The 1st person plural in political discourse—American politicians in interviews and in a debate

Billig (1995) wrote that politicians often evoke nationalistic views when delivering their speeches – they do this through the use of simple words (as personal pronouns) in a specified context. The context, and the way personal pronouns are utilized, creates decisive turning points for any politician, especially one on the electoral road (Johnson, 1994, van Dijk, 1997 and van Dijk, 2002). A politician must decide which stance to take on given issues, which constituents to support, and with which group/ideology to self-identify. This paper analyzes self-identifications that particular American politicians develop through their employment of pronominal choice. The period that was of particular interest was during 2008 elections in the US and the subsequent year. We compared how the 1st person plural pronoun was used during the interviews and during the debate. This paper finds that American politicians make use of personal pronouns to evoke nationalistic emotions and achieve their career goals differently, depending whether it is during the interview or during a debate. We argue that the role of the venue as an external characteristic of context is underestimated in the political discourse research.

► We examine the usage of 1st plural personal pronoun in the political discourse.
► We compare political interviews with political debate as the example of different contexts (venue).
► We analyze American politicians during 2008 presidential elections.
► We found that 1st plural personal pronoun is manipulated according to the venue of the speech/talk.
► We found that politicians through the usage of the personal pronoun we reveal whom they support and do not support.