Linguistic manipulation in campaign speeches of Donald Trump

Abstract

The article considers the way linguistic manipulation manifested itself in campaign speeches of Donald Trump. In order to be able to achieve the aim set, the author investigated the problem of political discourse in general, the nature of linguistic manipulation and, finally, found out how the latter was actualized by Donald Trump in his speeches within the presidential race. It is essential to clarify the notion of political discourse as a genre before looking into peculiarities of a presidential speech. This is due to the fact that political discourse has its comparatively established pattern of arrangement, its own style and structure. Manipulative functions of discourse create covert, disguised layer of linguistic data that is not easily separated from purely informational content. Linguistic manipulation is influence exercised by one person upon another or a group of people through speech and non-verbal means oriented toward achieving a certain goal that consists in changing of the addressee’s behavior, perceptions and intentions in the course of communicative interaction. The research shows that Donald Trump took an advantage of carefully constructed speeches aimed at manipulating the emotional sphere of the audience. The results of this scientific effort can be used for the further study of the problem of the linguistic manipulation strategies with the account of the non-verbal component of communication.