"Hero, Genius, King and Messiah": Ironic Echoing in Pro-Ethos and Anti-Ethos Readers' Comments on Facebook Posts

Research output: Chapter in Book/Report/Conference proceedingChapterpeer-review

7 Scopus citations

Abstract

This paper discusses readers' comments on posts written by the Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu on his Facebook page in November 2017. It focuses on the use of ironic echoes (Sperber & Wilson 1981) of compliments and accusations, including multi-stage ones, to either enhance or damage Netanyahu's ethos as a successful leader. It is argued that Netanyahu's supporters use ironic echoes of accusations by his critics in order to enhance his ethos, whereas his critics use ironic echoes of compliments to Netanyahu in order to damage it. Moreover, It is argued that both the construction and de-construction of Netanyahu's ethos are intertwined with the self-enhancement of the positive face (Brown & Levinson 1987) of commenters from one political camp, alongside the threat to the positive face of their rivals.

Original languageEnglish
Title of host publicationThe Discourse of Indirectness. Cues, voices and functions
EditorsZohar Livnat, Pnina Shukrun-Nagar, Galia Hirsch
PublisherJohn Benjamins Publishing Company
Pages59-81
Number of pages23
ISBN (Electronic)9789027260567
DOIs
StatePublished - 1 Jan 2020

Publication series

NamePragmatics and Beyond New Series
Volume316
ISSN (Print)0922-842X

Keywords

  • Accusation
  • Compliment
  • Condemnation
  • Face
  • Facebook
  • Ironic echoes/echoing
  • Irony
  • Multi-stage echoes
  • On-line readers' comments

ASJC Scopus subject areas

  • Language and Linguistics
  • Linguistics and Language

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