Browsing by Author "Prat Jareno, Júlia"

The use of emotion is becoming increasingly relevant in the fields of international relations and political communication. While new research has been attentive to the use and dissemination of emotion, it has failed to establish emotion as an individual category of study, thus mostly neglecting its role within political discourses. This thesis argues that emotion is key to understanding why some discourses are more appealing than others, using the theories of Ernesto Laclau, Jacques Lacan and Simon Koschut as theoretical framework. By combining the qualitative methods of Emotion Discourse Analysis and Pragmatics of Emotive Communication, this thesis studies how emotion is embedded within the Manifesto “The Programme of Change”, published by Podemos at the beginning of 2015 with the objective of inspiring the political campaigns of the multiple elections that were going to take place that year. My analysis is specifically focused on two topics. First, it aims to understand how emotions were used within the Manifesto to create the antagonistic groups “the people” and “the elite”. Second, it aims to expose the new feeling rules that the party proposed to challenge the narrative of the status quo. The results of my analysis show that Podemos created an image of a corrupted, self-serving and extravagant elite, while defining the people as a group of honest, trustworthy and capable citizens. The antagonism between both groups is sustained by a sense of unfairness and humiliation of the latter towards the former and it is built through a political discourse that puts forward five new feeling rules that challenge the elite’s power. The first feeling rule appeals to unfairness, turning it into anger towards the elite. The second appeals to anxiety, stressing the need for a quick change. The third evokes frustration, converting it into strength to gain power. The fourth relies on hope to draw and image of an optimistic future. The last evokes self-awareness to create a new order where ordinary people feel recognised and represented. The findings of this thesis add value to existing literature on Podemos, while also proving that emotion needs to be considered a valid unit of analysis in discourse analytical methodologies. It defines emotion as key to uncovering patterns in international relations, and it defends its role in sustaining and challenging structures of power.