In recent years politicians have increasingly appeared in various types of entertainment media. For example, the President of the United States Joe Biden appeared on the talkshow The Late Late Show with James Corden. A notable example from 2022 is the Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenkyy. He, who made his career as a comedian, became known as a political figure thanks to starring in the TV series Servant of the People. When he became president, the main focus from the Western media was that he was just that, a comedian. However, on February 24 2022, he was immortalized as the person who sat as president of Ukraine during the Russian invasion. The aim of this thesis is therefore to examine how the president of Ukraine, Volodymyr Zelenskyy, creates discourses in an entertainment interview during an ongoing war. The research questions for the essay are: (1) What discourses about the war in Ukraine does Zelenskyy raise verbally and non-verbally in My Next Guest with David Letterman and Volodymyr Zelenskyy? (2) How does Volodymyr Zelenskyy build authenticity and trust through the interview verbally and non-verbally? (3) What is the role of humor in communication about the war in Ukraine in the interview? The material analyzed in the thesis is the episode My next guest with David Letterman and Volodymyr Zelenskyy which is apart of David Letterman’s talkshow. Zelenskyy appeared in the thirty-minute interview in December of 2022 in Ukraine. The method used is multimodal discourse analysis and Fairclough's three-dimensional model. The results from the analysis present that the main discourse that Zelenskyj raises about the war is that Ukraine and Ukrainians are suffering and fighting to survive against Russia. With non-verbal communication, Zelenskyy succeeds in building trust and authenticity. As for humor, the analysis showed that it is important to use gallows humor to achieve resilience for the oppressed and that Zelenskyy can use satire to a certain extent in the interview. The main conclusion of the thesis is that Zelenskyy follows the conventions for a talkshow, however he differs from the classic talkshow format by speaking more about the Ukrainian people than himself.

Följande studie utforskar hur kulturella stereotyper framställs genom interaktionen under två separata intervjuer i talkshowen Malou Efter Tio. Programledaren Malou von Sivers har fått kritik för hur hon intervjuar två rapartister med skilda kulturella bakgrunder. Greekazo som associeras med minoritetsbefolkningen och Einár som associeras med majoritetsbefolkningen. Studien undersöker och jämför interaktionerna i de två intervjuerna utifrån teorierna samtalsanalys, intersektionalitet och olika koncept för representation i media. Analysen genomförs med samtalsanalys som metod och utgår från två separata transkriberingar av materialet. Resultatet visar att Malou von Sivers samspel med de två gästerna skiljer sig, där båda intervjuerna formar stereotypa uppfattningar kring rappgenren. Genom slutdiskussionen förs en diskussion om att det sker en problematisk representation av båda rapartisterna. Framför allt eftersom det upprättas en skillnad mellan rapartisterna genom intervjuerna då de tillskrivs olika egenskaper som baseras på deras etniska tillhörighet. Detta visar på starka maktrelationer som existerar i talkshowen och också på hur ojämlikhet som finns i samhället uppkommer i programmet. Utifrån vårt resultat kan vår studie synliggöra och uppmärksamma hur samtalsstrukturen i den här talkshowen flätas samman med maktstrukturen i vårt samhälle. / The following study examines how cultural stereotypes are reproduced through the interaction during two separate interviews from the talk show Malou Efter Tio. The host Malou von Sivers has been criticized for how she is interviewing two rap artists with different cultural backgrounds. Greekazo, associated with the minority population and Einár, associated with the majority population. The study examines and compare the two interviews based on the theories conversation analysis, intersectionality and several concept of representation in media. Conversation analysis is also used as a method and the analyzation is based on two separate transcriptions of the material. The results showed that Malou von Sivers interplay between two guests were different, however both interviews reproduce stereotypical perceptions about the rap genre. Furthermore, the results are discussed which shows that both representations of the rap artist are problematic. Especially since a difference is established between the rap artists through the interviews as they are attributed different characteristics based on their ethnicity. This shows the strong power relations that exist in the talk show and also how inequality that exist in our society arises in the program. Based on our results, our study exposes and pays attention to how the conversational structure of this talk show is intertwined with the power structure in our society.