“The Most Honourable Brogad”: A Critical Discourse Analysis of Jamaica’s Prime Minister as Hero, Sex Symbol and Villain on Social Media

This chapter examines the role of the public’s language use in giving and taking power away from political representatives. Within Critical Discourse Analysis (Fairclough, Discourse and social change. Polity Cop., 1992; Critical discourse analysis: the critical study of language. Longman, 1995; Analysing discourse: textual analysis for social research. Routledge, London/New York, 2003) scholars focus on the discourse of politicians, media houses and political and advocacy organizations. How does the common man, by way of social media, function as social actor to create and perpetuate the image of political representatives? Through the strategic use of language, social media users are able to give and take power away from politicians. In this chapter, we examine texts of five hundred (500) comments under social media posts created by, or pertaining to, Jamaica’s current Prime Minister, Andrew Holness. Such social media platforms include Instagram, Facebook, Twitter and YouTube; the posts are no older than a year, posted in 2020. The “articulate minority” has contributed to the construction of Holness’s political identity through negative and positive commentary on his appearance and performance. Three major themes emerged after the comments were analyzed using Content Analysis: Holness as hero, villain, and sex symbol. This analysis will serve as a guide for current and future politicians to pay attention to the discourse of the common man on social media. They can give power and take it away, creating and perpetuating a public identity which may have an impact on elections and political performance.