The Obama effect : a psychoanalytical observation of Obama's marketing rhetoric and discourse

Komel, Mirt (author), Šterk, Karmen (author)

Theoretical psychoanalysis, as developed from Jacques Lacan to Slavoj Žižek, provides us with conceptual tools to rethink Obama's political rhetoric as a postmodern marketing discourse, which aims not at fulfilling consumers' needs and/or satisfying their demands but rather aims at a discursive entrapment of their desire and/or its phantasmatic scenario. The article analyses the 2008 and 2012 Obama presidential campaign, and his renown Cairo speech by demonstrating the three catchphrases Yes we can!, Hope, and Forward! as embodiment of the three unconscious scenarios of the American dream. The three sound bites are designated as master signifiers of Obama's empty speech, the Lacanian concept which enabled understanding the ups and downs of the zeal and the spell of the charismatic Obama Effect.

• Language: English
• Work type: Not categorized
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FDV - Faculty of Social Sciences
• Year: 2014
• Number of pages: Str. 1131-1147, 1405
• Numbering: Letn. 51, št. 6
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-85367
• UDC: 159.964:324-057.91(73)
• ISSN on article: 0040-3598
• COBISS.SI-ID: 33090397
• Publication date in RUL: 20.09.2016

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Teorija in praksa : revija za družbena vprašanja
• Shortened title: Teor. praksa
• Publisher: Fakulteta za družbene vede
• ISSN: 0040-3598
• COBISS.SI-ID: 763652

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian

Abstract

Teoretska psihoanaliza, kakor se je razvijala od Jacquesa Lacana do Slavoja Žižka, se ponuja kot ustrezno konceptualno orodje za premislek Obamove politične retorike kot postmodernega marketinškega diskurza, ki ne cilja na zadovoljevanje potrošnikove potrebe in/ali zahteve, marveč na diskurzivno zajetje njihovih želja v svoj fantazmatski okvir. Članek analizira retoriko Obamovih predsedniških kampanj iz let 2008 ter 2012 in sloviti govor v Kairu z leta 2009 kot primere, kako trije slogani Yes we can!, Hope in Forward! utelešajo tri nezavedne scenarije ameriškega sna. Vsi trije so opredeljeni kot označevalci gospodarji Obamovega praznega govora, lacanovskega koncepta, ki omogoča razumevanje vzponov in padcev zanosa karizmatičnega Obamovega učinka.