Demagoguery and Democratic Deliberation: The Search for Rules of Discursive Engagement

Hogan, J. Michael; Tell, Dave

doi:10.1353/rap.2006.0077

Cited by 17 publications

(10 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…First, we contribute to a growing interdisciplinary literature in psychology, political science, education, sociology, and other fields that aims to identify the consequences of political language. Much of this research examines forms of political language other than political correctness, such as demagoguery (Gustainis, 1990; Hahl et al, 2018; Hatfield, Cacioppo, & Rapson, 1994; Hogan & Tell, 2006; Roberts-Miller, 2005), common-knowledge and special-access lies (Hahl et al, 2018), and hate speech (Cowan, Heiple, Marquez, Khatchadourian, & McNevin, 2005; Cowan & Hodge, 1996; Leets, 2002). However, given the reliance on norms of political correctness in American society, and the increasing pressure to be politically correct, we think that examining political correctness specifically is an important area of research (Fairclough, 2003).…”

Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tell it like it is: When politically incorrect language promotes authenticity.

Rosenblum¹,

Schroeder²,

Gino³

2020

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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When a person's language appears to be political-such as being politically correct or incorrect-it can influence fundamental impressions of him or her. Political correctness is "using language or behavior to seem sensitive to others' feelings, especially those others who seem socially disadvantaged." One pilot study, 6 experiments, and 3 supplemental experiments (N ϭ 4,956) demonstrate that being politically incorrect makes communicators appear more authentic-specifically, less susceptible to external influence-albeit also less warm. These effects, however, are moderated by perceivers' political ideology and how sympathetic perceivers feel toward the target group being labeled politically correctly. In Experiments 1, 2, and 3 using politically incorrect language (e.g., calling undocumented immigrants illegals) made a communicator appear particularly authentic among conservative perceivers but particularly cold among liberal perceivers. However, in Experiment 4 these effects reversed when conservatives felt sympathetic toward the group that was being labeled politically correctly or incorrectly (e.g., calling poor Whites white trash). Experiment 5 tests why political incorrectness can boost authenticity, demonstrating that it makes communicators seem less strategic. Finally, Experiment 6 examines the use of political language in a meaningful field context: perceived persuasion in real political debates. Debaters instructed to be politically correct (vs. politically incorrect) were judged by their uninstructed conversation partners to be easier to persuade during the conversation, although they actually reported being similarly persuaded. Together, these findings demonstrate when and how using politically incorrect language can enhance a person's authenticity.

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Section: Discussionmentioning

confidence: 99%

Tell it like it is: When politically incorrect language promotes authenticity.

Rosenblum¹,

Schroeder²,

Gino³

2020

Journal of Personality and Social Psychology

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“…Foreshadowing stark differences, demagoguery oversimplifies complex societal issues [57,101]. Demagoguery's rhetoric polarization lays the groundwork for action-based political mobilization: you are either with "us" or with "them" [63,78]. Civic engagement interactions are unstructured and characterized by multiple forms of communication and action, with its discourse being frequently characterized as "messy conversation" that facilitates participation [35].…”

Section: Minimal Conceptualization Of Political Discourse Theoriesmentioning

confidence: 99%

Upvotes? Downvotes? No Votes? Understanding the relationship between reaction mechanisms and political discourse on Reddit

Papakyriakopoulos,

Engelmann,

Winecoff

2023

Preprint

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A significant share of political discourse occurs online on social media platforms. Policymakers and researchers try to understand the role of social media design in shaping the quality of political discourse around the globe. In the past decades, scholarship on political discourse theory has produced distinct characteristics of different types of prominent political rhetoric such as deliberative, civic, or demagogic discourse. This study investigates the relationship between social media reaction mechanisms (i.e., upvotes, downvotes) and political rhetoric in user discussions by engaging in an in-depth conceptual analysis of political discourse theory. First, we analyze 155 million user comments in 55 political subforums on Reddit between 2010 and 2018 to explore whether users' style of political discussion aligns with the essential components of deliberative, civic, and demagogic discourse. Second, we perform a quantitative study that combines confirmatory factor analysis with difference in differences models to explore whether different reaction mechanism schemes (e.g., upvotes only, upvotes and downvotes, no reaction mechanisms) correspond with political user discussion that is more or less characteristic of deliberative, civic, or demagogic discourse. We produce three main takeaways. First, despite being "ideal constructs of political rhetoric," we find that political discourse theories describe political discussions on Reddit to a large extent. Second, we find that discussions in subforums with only upvotes, or both up-and downvotes are associated with user discourse that is more deliberate and civic. Third, and perhaps most strikingly, social media discussions are most demagogic in subreddits with no reaction mechanisms at all. These findings offer valuable contributions for ongoing policy discussions on the relationship between social media interface design and respectful political discussion among users. 1

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“…The character, declaration, emotional, avoid (CDEAV) type, by contrast, represents the polar opposite: None of its elements is dialogic. We can describe CDEAV and other non-dialogic types as "demagogic" as this term is used to describe rhetoric that stands in direct opposition to dialogic rhetoric (Hogan & Tell, 2006;Roberts-Miller, 2005). Applying this dialogic-demagogic continuum, the various combination types can be described as (a) wholly dialogic, when all elements are dialogic; (b) predominantly dialogic, when most (but not all) elements are dialogic; (c) mixed, for combination types with an equal number of demagogic and dialogic elements; (d) predominantly demagogic, when most (but not all) elements are demagogic; and (e) wholly demagogic, when all elements are demagogic.…”

Section: Evaluating the Media's Verdict Against Normative Standardsmentioning

confidence: 99%

Narratives of a Race

Nwokora

Brown

2016

American Politics Research

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The first debate in 2008 was a turning point in the presidential election campaign: a race that was close before the debate turned decisively in Obama’s favor following it. This article explores how the media reached their verdict that “Obama won.” We examine two aspects of this problem: how, in practice, the media reached this verdict and whether they made the right decision from a normative standpoint. Based on content analysis of debate transcripts, we argue that the media interpreted the debate by synthesizing three pre-debate narratives in roughly equal proportions. Crucially, two of these narratives favored Obama. We also find that the “Obama won” verdict was consistent with what we might expect had the debate been judged by a public-spirited umpire.

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Demagoguery and Democratic Deliberation: The Search for Rules of Discursive Engagement

Cited by 17 publications

References 25 publications

Tell it like it is: When politically incorrect language promotes authenticity.

Tell it like it is: When politically incorrect language promotes authenticity.

Upvotes? Downvotes? No Votes? Understanding the relationship between reaction mechanisms and political discourse on Reddit

Narratives of a Race

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