STRATEGY OF DISCREDIT IN THE ENGLISH-LANGUAGE PUBLISIZED DISCOURSE

Abstract

The article focuses on revealing linguistic and stylistic means that realize strategy of discredit as a confrontational communicative strategy and tactics which are used for its implementation in the English-language publicized discourse. In the broad sense confrontation is opposition, conflict of interests and ideas. Confrontational forms of communication are optimally realized in publicized discourse due to their ability to reflect current social processes and the most vital issues of nowadays. The use of confrontational communicative strategies unlike cooperative strategies causes conflict in communicative interaction. It has been established that for realization of confrontation speakers use, in particular, the strategy of discredit that is mainly implemented by the following tactics: the tactics of mockery, the tactics of accusation, the tactics of insult. The strategy of discredit used by an addresser does not provide for respect to an addressee. On the contrary, the strategy aims at achievement of an addresser’s own goals through humiliation, slandering, derogation of opponent’s reputation. It should be noted that confrontation might result in the loss of “healthy” contact between an addresser and his/her opponent, deterioration of the atmosphere of trust and collaboration. Within the realization of the strategy of discredit the tactics of mockery is employed to criticize a certain object by means of creating comical effect via giving negative assessment. The tactics of accusation that is mostly characterized by disdainful and hostile sentiment aims at blaming the object that is discredited. The tactics of insult that provides humiliation of the object is considered to be the implementation of direct aggression. The cited discursive fragments in this paper have exposed an ability of a wide range of the linguistic and stylistic means to realize confrontation. Among the most used means there are invectives, verbalized by lexical units that are characterized by negative semantics, by swear words, comparative structures, lexical repetitions, colloquial lexical units, stylistic figures of irony etc.