Abstract
This study explores the thesis that a shift in the dominant media of communication from print to electronic sources may aid outsider candidates' bids for high offices in U.S. politics. The shift in the kind of symbol—from printed word to icon—that holds the most currency in the contemporary media environment upsets conventional assumptions about social reality, leaving space for political outsiders to redefine public conceptions of authority and who should hold it. The 1990 gubernatorial and 1992 and 1994 U.S. Senate campaign ads run by “breakthrough” woman candidate Dianne Feinstein may provide evidence of this epistemological shift in political image-making. Semiotic analysis of 45 Feinstein television advertisements across the three campaigns reveals that she relied on non-traditional coding to construct a campaign persona that defied some traditional, masculinized entailments of candidate image while she redefined other image dimensions, such as competency, toughness, and leadership.
Published Version
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