"Well, Yair? When will you be prime minister?": Different Readings of Ordinariness in a Politician's Facebook Post as a Case in Point

The chapter examines readers' comments on a Facebook post in which the Israeli politician Yair Lapid positions himself as an ordinary person. Based on Sacks (1984), it is argued that such positioning is characterized by themes, perspectives, and communicative patterns typical of ordinary people, rather than political-public authorities. An examination of 141 relevant readers' comments shows that, in Bakhtin's terms, there are three main readings of such ordinary voice: A single-voiced reading, which views the ordinary voice as legitimate, authentic, and independent; a double-voiced reading, which views the ordinary voice as authentic and legitimate, but as partial; and a polyphonic reading, which views the ordinary voice as fictitious, illegitimate, and designated to promote a political agenda. The paper discusses the communicative patterns of each category in comparison to those of the original post, and examines the effect of these patterns on the positioning of both Lapid and his readers.