Threatening Strategy In Pre-Election Discourse

Abstract

The authors of this article consider the question of pragmatic effect of statements with the meaning of threat in Russian preelection discourse. The main goal of this article is to find out cognitive means to study and systematize pragmatic effect of threatening statements in a political pre-election discourse. Communicative construct of pre-election threat is used to describe the basic threatening strategy of pragmatic effect on voters’ dispositions of emotional state. The chosen cognitive tool made it possible to evaluate intensity of the pragmatic effect of the pre-election threats on voters. The authors managed to design V. Putin’s communicative construct of pre-election threat and to reveal his basic threatening strategy. The study opens up wide possibilities for interpreting the directions of the pragmatic effect on voters by the mean of threatening statements. The authors come to the conclusion that the basic threatening strategy includes not only the process (technology) of forming voters’ uncomfortable emotional state, but also the mechanism of returning them to a comfortable state, since the voter who is constantly in discomfort, in anxiety or stress, will not be able to make decisions. These results can be used in predicting pragmatic effect of politician’s threatening statements on voters.