the hope

to protect her children and give them a better life.

Similarly, WE4-Clamor, who le her kids in Venezuela

 Emphases with bold letters are added.

 In Spanish, the woman uses the verb socavar, whose direct synonym is minar: enterrar articios explosivos para contener el avance del

enemigo (DRAE). is literally means “to undermine.”

to nd work in Ecuador, received a call saying her

kids had to leave the place where they were living. Her

three kids were sent by bus, by themselves, to Ecuador,

where their mother could only wait at the border for

them. Because of visa restrictions newly-imposed on

Venezuelan citizens at that very moment, if she le

Ecuador she was at risk of being denied re-entry and

losing everything. When waiting for the kids with her

cousin in Rumichaca, a bridge that divides the border

between Ecuador and Colombia, she describes her

feelings as if she had lost a war: “We were waiting in

Rumichaca, looking everywhere for them, desperate.

We were in the Red Cross tents, and we felt defeated,

because we couldn’t nd them” (Red Clamor, 2020, p.

18). Luckily, for this woman and her kids, they were

able to reunite and go to her new place in Quito,

Ecuador.

Testimonials that Express

Otherness: e Discourse of Hopelessness

It is striking that some of these women feel

bad for migrating into other countries. ey feel the

tension that their presence in the host countries creates.

At the same time, they are tired of not having decent

job opportunities, being unhoused, having limited

access to education and health services, suering

discrimination and xenophobia and, in some cases,

tired of suering sexual orientation discrimination

(Red Clamor, p. 13). For example, WC5-Clamor uses a

war metaphor to apologize for whatever she feels she

and other migrants are doing wrong. ere are also

traces of hopelessness in her words when she says that

this was their last recourse:

Really, sorry for invading your space. We are

invading a space, and that was not something

we wanted. No. It’s what we had to do because

we had no other choice. It's not because we

want to, but because we had no other choice

(Red Clamor, 2020, p. 13).

For as much as they did not want to migrate

and they do not want to be in a dierent country, they

see no other solution to their problems.

is is also the case of WC6-Care. She and her

young son walked days at a time,their feet bleeding

and blistered, in search of a better life. “ere’s

nothing you want more than to be in your country

with your traditions, with your people, your family,”

she says. “e situation in Venezuela is getting more

critical every day.” is speaker employs repetition

of the possessive pronoun your to emphasize the fact

that she belongs somewhere else that is not the host

society, which is hostile towards her and her family.

Aer arriving in Colombia, they discovered that

nding legal work as Venezuelans is dicult. e

family had to live on the street, begging for food and

facing discrimination and harassment for months

before deciding to continue on to Peru where they

have friends and a better support network. And just

as structures collapse when there is a bombing, WC6-

Clamor says: “I traveled with the illusion that my

profession was going to allow me to work and help

my family. All of my illusions crumbled with time. I

le with a suitcase lled with dreams and ended with

a bag of nightmares” (Red Clamor, 2020, p. 12). e

nal metaphor, a suitcase lled with dreams that

turned into a bag of nightmares, conveys feelings of

displacement, rejection and ostracism upon entering

a new society that is not welcoming.

WCH7-AI is a journalist. In Venezuela, she

worked on one of the major newspapers in her region.

In 2018, she ed her home due to a lack of food and

medicine for her son, as well as threats from Bolivarian

National Guard ocials because of her work as a

freelance reporter.

While holding regular immigration status in

Peru, she was able to apply for a visa that the Chilean

government requires for Venezuelans for entering

Chile. e Chilean Consulate in Peru took more than

eight months to process this visa application, despite

the humanitarian nature of this sort of visa. In February

2020, the Consulate granted them a visa, valid for three

months, to enter Chile. WCH7-AI planned a journey

but was not able to go because of border closures

during the Covid-19 pandemic. Months later, when

the border was opened in November 2020, her visa had

already expired. She applied for the visa again, but it

was rejected without any explanation. WCH7-AI says

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

that her situation became untenable: “I started selling

water at trac lights on the streets of Lima. I plunged

into a depression. I didn’t even recognize myself.

I wanted to commit suicide, I felt like my head was

going to explode.” e use of the verb “to plunge” to

talk about depression is very signicant, given that this

verb, according to the Merriam Webster Dictionary,

means entering quickly and forcibly into something,

or to enter a state or course of action usually suddenly,

unexpectedly or violently. Usually, people talk about

“falling into a depression.” erefore, by using the

verb to “plunge,” WCH7-AI intends to convey how

quickly her situation precipitated a deplorable state

of mind. e war metaphor used in this testimonial

(“I felt like my head was going to explode”) very

vividly illustrates not only her physical pain, but

the extreme-psychological agony this person was

experiencing in that situation. In the case of WCH7-

AI, having to migrate again, this time from the rst

host country, pushed her toward suicide––seeing no

place for herself in this world. However, the interview

with her took place in Santiago de Chile. We do not

learn the details of her situation there, but Amnesty

International explains that she got there by walking

and with the aid of a Coyote (people smuggler):

Venezuelan people travel long distances by bus

and on foot, oen with their young children.

e closure of land borders, the imposition

of visa requirements and the diculty of

obtaining consular visas are factors that push

people to cross borders irregularly. To reach

the Chilean border, they have no choice but

to travel long distances on foot, a physically

strenuous journey, during which they are

exposed to hostile climatic conditions, such as

the driest desert on the planet, and are at high

risk of abuse, including robberies, fraud and

sexual violence, at the hands of the criminal

groups that dominate those territories

(Amnesty International, 2023).

Testimonials About Sexualization and Dehumanization

It is oen the case that Venezuelan migrant

women are sexually harassed just because of their

origin. Pineda & Avila (2019, p. 82) argue that, from

the moment they start their journey from their country

of origin to the host country, women face multiple

forms of violence and gender-based inequalities, such

as prejudice, stereotypes, harassment, sex violence,

prostitution, kidnapping or recruitment from sex

trackers. It is also documented that Venezuelan

women, have been blamed––particularly in

Colombia––for an increase in indelity cases thereby

destabilizing families (Cf. Pineda &Avila, 2019).

Many Venezuelan women who were interviewed by

Red Clamor reported suering discrimination, sexual

harassment, sexual assault or sexual aggression. In

their host societies, they are constantly asked if they

are Venezuelan, and not in an “innocent” way; the

question is oen followed by propositions for sex in

exchange for money, food, or a place to sleep. At other

times, the question is accompanied by sexual violence

or other violent attacks. (Red Clamor, 2020, p. 54).

Some of the women who have suered this

kind of violence explicitly talk about their experiences.

at is the case for both WC8-Clamor and WE9-Clamor

who suered sexual assaults while receiving a service

or when providing it. WC8-Clamor took a taxi and, a

few moments later, the other passengers traveling in the

car stepped out of the taxi. It was she and the driver

from there on. is woman states that when she talks,

people immediately know she is from Venezuela, and

when that happens they start yelling at her. at day,

the taxi driver asked her “Are you Venezuelan?” to

which she said yes. Aer talking about the situation

in Venezuela for a while, the man started grabbing her

inappropriately and pulling her shirt to take it o. He

drove to a high and solitary place and locked the doors

of the car. She describes the following:

I thought: Oh my God, he is going to rape me

here […] he started taking his clothes o and

to take his thing out so I would grab it, he took

his member out […] I started looking inside

my purse. I have a small cologne spray and I

 It is important here to note that the word used in Spanish by WCH7-AI is the exact equivalent of plunged: “Me sumergí en una

depresión […],” which is not a common expression either in this language to talk about depression. e regular expression is “caer en

depression," literally “to fall into depression.”

sprayed him with that. Aer that, I opened the

door and ran. He le a stench in me, in half of

my face. When I got home, and felt the stench

in my body, I showered, but I could still feel

that smell (Red Clamor, 2020, p. 54).

e resemblance to war permeates in this

woman’s discourse. In a war-free country such as

Colombia, in a day-to-day situation, women are not

expecting these sorts of thing to happen them, but this

Venezuelan-migrant woman literally had to defend

herself and run to escape aer being a victim of

sexual assault. Aer that, and as it is the case of many

assaulted women, WC8-Clamor could not get rid of

the sensations this assault imprinted in her mind and

body. She was le suering from post-traumatic stress

just as victims of war oen are.

e testimonial given by WE9-Clamor about

her experience in Ecuador is similar. She and her

sisters escaped a mob of men who tried to take revenge

on them for a crime committed by a Venezuelan man

they did not even know. ey were in the city of

Otavalo, staying in the town square because they had

no house. ey noticed more trac and movement

than usual the day this happened. ey were asleep

and suddenly woke up:

one of [the men] said “kill them, kill them.”

We ran and ran, barefoot. ey said “look

for them, look for them” […] In the evening

[…] people explained to us what happened:

a Venezuelan man had killed an Ecuadorian

woman, and that is what was happening when

they attacked us. ey stole our things and they

tried to rape us and kill us, and because of that,

we decided to go to Quito (Red Clamor, 2020,

p. 37).

is is the kind of extreme situation that occurs

in countries at war: women running barefoot trying

to escape rape and death, their possessions stolen and

their spaces ransacked. But this happened in Ecuador;

there was no war. ese are women who had to run

for their lives because, as Venezuelan migrants, they

were scapegoats for someone else’s crime.

e vulnerability of women and LGBTI+

Venezuelan-refugee and migrant persons worsens

due to their displacement. Women, amongst them

transgender women, suer xenophobic discrimination

that is tied to gender-based violence, a consequence

of the unequal power dynamics that emerge in

relationships with men. is sort of discrimination

manifests itself in the sexualization of their bodies

and in sexual violence (Red Clamor, p. 18-19). Just in

the year 2018, for example, in the Caribbean Region

of Colombia, 23 cases of violence against LGBTI+

Venezuelan persons were registered. A transwoman

was murdered, ve died of AIDS for the lack of access

to medicine, there were two complaints about police

violence against transwomen and 42 complaints of

discrimination and xenophobia based on national

origin and being part of the LGBTI+ collective (Cf.

Pineda and Avila, 2019).

WC10-Clamor is a transgender woman whose

case is a good example of this. She recalls an assault

that took place while walking through a cold part of

Colombia:

ere were moments that one would never

want to remember. ey took advantage of

our situation. On one occasion, in a place in

Colombia where it is too cold, we asked an

18-wheeler driver to get us out of there [...] I

had to beg on my knees so he would get us out

of that place because the cold was going to kill

me. And the man did give us a ride, but still,

he took advantage of the situation, he made

me do things that I cannot talk about (Red

Clamor, 2020, p. 19).

e act of begging on one’s knees can also be

compared to when, in war situations, a person begs

for their life, or when being forced into that position

before being executed. WC10-Clamor reports that

she and her travel partners were in such an extreme

and vulnerable position that she had to go down on

her knees to get out of it alive. Finally, the fact that

she cannot bring herself to talk about what the man

made her do to give them a ride is a sign that it was

very traumatic. It can be argued that, in this case, not

naming the facts but using a euphemistic expression

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

BIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCESBIBLIOGRAPHIC REFERENCES

Agyekum, K. (2002). e communicative role of

silence in Akan. Pragmatics. Quarterly

Publication of the International Pragmatics

Association (IPrA), 12(1), 31-51. https://doi.

org/10.1075/prag.12.1.03agy

Amnesty International. (n.d.). Who We Are. Retrieved

February 10, 2024. https://www.amnesty.org/

en/about-us/

Amnesty International. (July 12, 2022). Unprotected:

gender-based violence against Venezuelan

refugee women in Colombia and Peru. Retrieved

February 10, 2024. https://www.amnesty.org/

en/documents/amr01/5675/2022/en/

“…things I cannot talk about” is comparable to

remaining silent. “Silence is a multifunctional

communicative feature with dierent sociopragmatic

and pragmalinguistic functions” (Méndez Guerrero

& Camargo Fernández, 2015, p.7). It has been proven

that silence is a tool that some speakers utilize when

they cannot bring themselves to talk about certain

topics, either because it makes reference to what they

consider “unspeakable” topics, or taboo topics, or

when the topic touches some deep bers that make

strong emotions arise. According to Agyekum (2002,

p. 49) “silence is eectively employed when the topic

is particularly delicate, a taboo, or when the situation

is emotionally loaded and the speaker is ‘at a loss’ for

words.”

CONCLUSIONCONCLUSION

Venezuela is experiencing an unprecedented

humanitarian crisis that has caused an exodus to

neighboring countries, leaving women and girls

particularly vulnerable. Studies show that migrants

tend to be more exposed to sexual and gender-based

violence due to the normalization of such forms of

violence (Cf. Calderón-Jaramillo, 2020). rough

a series of testimonials gathered from reputable

humanitarian organizations––Amnesty International,

Red Clamor, ACNUR and Care.org–– it was possible

to identify several metaphors used by displaced

women when talking about their experience. is

group of women, who do not know each other and

who now live in dierent regions or countries, all

migrated from a place that is experiencing dramatically

dicult circumstances. e women have a common

denominator that shows in their speech: the use of

metaphors of war and survival.

Aer a close reading and detailed analysis of

the Venezuelan migrant women’s discourse chosen for

the study, a reasonable conclusion is that hardship and

trauma have molded their view of the world; they now

understand it as a battleeld. e sample is not very

big, but it could be argued that the results showed here

can be extrapolated to a large portion of the female

Venezuelan migrant population.

e main objective of the study was reached,

which was to show that this particular set of women,

a group of Venezuelan migrants, have a specic way

of communicating their emotions when it comes to

their situation as poor and displaced women. eir

speech revolves mainly around metaphors of war and

the semantic eld of warfareand survival. ey speak

of themselves as survivors of an “unocially declared”

war against them because of their nationality and their

gender. ey have been subjected to persecution, rape

and blatant discrimination.

Finally, one may hope that the secondary

purpose of the article will be fullled by raising

consciousness in the general public and among the

members of the scientic community. It is necessary

to remind ourselves again and again that millions of

women live their lives like this and endure similar

situations every day. Moreover, it is crucial to

understand that the testimonials analyzed for this

article belong to the women who could talk, the ones

who were given the chance to have a voice and tell

their stories. ere are untold millions who suer in

silence and, nally, there are the ones who lost their

lives while searching for a better life, and who will

never be able to tell us what they went through.

Future investigations may include testimonials

from men and cover the lives of Venezuelan migrants

in other regions of the world.

Amnesty International. (March 7, 2023). "No one

wants to live in hiding": Lack of protection

for Venezuelan refugees in Chile. Retrieved

January, 14 2024. https://www.amnesty.org/

en/documents/amr22/6437/2023/en/

Andrews-Lee, C. (2022). A populist legacy and

authoritarian response. In N. Ringe, & L.

Rennó (Eds.), Populists and the pandemic (pp.

196-206). Routledge.

Calderón-Jaramillo, M., Parra-Romero, D., Forero-

Martínez, L. J., Royo, M., & Rivillas-García, J.

C. (2020). Migrant Women and Sexual and

Gender-Based Violence at the Colombia-

Venezuela Border: A Qualitative Study.

Journal of Migration and Health, 1–2, 100003.

https:// doi.org/10.1016/j.jmh.2020.100003

CARE Action Two Page Brief. (December 14, 2023).

Retrieved February 10, 2024. https://www.

care.org/news-and-stories/resources/care-

action-two-page-brief/

Carter, R., Goddard, A., Bowring, M., Reah, D., &

Sanger, K. (2001).Working with texts: A core

introduction to language analysis. Psychology

Press.

Charity, A. H. (2008). Linguists as agents for

social change. Language and Linguistics

Compass, 2(5), 923-939. https://doi.

org/10.1111/j.1749-818X.2008.00081.x

Cowie, R., & Cornelius, R. R. (2003). Describing the

emotional states that are expressed in speech.

Speech Communication, 40(1-2), 5-32. https://

doi.org/10.1016/S0167-6393(02)00071-7

Del Campo, C. (July 22, 2022,). Constant violence

and absent governments: e twofold lack

of protection faced by Venezuelan refugees.

Amnesty International. https://www.

amnesty.org/en/latest/news/2022/07/

twofold-lack-faced-by-venezuelan-

refugees/#:~:text=More%20than%20

6.1%20million%20people,them%20are%20

women%20and%20girls.

Encyclopedia Britannica. (n.d.). Violence. Retrieved

February 10, 2024. https://www.britannica.

com/topic/violence

Estey, J. & Adelung, K. (2019, June 1). A pregnant

mother’s harrowing journey on foot from

Venezuela. Care.org. https://www.care.org/

news-and-stories/news/a-pregnant-mothers-

harrowing-journey-on-foot-from-venezuela/

Foucault, M. (1978). Nietzsche, genealogy, history.

Semiotexte, 3(1), 78–94. https://philarchive.

org/archive/FOUNGH

Gao, C., & Xu, B. (2013). The application of

semantic field theory to English vocabulary

learning. Theory & Practice in Language

Studies, 3(11), 2030-2035. https://doi.org/

10.4304/tpls.3.11.2030-2035

Gonzalez-Agüero, M., & Burcu, O. (2024).

The vulnerabilities of skilled irregular

Venezuelan migrants and entrepreneurs

in Chile. Journal of Ethnic and

Migration Studies, 1-19. https://doi.

org/10.1080/1369183X.2024.2305270

Hardman, M.J. (2006, March 19). Question about

metaphors. Personal Communication, via

email.

Hardman, M. J., Taylor, A. & Wright, C.

(2013).Making the invisible visible: Gender

in language: iUniverse. Bloomington.

Heras Moner Sans, A. I., & Foio, S. (2007, April

13-15). Inclusion and exclusion as semantic

fields agents’ perspectives through inter

disciplinary analysis. Unpublished paper

presented at The Second International

Conference on Multicultural Discourses,

Institute of Discourse and Cultural Studies,

Zhejiang University, Hangzhou, China.

Lakoff, G., & Johnson, M. (1980). Metaphors we live

by. University of Chicago Press.

Makuch, M. Y., Osis, M. J., Becerra, A., Brasil, C., de

Amorim, H. S., & Bahamondes, L. (2021).

Narratives of experiences of violence of

Venezuelan migrant women sheltered at the

northwestern Brazilian border. PLoSOne

16(11), e0260300. https://doi.org/10.1371/

journal.pone.0260300

Méndez Guerrero, B. & Camargo Fernández,

L. (2015). Los actos silenciosos en la

conversación española: condicionantes,

realizaciones y efectos. Círculo de

lingüística aplicada a la comunicación, 64,

6-31. https://dialnet.unirioja.es/servlet/

articulo?codigo=5270722

Merriam Webster Dictionary. (n.d.). Plunge.

Retrieved February 10, 2024. https://www.

merriam-webster.com/dictionary/plunge

Mey, J. (2001). Pragmatics. An introduction. Malden,

MA: Blackwell.

Gutiérrez-Rivas, C. Rev. Educ. Art. y Com. Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio- Diciembre 2024: 44-57

Vol. 13 Nro. 2, Julio-Diciembre 2024

ISSN: 2602-8174

Nordquist, R. (2019, July 2019). Semantic Field

Denition. oughtCo. https://www.

thoughtco.com/semantic-eld-1692079

Perez, L. M., & Freier, L. F. (2023). Of prostitutes

and thieves: the hyper-sexualisation and

criminalisation of Venezuelan migrant

women in Peru. Journal of Ethnic and

Migration Studies,49(3), 715-733. https://doi.

org/10.1080/1369183X.2022.2047907

Philo, G. (2007). Can discourse analysis successfully

explain the content of media and journalistic

practice? Journalism Studies, 8(2), 175–196.

https://doi.org/10.1080/14616700601148804

Pineda, E., & Avila, K. (2019). Aproximaciones a la

migración colombo-venezolana: desigualdad,

prejuicio y vulnerabilidad. Clivatge, 7, 46–97.

https://doi.org/10.25058/1794600X.988

Red Clamor-ACNUR. (2020, November). Pies

para que te tengo: Testimonios de personas

venezolanas refugiadas y migrantes- Red

CLAMOR. Retrieved December 11, 2023.

https://www.acnur.org/media/pies-para-

que-te-tengo-testimonios-de-personas-

venezolanas-refugiadas-y-migrantes-red-

clamor

Royal Spanish Academy. (s.f.). Minar. In Diccionario

de la lengua española. Retrieved February 10,

2024. https://dle.rae.es/cultura?m=form

Royal Spanish Academy. (s.f.). Socavar. In Diccionario

de la lengua española. Retrieved February 10,

2024. https://dle.rae.es/socavar?m=form

Shapiro, A. (2021, September 13). Hardship and hope:

Venezuelan migrants share their stories. Care.

org. https://www.care.org/news-and-stories/

news/stories-from-the-field-venezuelan-

migrants-share-their-stories/

Stetz, A. (2022). e humanitarian crisis in Venezuela.

Harvard Model Congress. Europe.

Taylor, C. (2021). Metaphors of migration over

time. Discourse & Society, 32(4), 463-

481.

UNHCR. e UN Refugee Agency (n.d.). 108.4 million

people worldwide were forcibly displaced.

Retrieved February 10, 2024. https://www.

unhcr.org/gures-at-a-glance.html

UNHCR. e UN Refugee Agency (n.d.). Venezuela

humanitarian crisis. Retrieved February

10, 2024. https://www.unrefugees.org/

emergencies/venezuela/

United Nations General Assembly (1994, February

23) Declaration on the Elimination of Violence

against Women, A/ RES/48/104. Retrieved

February 10, 2024. https://www.refworld.org/

docid/3b00f25d2c.html

UN Women (n.d.) e Shadow Pandemic: Violence

against women during COVID-19. Retrieved

February 10, 2024. https://www.unwomen.

org/en/news/in-focus/in-focus-gender-

equality-in-covid-19-response/violence-

against-women-during-covid-19

Van Praag, O (2019, September 13). Understanding

the Venezuelan refugee crisis. Wilson Center.

www.wilsoncenter.org/article/understanding-

the-venezuelan-refugee-crisis.

Venezuelan, A., & Ausman, J. (2019). e

devastating Venezuelan crisis. National

Library of Medicine. e National Center

for Biotechnology Information. Surgical

Neurology International. https://www.ncbi.

nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6744797/

Wangru, C. (2016). Vocabulary Teaching Based on

Semantic-Field. Journal of Education and

Learning,5(3), 64-71. https://doi.org/10.5539/

JEL.V5N3P64

Wordliczek, R. (2022). Defense of human rights

and the humanitarian crisis at the border of

Venezuela and Colombia from the United

States policy perspective.Barometr Regionalny.

Analizy i Prognozy,18(2), 23-31. https://doi.

org/10.56583/br.2049