On November 8th, 2016, Republican nominee Donald Trump was elected President of the United States of America. On November 9th, 2016, Twitter was flooded with messages hashtagged #TrumpsAmerica which narrated various ways that marginalized groups were being attacked, verbally or physically, by self-proclaimed Trump supporters whose inappropriate actions had been legitimized by Trump’s election into office. Many Americans were in shock upon receiving the news of the new President Elect. Jon Ronson, journalist and author of The Elephant in the Room: A Journey into the Trump Campaign and the Alt-Right, stated in the closing remarks of his book that “the alt-right’s small gains in popularity will not be enough to win Trump the election […] but if some disaster unfolds […] and Trump gets elected […] that is terrifying” (2016: 793). Ronson’s book was published before the election had concluded, and his closing remarks haunt many Americans who are now just that—terrified. Still others ponder at how the country transitioned from the progressive era of the Obama administration to the election of a man who helped inspire the 2016 word of the year, “post-truth”. What many believed was a joke in the Republican primaries has suddenly evolved into a Presidency that is all too real. Many Americans believed Trump appeared out of nowhere, ran his mouth carelessly during his campaign, and was elected by the racist, xenophobic, anti-Semitic, and homophobic population of America, more specifically known as the Alternative Right Movement. Matthew Lyons, author of “Ctrl, Alt, Delete: The Origins and Ideology of the Alternative Right”, defines the Alt-Right movement as “a loosely organized far-right movement that shares a contempt for both liberal multiculturalism and mainstream conservatism [which] combines White nationalism, misogyny, anti-Semitism, and authoritarianism in various forms and in political styles ranging from intellectual argument to violent invective” (2017: 2). He continues to note the Alt-Right maintains, “a belief that some people are inherently superior to others; a strong internet presence and embrace of specific elements of online culture; and a self-presentation as being new, hip, and irreverent” (Lyons 2017: 2). However, this alt-right rhetoric which Trump stands for has always been a counter-narrative throughout American political history, quietly lingering in the shadows until the moment it could finally reveal itself.
My paper will be focusing specifically on this counter-narrative that has pervaded throughout American political history and how the alt-right has evolved and harnessed this rhetorical narrative to create an environment that has lent itself to the election of a man such as Donald Trump. By first establishing the necessity of using a rhetorical lens with which to evaluate the 2016 American Presidential election, I will then trace the rhetorical genealogy in order to show the gradual ascension of alt-right rhetoric through American political history, concluding with the election of Trump.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:DRESDEN/oai:qucosa:de:qucosa:21128 |
| Date | 19 April 2018 |
| Creators | Perez, Alyssa Cathryn |
| Publisher | Universität Leipzig |
| Source Sets | Hochschulschriftenserver (HSSS) der SLUB Dresden |
| Language | English |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | info:eu-repo/semantics/publishedVersion, doc-type:article, info:eu-repo/semantics/article, doc-type:Text |
| Rights | info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess |
| Relation | urn:nbn:de:bsz:15-qucosa2-210868, qucosa:21086 |
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