“Our Message Can Be Summarized with These Words: Britain First”: A Multimodal Critical Discourse Analysis of the Speech of Oswald Mosley’s character from the Peaky Blinders Series

Abstract

Fascism is a radical and polemic political movement that had its origin in Italy after World War I. Thereupon, different versions of this ideology emerged in several European countries such as England, where Oswald Mosley was its precursor and the founder of the British Union of Fascists. Through his powerful speeches, he achieved to persuade the English elite to help him position himself as a leader and establish fascism in Britain. This article addresses a fictitious interpretation of Oswald Mosley giving a political speech in the middle of a sophisticated party. The main intention of this work is to explore the mechanisms of persuasion employed by the fictitious version of Mosley to address his audiences and convince them to accept his message. Some findings reveal that the use of polite expressions as well as remarkable confidence in his speech, helped Mosley gain the sympathy of his listeners.