Abstract This paper investigates the ways in which immoral villains in contemporary fictional television are linguistically constructed as antiheroes that are appealing and even likeable to a wide mainstream audience. The underlying dataset comprises the first thirteen episodes of each of the three American TV series Breaking Bad, House of Cards, and Dexter. In order to highlight the equivocal status of the protagonists, this study adopts approaches from both cognitive semantics and register theory. The blending of mental spaces in utterances by the antiheroes underlines the fact that they oscillate between diverse social and cognitive domains. In addition, the protagonists are highly versatile in accommodating their linguistic registers to alternating situational contexts. As a result, they are framed as resourceful, multifaceted, and captivating individuals in a way that accounts for the tremendous pop-cultural impact and economic success of these TV shows.

中文翻译：

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构建反英雄：当前美国电视连续剧中的语言表征

摘要本文研究了当代虚构电视中不道德小人在语言上被构造为反英雄的方法，这些方法对广大的主流观众都具有吸引力甚至令人喜爱。基础数据集包括三个美国电视连续剧《绝命毒师》，《纸牌屋》和《德克斯特》中的前十三集。为了突出主角的模棱两可的地位，本研究采用了认知语义学和登记理论的方法。反英雄将话语中的心理空间融合在一起，突显了它们在不同的社会和认知领域之间振荡的事实。另外，主角在适应他们的语言记录以适应不同的情境时具有很高的通用性。结果，它们被框架化为足智多谋，