Constructing Prototypes Through Figurative Language in Albania’s 2025 Elections: Europe and “European Albania” as New Identity Frames

Abstract

The 2025 Albanian general elections illustrated the strategic importance of figurative language in shaping political identity, mobilising public sentiment, and guiding voter cognition. Political leaders, especially Prime Minister Edi Rama, placed European Union membership at the centre of the campaign through metaphors, deictic positioning, and expanded temporal horizons that framed EU integration as both destiny and direction. Rama’s discourse persistently aligned the Socialist Party’s programme with the prototype of a “European Albania,” constructing an image of progress, modernisation, and inevitable alignment with European norms. In contrast, opposition figures advanced figurative narratives grounded in restoration, sovereignty, and national self-protection, promoting an alternative prototype of the vigilant, corrective political actor. These competing figurative frames activated different cognitive models—the reformist, outward-looking Europeaniser versus the nationalist-restorative guardian—shaping how voters assessed legitimacy, competence, and collective identity. By converting abstract political goals into emotionally charged and morally resonant stories, figurative language functioned simultaneously as a cognitive mechanism and a persuasive rhetorical instrument. Drawing on prototype theory, cognitive metaphor theory, and paratopic discourse analysis, this study demonstrates how figurative framing structured the ideological meaning of the 2025 election and illuminated deeper tensions surrounding Albania’s European integration trajectory.