People-building Strategies in Trump’s and Biden’s Political Discourse

Abstract

Social-identity creation is crucial for politicians to rhetorically build their political community, legitimise specific actions and mobilise supporters by appealing to specific values or discursive argumentations. Combining a critical discourse analysis perspective derived from van Dijk’s socio-cognitive approach with Conceptual Metaphor Theory, this paper investigates people-building discourse strategies in Donald J. Trump’s speech prior to the Capitol Hill riots and President Joseph R. Biden’s Inaugural Address. The research aims to compare strategies adopted in populist and anti-populist discourse. Results show that, while the distinction between populism and anti-populism is still underdeveloped, similar discourse strategies and metaphorical mappings chiefly revolving around the ideas of nation and democracy may be deployed with opposite ends. Furthermore, the study highlights how the populist/anti-populist frontier is not clear-cut and may shape different civic identities and ideals of democracy according to the ideology underpinning each politician’s discourse.

Keywords

• social identities
• populism
• anti-populism
• critical discourse analysis
• metaphor