A Thematic Review of Trump’s Political Rhetoric, and its Relationship with Violence in America

This paper provides a socio-cultural analysis context for those interested on the intersections of self-presentations, justifications, anxieties and mitigations political rhetoric and crime offered in their testimonies by American individuals who have committed crimes and explicitly stated that their actions were motivated by the of rhetoric of Donald J. Trump’s pollical rhetoric. Whilst adopting ideas from Braun & Clarke (2012), this paper does not claim to carry out a systematic analysis, but a critical review that lays out themes emergent from two kinds of sampled texts namely, documentaries and court cases. Twelve criminal cases were identified as meeting our selection criteria, covering crimes ranging from verbal to physical attacks. The aim is to provide a socio-cultural context in which to understand the impact of political rhetoric on the actions of individuals which may have resulted in criminal behaviours. The paper argues that through his political rhetoric, President Donald J. Trump, advocates extremist views; promoting and inciting different forms of violence in general and against specific social groups; and individuals. This study concludes that the political rhetoric of President Donald J. Trump is most likely a factor in the radicalisation of individuals who commit different types of violent crime.

“Some people work a bit more than me, and so we tease them”: the production of an elite student community in an elite French higher education institution

This article presents the results of an ethnographic study of student humor in a French elite higher education institution, specifically how students in the student community use the term polard. The data was collected between 2014 and 2018 in one of France’s most prestigious elite higher education institution. There are two main ways this term is used as humor, indirectly mocking students, notably those outside the student community, a practice that constructs the polard as a foil figure of a student who spends all their time doing schoolwork and refrains from participating in extracurricular activities, and teasing friends and acquaintances in interactions following a devalued behavior, seeming over-concerned with studies. Furthermore, there exist interactional scripts students can use to successfully navigate these teasing interactions without losing face. Finally, this humor is discussed in relation to the elite setting, as it is linked to the social closure of these elite higher education institutions, and it contributes to the production of an elite student community, by socializing students to privileged self-presentations characterized by ease and by creating distinctions between students, separating the truly elite students from the others.

An Explication of Identity Shift Theory

First articulated in 2008, the concept of identity shift refers to the process of self-transformation that is the result of intentional self-presentation in a mediated context. As research into identity shift has become increasingly prevalent, our understanding of the concept’s mechanisms and constraints has become more detailed and in depth. We now have a greater understanding of the process and limitations of identity shift: an understanding sufficient to begin articulating a theory of identity shift that explains and predicts the intrapersonal effects of mediated self-presentations. The present work advances such a theory. We begin by summarizing and synthesizing extant identity shift work – including published articles, presented manuscripts, and unpublished research – to better understand the identity shift process. We then use this synthesis to articulate an initial theory (identity shift theory; IST) that specifies the processes, conditions, constraints, and effects of identity shift based on personal, psychological, and communicative characteristics. Ultimately, the advancement of identity shift theory can inform future research and practice into the implications of online self-presentation for self-effects.

Comparative analysis on the photographic self-presentations of the top Philippine universities in their official websites

This paper is a visual analysis on photographs that were gathered from the main and secondary pages of the websites of the Philippines’ top four higher educational institutions (HEIs), namely University of the Philippines Diliman (UPD), Ateneo De Manila University (ADMU), De La Salle University (DLSU), and University of Santo Tomas (UST). Specifically, this paper used denotative reading, analysis of visual grammar, and connotative reading on the photographs to ascertain how each of these four Philippine HEIs represented their self-images in contradistinction with each other in terms of their teaching, research, extension, internationalization, campus and facilities, and student life, as well as their overall positioning. This paper was able to establish that UPD has strongest self-representation in teaching, and campus and facilities; ADMU in campus and facilities, and teaching; DLSU in teaching and student life; and UST in student life, and campus and facilities. This paper was also able to establish that UPD has the weakest self-representation in extension and internationalization; ADMU in research and extension; DLSU in extension and internationalization; and UST in research and internationalization. This paper is significant as it is the first publication that analyzes the websites of Philippine HEIs and even of Philippine corporations, while contributing to meager international literature on websites of HEIs and corporations. By looking at individual and collective self-representations of the top Philippine HEIs, this paper aims to gather insights on the status of Philippine higher education including the challenges it faces.

From ‘sick nation’ to ‘superpower’: Anti-corruption knowledge and discourse and the construction of Indonesian national identity (1997–2019)

Anti-corruption knowledge and discourse emerged in the mid-1990s promoted by powerful international actors and organizations, mostly targeting countries in the ‘Third World’. In this paper, we seek to decolonize this knowledge and show how it influences the construction of national identity of former colonies. Our case is a country with a reputation as one of the most corrupt in the world: Indonesia. Long celebrated in the West for its economic growth and political stability, in 1997 the Asian Financial Crisis forced Indonesia to accept financial aid from the International Monetary Fund accompanied by harsh conditions that resulted in domestic turmoil. Using discourse-historical method, we trace how national identity was constructed in The Jakarta Post from 1997 through two decades of Western-influenced corruption-related reform. Our findings show how acceptance of Western anti-corruption discourse and knowledge early on contributed to highly negative internal constructions of Indonesian national identity, but over time, this gave way both to more positive self-presentations as well as greater critique and contestation of this knowledge. Moreover, alternative rationales for anti-corruption were asserted that drew from shared understandings of Islam and Indonesia’s independence. Overall, we show how this type of internationally dominant management and organizational knowledge (MOK) colonized how Indonesia was imagined but that contestation was possible, enabled by improvements in economic circumstances. We conclude by arguing that to understand the colonizing effects of MOK, it is necessary to look at the impact of management knowledge beyond the boundaries of organizations, including at the level of national identities.

The Rhetoric ­of­ Medicine: Lessons­ of­ Professionalism from ­Ancient Greece by Nigel Nicholson and Nathan R. Selden

This is not a book about formal or classical rhetoric in medical writing. The authors’ approach to “rhetoric” has more to do with examining the ethical elements found in the sociocultural conceptualizations and self-presentations of physicians, particularly in respect to ancient Greek physicians of the sixth and fifth centuries bc and modern physicians. Reviewed by: Todd A. Curtis, Published Online (2021-08-31)Copyright © 2021 by Todd A. CurtisThis open access publication is distributed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives License (CC BY-NC-ND) Article PDF Link: https://jps.library.utoronto.ca/index.php/aestimatio/article/view/37725/28727 Corresponding Author: Todd A. Curtis,University of Texas at AustinE-Mail: [email protected]

Self-presentation of non-philological students: Speech genre and linguistic aspects

The analysis of the speech genre of self-presentation is performed within the anthropocentric approach to the language and speech. The study focuses on the self-presentation of non-philological students. The research is based on the comparative analysis of the papers of first year students and graduate students of the faculties of geography and of computer science and information technology, as well as of the Institute of physical education and sports of Saratov National Research State University. A multi-aspect analysis of student self-presentations revealed the main features of the speech genre of self-presentation. Among them are the most typical cognitive models (scenarios) of self-presentation which form the basis of the corresponding speech genre. In student papers, the speech genre of self-presentation often interacts with other speech genres: appeals, messages, and gratitude. First year students demonstrate a strategy that suggests an effort to please, to appear attractive to others. Graduate students present a strategy of self-promotion, trying to prove their professional competence. The analyzed papers show that the students demonstrate the awareness that effective self-presentation is based on verbal-logical and emotional-expressive elements of speech which act as the means of linguistic persuasion. The papers abound in clichés and set expressions containing elements of formal academic style.

On streaming-dating convergence: Music-mediated self-presentations on Tinder

This study takes a cultural anthropological approach to address the use of music taste as an instrument of self-presentation on online dating platforms by examining the partnership between Spotify and Tinder, which not only allows Tinder users to pick an anthem from Spotify’s catalog, but also displays a list of “top artists” based on data aggregated through their activity on Spotify. Using Cheney-Lippold’s formulation of the “measurable type” and Bucher’s notion of “conscious clicking” as foundational frameworks, this paper offers the term “conscious listening” to explore the ways that users play with their music taste-based identities on Tinder. In order to better theorize this phenomenon, a wide array of thinkers ranging from communications, sociology, and data/platform studies are coalesced along with the results of in-depth interviews with 10 Tinder users to analyze the recent convergence of music streaming and social dating platforms.

Ageing like a supermodel: Negotiating body in the celebrity ‘self-life writing’

In the modelling profession, ageing is a multi-challenging process. By analysing the auto/biography Becoming by Cindy Crawford and Katherine O´Leary, the ageing issues prove to be particularly stimulating. Crawford views her private and professional, internal and external self through a temporal perspective. The special focus of the analysis is a relationship to the body exposed to multiple views. In this context, the auto/biographical text becomes a relevant and stimulating document for questioning (self)presentations of ageing female celebrities, analysing the production of new cultural notions of appropriate ageing and transformations of beauty ideology that creates new (unrealistic) standards, norms and expectations.

The visual digital self: A discourse theoretical analysis of young people’s negotiations on gender, reputation and sexual morality online

Young people’s self-presentations on Instagram often display considerate discourses on gender, reputation and (sexual) morality. Previous studies have explored how these discourses are embedded in cultural narratives, while overseeing the significance of visibility and visual storytelling cultures online. Using a Foucauldian Feminist approach, we explore how young people’s discourses reflect the visual performance of aesthetic and neoliberal subjectivities online. Through six groups of young people between thirteen and twenty years old, we investigate how the visibility afforded by Instagram affects the negotiations of young people on gender, reputation and sexual morality. We gave them the agency to create, narrate and reflect upon fictious social media profiles with ‘good’, ‘bad’ or ‘ideal’ self-presentations, using a discourse theoretical analysis to examine the visual artefacts, individual stories and group conversations. Our analysis shows that youth’s discourses on self-presentation are based on a dynamic relation between self-determination and self-monitoring. Ideal self-presentations are understood as self-determining performances of visual, aesthetic and neoliberal subjectivities, whereas bad self-presentations are often negotiated as self-monitoring performances regarding sexual morality.