Genre Transformation of “Congratulation” in Political Discourse

The article presents the results of the genre transformation of the nuclear genre of festive discourse “congratulation” according to the requests of political discourse. The study material was 130 texts of congratulations of politicians (New Year, March 8, May 9, February 23, and others) from 2002 to 2017 from the personal archives of the authors. “Congratulation” is a nuclear genre of festive discourse. It belongs to ritual, etiquette genres and serves the communicative situation of congratulations. Realizing the intentions of festive discourse, the genre is aimed at modeling a perfect harmonious picture of the world, reflecting the values of society, and, in connection with this, “congratulation” turns out to be a popular political discourse. It is revealed that the functioning of congratulations in political discourse leads to the fact that the genre of “congratulation” adapts to the receiving discourse and becomes an instrument for solving the author's political tasks, preserving and strengthening his or her political power. In this regard, the authors talk about a political congratulation, the addresser of which is a politician who realizes his or her tasks within “congratulation”, the genre peripheral for political discourse. First of all, this leads to the transformation of the purpose of the genre. Thus, the “primary” purpose of the traditional congratulation - the intensification of the positive emotional state of the addressee - becomes secondary. The promotion, actualization of some ideas of the author-politician to attract supporters, maintain power, propagate the views and the program of the party or the author, which meets the objectives of political discourse, comes to the fore. The functioning of “congratulations” in political discourse also leads to a transformation of the structure of the genre. The etiquette norms and the ritual of the genre determine the standardized structure of “congratulations”: address, congratulations, wishes, In political congratulations, an informational part about the activities of the politician appears, in which the politician is presented as an active figure, a demiurge of the “ideal world” for the electorate. This compositional part appears due to the fact that the author, using the etiquette genre, seeks to realize his or her own political aims and objectives. The article also demonstrates that, despite the transformation of “congratulations” in accordance with the demands of political discourse, the considered etiquette genre retains its own characteristics, and it is the festive idea that becomes the criterion for choosing dictum information and language means in each compositional part of political congratulation.

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