Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime
Swearing in public discourse represents a contentious rhetorical feature of populist leaders’ transgressive politics. This paper argues that, beyond constituting merely “offensive” speech, swearing generatively accomplishes a host of discursive functions which contribute to the fortification of a po...
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Archīum Ateneo
2021
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ph-ateneo-arc.psychology-faculty-pubs-13232022-01-27T06:19:44Z Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime Montiel, Cristina Jayme Uyheng, Joshua de Leon, Nmanuel Swearing in public discourse represents a contentious rhetorical feature of populist leaders’ transgressive politics. This paper argues that, beyond constituting merely “offensive” speech, swearing generatively accomplishes a host of discursive functions which contribute to the fortification of a populist regime. Taking populist President Duterte of the Philippines as a case in point, we utilize a critical text analytics approach to examine his use of profane language across a corpus of 746 of his public speeches. We find that Duterte discursively harnesses swear words to: (a) affirm vernacular identities with hostile humor, (b) claim outsider virtues against corrupt institutions, and (c) marshal insider force as the nation's sovereign leader. Swearing thus represents a rich discursive resource for populist leaders to navigate their contradictory positions as insiders and outsiders to political power, toward both public endearment and coercion of the nation's people. Our findings suggest the importance of critically examining language in relation to collective-level phenomena like populism and the utility of mixed methods approaches for enriching global psychologies of politics and language. 2021-12-06T08:00:00Z text https://archium.ateneo.edu/psychology-faculty-pubs/323 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0261927X211065780 Psychology Department Faculty Publications Archīum Ateneo swear words authoritarian populism political discourse duterte social network analysis critical discourse analysis Discourse and Text Linguistics Experimental Analysis of Behavior Personality and Social Contexts Political Science Politics and Social Change Public Administration Social Psychology and Interaction |
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swear words authoritarian populism political discourse duterte social network analysis critical discourse analysis Discourse and Text Linguistics Experimental Analysis of Behavior Personality and Social Contexts Political Science Politics and Social Change Public Administration Social Psychology and Interaction |
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swear words authoritarian populism political discourse duterte social network analysis critical discourse analysis Discourse and Text Linguistics Experimental Analysis of Behavior Personality and Social Contexts Political Science Politics and Social Change Public Administration Social Psychology and Interaction Montiel, Cristina Jayme Uyheng, Joshua de Leon, Nmanuel Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
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Swearing in public discourse represents a contentious rhetorical feature of populist leaders’ transgressive politics. This paper argues that, beyond constituting merely “offensive” speech, swearing generatively accomplishes a host of discursive functions which contribute to the fortification of a populist regime. Taking populist President Duterte of the Philippines as a case in point, we utilize a critical text analytics approach to examine his use of profane language across a corpus of 746 of his public speeches. We find that Duterte discursively harnesses swear words to: (a) affirm vernacular identities with hostile humor, (b) claim outsider virtues against corrupt institutions, and (c) marshal insider force as the nation's sovereign leader. Swearing thus represents a rich discursive resource for populist leaders to navigate their contradictory positions as insiders and outsiders to political power, toward both public endearment and coercion of the nation's people. Our findings suggest the importance of critically examining language in relation to collective-level phenomena like populism and the utility of mixed methods approaches for enriching global psychologies of politics and language. |
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text |
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Montiel, Cristina Jayme Uyheng, Joshua de Leon, Nmanuel |
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Montiel, Cristina Jayme Uyheng, Joshua de Leon, Nmanuel |
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Montiel, Cristina Jayme |
title |
Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
title_short |
Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
title_full |
Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
title_fullStr |
Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
title_full_unstemmed |
Presidential Profanity in Duterte's Philippines: How Swearing Discursively Constructs a Populist Regime |
title_sort |
presidential profanity in duterte's philippines: how swearing discursively constructs a populist regime |
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Archīum Ateneo |
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2021 |
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https://archium.ateneo.edu/psychology-faculty-pubs/323 https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/abs/10.1177/0261927X211065780 |
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