The digital performativity of populism: the politics of charisma, ordinariness, and spectacle

从我在上一节概述的四个目标来看，进行新的研究将是我博士后研究的支柱，不仅因为它是作为一个学者最令人兴奋的部分，而且因为它有助于实现其他目标。这项新的研究将提供肥沃的土壤，通过其“新鲜”和广泛“吸引人”的案例研究（对许多西方读者来说是有主题兴趣的），以产生经验和分析上有洞察力的出版物，在强调其“此时此地”贡献的同时，将注意力吸引到我的研究整体上，并发展-加强我的分析技能。拟议的研究项目“民粹主义的数字表演：魅力、平凡和奇观的政治”所提出的问题，正是我博士研究的核心问题。政治意识形态的意义是如何产生和复制的，或者是如何通过媒介的政治表演——这些呈现和自我呈现的模式，比如“有魅力的”领导人，“普通的”名人，以及“壮观的”集会/示威，这些都涉及到传播媒体的使用，或者说得更好，其中媒体传播的使用是根深蒂固的？这种“媒介化”的政治意识形态意义是如何促使我们在我们所生活的社会中思考和行动的？回到2013年底，当我开始读博的时候，这些问题仍然被一种“自由中间派共识”所掩盖，这种共识认为政治在很大程度上是一种理性和管理的业务，在这种共识下，表演话语的审美情感和政治意识形态诉求就像一些民粹主义漫画的特质，比如贝卢斯科尼，以及一些边缘极端政党，比如茶党。可以说，今天民粹主义既不局限于少数特殊人物，也不再是极端/极右和极左的声音，上述问题似乎比以往任何时候都更加相关，因此它们需要被带回政治探究、社会学研究和传播学的中心。拟议中的项目试图通过关注一些案例研究来做到这一点，这些案例研究举例说明了当前西方政治中的“民粹主义转向”，同时也提出了问题，例如唐纳德·特朗普和贾斯汀·特鲁多的魅力表演，杰里米·科尔宾（格拉斯顿伯里音乐节）和奥普拉·温弗瑞（金球奖）的普通表演，以及英国脱欧和希腊反紧缩集会的壮观表演。正如我想说的那样，所有这些都不是单一和独特的政治表演，而是一种制度性和历史性的政治表演的表现——一种制度性的媒体表演——因此，它们带有媒体使用的实践(例如特朗普的特鲁多的推特狂热，科尔宾和温弗瑞的社交媒体演讲，以及对英国脱欧和反紧缩集会的镜头进行大规模修复)，以及代理和命令的象征性实践（例如，国家再生或变革的使命，道德抵抗的日常生活，以及对归属感的想象）。该项目将通过分析其在社交媒体平台上的特定技术符号学表达，从而反映政治表现的“媒介”和“象征”动态，通过这些表达，它们被调解和修复——它们的数字互文性。在此过程中，它也将能够反思当代民粹主义的政治意识形态本质：关于各种数字表演如何在美学和情感上回忆“人民”的符号，激进和进步或反动和保守，并最终对它们对民主未来的影响。

From the four objectives I outlined in the previous section, conducting new research will be the backbone of my postdoctoral fellowship, not only because it is the most exciting part of being an academic, but also because it is instrumental to the achievement of the other objectives. This new research will provide fertile ground, through its 'fresh' and widely 'appealing' case studies (of topical interest to many Western audiences), for producing empirically and analytically insightful publications, drawing attention to my research as a whole while stressing its 'here-and-now' contributions, and developing-strengthening my analytical skills. The questions that the proposed research project, 'the digital performativity of populism: the politics of charisma, ordinariness, and spectacle', poses are the very same questions lying at the heart of my doctoral research. How is politico-ideological meaning produced and reproduced, or contested, through mediatic political performances - these patterns of presentation and self-presentation, such as the 'charismatic' leader, the 'ordinary' celebrity, and the 'spectacular' rally/demonstration, which involve the use of communication media, or put it better, in which the use of media communications is deeply embedded? How does this 'mediatized' politico-ideological meaning invite us to think about and act within the society we live? Back in late 2013, when I started my PhD, these questions were still overshadowed by a 'liberal-centrist consensus' which wanted politics a largely rational and managerial business, where the aesthetic-affective and politico-ideological appeals of performative discourse were like an idiosyncrasy of some populist caricatures, like Berlusconi, and some marginal extreme parties, like the Tea Party. Arguably, today that neither populism is confined to just a few exceptional figures nor extreme/far-right-and-left voices are marginal anymore, the above questions seem to be more pertinent than ever before, and therefore they need to be brought back to the centre of political inquiry, sociological research, and communication studies. The proposed project seeks to do so by focusing on some case studies which exemplify, and at the same time problematise, the current 'populist turn' in Western politics, such as the charismatic performances of Donald Trump and Justin Trudeau, the ordinary performances of Jeremy Corbyn (Glastonbury festival) and Oprah Winfrey (Golden Globes), and the spectacular performances of Brexit and Greek anti-austerity rallies. All these are, as I wish to argue, not single and unique political performances, but manifestations of an institutionally and historically embedded repertoire of political performances - an institutional media performativity - and as such they carry with them practices of media use (e.g. Trump's-Trudeau's Twitter-mania, social media paroxysm with Corbyn's and Winfrey's speeches, and extensive remediation of footage from Brexit and anti-austerity rallies) and symbolic practices of agency and ordering (e.g. a mission of national palingenesis or change, an everyday life of moral resistance, and an imaginary of belonging, respectively). This project will reflect on both the 'mediatic' and 'symbolic' dynamics of political performances by analysing their specific techno-semiotic articulations in the social media platforms by means of which they are mediated and remediated - their digital intertextuality. In doing so, it will also be able to reflect on the politico-ideological nature of contemporary populisms: on how the various digital performances aesthetically and affectively recall symbols of 'the people', radical and progressive or reactionary and conservative, and ultimately on the implications they bear for the future of democracy.