Donald Trump makes use of humiliating nicknames as a tactic to demean his opponents | EUROtoday

Donald Trump has had portraits of American presidents hung in a hall of the White House, including descriptions, in his personal model, of their mandates. The plates thus seek advice from “Sleepy Joe” (“Sleeping Joe”), “Crooked Joe” (“the crook Joe”) and “Barack Hussein Obama”. This is not any coincidence: nicknames are on the coronary heart of Trump’s apply of energy.

Phonetically, these expressions are constructed to stay in your head. “These are very short, very marked nicknames, with alliteration and assonance”analyzes the physician in American civilization Jérôme Viala-Gaudefroy, creator of Trump’s phrases (Dalloz, 2024). “Lying Ted”, “Little Marco”, “Sleepy Joe”, “Crooked Hillary” : these nicknames sound like these of cartoon heroes. Demeaning, they’re designed to humiliate your opponents.

Constantly repeated, these nicknames have a task much like that of Homeric epithets within theIliad and theOdyssey : nominal teams like “Light-footed Achilles” Or “Ulysses of a Thousand Tricks” promote memorization and understanding, in response to linguist Milman Parry. Repeat “Sleepy Joe” Or “Crooked Hillary” thus permits Donald Trump to anchor his phrases in a world the place people have the one identification that he provides them.

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