God and Man at a Southern Appalachian Community College: Cognitive Dissonance and the Cultural Logics of Conservative News Talk Radio Programming

Abstract

Click to increase image sizeClick to decrease image size Notes Usually, it was the students who were the most adamant in identifying as conservative that most frequently demonstrated this behavior. See Holbert (2004 Holbert , R. L. ( 2004 ). Political Talk Radio, Perceived Fairness, and the Establishment of President George W. Bush's Political Legitimacy . The Harvard International Journal of Press/Politics , 9 , 12 – 27 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), A. Hall and Cappella (2002 Hall , A. and Cappella , J. N. ( 2002 ). The Impact of Political Talk Radio Exposure on Attributions About the Outcome of the 1996 U.S. Presidential Election . Journal of Communication , 52 , 332 – 350 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), G. H. Lee and Cappella (2001 Lee , G. H. and Cappella , J. N. ( 2001 ). The Effects of Political Talk Radio on Political Attitude Formation: Exposure Versus Knowledge . Political Communication , 18 , 369 – 394 .[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Hofstetter, Barker, Smith, Zari, and Incrassia (1999 Hofstetter , C. R. , Barker , D. , Smith , J. T. , Zari , G. M. , and Incrassia , T. A. ( 1999 ). Information, Misinformation, and Political Talk Radio . Political Research Quarterly , 52 , 353 – 369 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Barker (1999 Barker , D. C. ( 1999 ). Rushed Decisions: Political Talk Radio and Vote Choice, 1994–1996 . The Journal of Politics , 61 , 527 – 539 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Owen (1997 Owen , D. ( 1997 ). Talk Radio and Evaluations of President Clinton . Political Communication , 14 , 333 – 353 .[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), and Bolce, De Maio, and Muzzio (1996 Bolce , L. , De Maio , G. , and Muzzio , D. ( 1996 ). Dial-In Democracy: Talk Radio and the 1994 Election . Political Science Quarterly , 111 , 457 – 481 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). See Saurett and Gunster (2011 Saurett , P. and Gunster , S. ( 2011 ). Ears Wide Shut: Epistemological Populism, Argutainment and Canadian Conservative Talk Radio . Canadian Journal of Political Science , 44 , 195 – 218 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Swain (1999 Swain , W. N. ( 1999 ). Propaganda and Rush Limbaugh: Is the Label the Last Word? Journal of Radio Studies , 6 , 27 – 40 .[Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]), Barker (1998 Barker , D. C. ( 1998 ). Rush to Action: Political Talk Radio and Health Care (un)Reform . Political Communication , 15 , 83 – 97 .[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), and Larson (1997 Larson , M. S. ( 1997 ). Rush Limbaugh-Broadcast Demagogue . Journal of Radio Studies , 4 , 189 – 202 .[Taylor & Francis Online] , [Google Scholar]). I use the plural form to represent the polyvocality of individual conservative political identities and the dynamic character of the epistemic tools employed in their active (re)construction. See Stroud (2010 Stroud , N. J. ( 2010 ). Polarization and Partisan Selective Exposure . Journal of Communication , 60 , 556 – 576 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Iyengar and Hahn (2009 Iyengar , S. and Hahn , K. S. ( 2009 ). Red Media, Blue Media: Evidence of Ideological Selectivity in Media Use . Journal of Communication , 59 , 19 – 39 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), Hollander (2008 Hollander , B. A. ( 2008 ). Tuning Out or Tuning Elsewhere? Partisanship, Polarization, and Media Migration from 1998–2006 . Journalism & Mass Communication Quarterly , 85 , 23 – 40 .[Crossref] , [Google Scholar]), Morris (2007 Morris , J. S. ( 2007 ). Slanted Objectivity? Perceived Media Bias, Cable News Exposure, and Political Attitudes . Social Science Quarterly , 88 , 707 – 728 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]), and Tewksbury (2005 Tewksbury , D. ( 2005 ). The Seeds of Audience Fragmentation: Specialization in the Use of Online News Sources . Journal of Broadcasting & Electronic Media , 49 , 332 – 348 .[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]). I encountered Norton's (2011 Norton , M. ( 2011 ). A Structural Hermeneutics of The O'Reilly Factor . Theory and Society , 40 , 315 – 346 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]) essay after the initial fifty-five hours of data had been collected and an interpretive framework had been developed. However, I found his ideas on the rhetorical techniques employed on The O'Reilly Factor to be both applicable to my work and far superior to the framework of rhetorical techniques I had constructed. Therefore, I adapted his rhetorical techniques to this study, a tactic that held up very well during the twenty hours of testing that followed. The reader would do well to seek out this important article. Interestingly, the Dependents are often portrayed as being victims as well, duped by the machinations of the Radical Other(s). The persistent belief among conservative voters that Saddam Hussein's regime possessed (and subsequently hid) weapons of mass destruction prior to the Iraq War long after the Bush administration admitted that the regime had no active WMD program prior to the invasion provides an excellent example of immunization (Nyhan and Reifler 2010 Nyhan , B. and Reifler , J. ( 2010 ). When Corrections Fail: The Persistence of Political Misconceptions . Political Behavior , 32 , 303 – 330 .[Crossref], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]).