2. Identity as „character‟
Political persona and political life:
◦ Character in politics
◦ Spheres of political action
◦ Onstage/offstage political performance
Stance: respect/disrespect; responsible/not
responsible
3. GB: A good family. Good to see
you.
GD: And the education system in
Rochdale I will congratulate it.
GB: Good. And it's very nice to see
you, take care.
[GD departs, Gordon enters car]
GD: Thanks take care. Good to see
you all. Thanks very much.
[In car]
GB: That was a disaster. Should
never have put me with that
woman. Whose idea was that?
Unknown male: I don‟t know, I
didn‟t see.
GB: Sue‟s, I think. Just ridiculous.
Unknown male: Not sure if they‟ll
go with that one.
GB: They will go with it.
Unknown male: What did she say?
GB: Everything. She‟s just this sort
of bigoted woman who said she
used to be a Labour voter…
Ridiculous.
4.
5. The self, then, as a performed character, is not an
organic thing that has a specific location, whose
fundamental fate is to be born, to mature, and to
die; it is a dramatic effect arising diffusely from a
scene that is presented, and the characteristic
issue, the crucial concern, is whether it will be
credited or discredited.
(Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in
Everyday Life, 1959)
6. The self, then, as a performed character, is not an
organic thing that has a specific location, whose
fundamental fate is to be born, to mature, and to
die; it is a dramatic effect arising diffusely from a
scene that is presented, and the characteristic
issue, the crucial concern, is whether it will be
credited or discredited.
(Erving Goffman, The Presentation of Self in
Everyday Life, 1959)
7. With the development of print and other media,
however, political rulers increasingly acquired a
kind of visibility that was detached from their
physical appearance before assembled
audiences. Rulers used the new means of
communication not only as a vehicle for
promulgating official decrees, but also as a
medium for fabricating a self-image that could
be conveyed to others in distant locales.
John Thompson, 2005, “The New Visibility”
8. Ever since the advent of print, political rulers
have found it impossible to control completely
the new kind of visibility made possible by the
media and to shape it entirely to their liking;
now, with the rise of the Internet and other
digital technologies, it is more difficult than
ever.
John Thompson, 2005, “The New Visibility”
9. Conversations or interactions that individuals believe
to be private (whether carried out face-to-face or
with the aid of one-to-one technologies like the
telephone) can be picked up and recorded by covert
means, and subsequently made available to many
thousands or millions of others through the media.
Words or actions that were originally produced as
private communication or behaviour can
unexpectedly acquire a public character, becoming
visible in ways that were certainly unanticipated,
possibly very embarrassing and perhaps even
seriously incriminating (as Monica Lewinsky and Bill
Clinton, among many others, discovered to their
cost).
John Thompson, 2005, “The New Visibility”
10. People become more concerned with the character of the
individuals who are (or might become) their leaders and
more concerned about their trustworthiness, because
increasingly these become the principal means of
guaranteeing that political promises will be kept and that
difficult decisions in the face of complexity and
uncertainty will be made on the basis of sound
judgement. The politics of trust becomes increasingly
important, not because politicians are inherently less
trustworthy today than they were in the past, but
because the social conditions that had previously
underwritten their credibility have been eroded.
John Thompson, 2005, “The New Visibility”
11. Private/public /
= Offstage/Onsta
ge
Political sphere Political sphere (a)
Personal sphere Onstage
Political sphere (b)
Offstage
Personal sphere
(Offstage)
12. Strategic projection of
political identity in
SPHERE OF PUBLIC publicity
AND POPULAR
Journalistic mediations
and criticism
(interactive sourcing
and interactive
SPHERE OF performance)
POLITICAL
INSTITUTIONS Interaction of private
AND PROCESSES life with career in
political institutions
PRIVATE SPHERE Strategic projection of
private life in publicity
Journalistic revelations
of private life: gossip
and scandal.
John Corner, 2000, Mediated Persona
and Political Culture: Dimensions of
Structure and Process
13. Open mike gaffes and popular/political culture
Authentic open-mike
gaffes
Dramatised fictional open-
mike gaffes
(Yes Prime Minister, „The
Tangled Web‟ 28 Jan 1988)
Fake open-mike gaffes
(Getting something into the
public domain, but endorsing
its authenticity from seeming
to originate offstage not
onstage)
Dramatised fictional fake
open-mike gaffes
(The West Wing, „The US Poet
Laureate‟ , 27 March 2002).
14. GB: That was a disaster. Should never have put me
with that woman. Whose idea was that?
Unknown male: I don‟t know, I didn‟t see.
GB: Sue‟s, I think. Just ridiculous.
Unknown male: Not sure if they‟ll go with that one.
GB: They will go with it.
Unknown male: What did she say?
GB: Everything. She‟s just this sort of bigoted
woman who said she used to be a Labour voter…
Ridiculous.
Strategic publicity considerations: this will play on TV
as an unfortunately convincing, eloquent, public,
dramatisation of „Labour‟s own supporters are
deserting the party‟
15. Onstage performance – “Respect”
willingness to enter into f2f discussion with GD
length of time spent in conversation with her
tributes to her life and family
political undertakings, past and present, that
speak to her concerns
Politely framed but substantive responses to her
criticism
◦ Rational-political initial response to her point about
immigration (possible trigger for the „bigoted‟ epithet)
Offstage performance – Disrespect
“She‟s just this sort of bigoted woman who said
she used to be a Labour voter”
16. Length of time
Gordon Brown: Hello, how are you? Now, GB: You're a very good woman, you've
come and talk with me. How are you served the community all your life.
getting on? Where do you stay around GD: I am, I‟ve worked for the Rochdale
here? council for 30 years. And I work with
Gillian Duffy: Yes. children and handicapped children.
GB: It's a nice area, isn't it? GB: Oh well I think working with children is
GD: Now, my family have voted Labour all so important isn‟t it? So important. Have
their life. Me father, even when he was in you been at some of the children‟s
his teens went to Free Trade Hall to sing centres?
the red flag and now I'm absolutely GD: But what I can't understand is why I am
ashamed of saying I'm Labour. still being taxed at 66 years old because
my husband's died and I have some of his
GB: No, you mustn't be. Because what have pension tagged onto my pension.
we done? We've improved the health GB: Well, we‟re raising the threshold at
service. We're financing more which people start paying tax as
neighbourhood policing, we're getting pensioners, but yes, if you‟ve got an
better schools and we're coming through a occupational pension you may have to pay
very difficult world recession. some tax. But you may be eligible for the
You know what my views are. I'm for pension credit as well, you should check...
fairness. For hard working families. GD: No, no, I‟m not, I‟ve checked and
I've told these guys across there - look if checked and they said I‟m no they can't do
you commit a crime you're going to be it.
punished. GB: Well you should look it again just to be
sure, to be absolutely sure.
GD: I'm afraid I don't think it's happening GD: Yes they‟ve told me, I‟ve been down to
in Rochdale. Rochdale council to try and get it off me
GB: Well, with a bit more policing than tax.
there were... but obviously we're going to GB: We‟re linking pension to earnings in
do better in the future with neighbourhood two years' time, we‟ve got the winter
policing. Neighbourhood policing is the allowance as you know, which I hope is of
key to it. You're a very good woman you've benefit, two fifty...
served the community all your life.
17. GD: I agree with that, it‟s very good, but you‟ve got to go back to work. At six
every year I talk to people of my age and months…
they say "Oh well, they‟ll be knocking it off, GD: You can‟t say anything about the
it will be going - it will be going." immigrants because you‟re saying you‟re,
Simon Danczuk (Labour parliamentary but all these eastern Europeans coming in,
party candidate for Rochdale): No, that's where are they flocking from?
not true. You were particularly impressed GB: A million people come in from Europe,
with the bus pass as well. but a million British people have gone into
GD: Yes. Europe, you do know there‟s a lot of British
GB: We‟ve done the bus passes, free eye people staying in Europe as well.
test prescriptions... Look come back to what your initial
principles: helping people - that's what
GD: But how are you going to get us out of we're in the business of doing.
all this debt, Gordon? A decent health service, that's really
GB: We‟ve got a deficit reduction plan, cut important, and education. Now these are
the debt by half over the next four years, things that we have tried to do.
we‟ve got the plans that have been set out We're going to maintain the schools so that
to do it - look, I was the person who came people have that chance to get on.
in and said... GD: So what are you going about do about
GD: Look, the three main things that I had students who are coming in now? You've
drummed in when I was a child was scrapped that now Gordon, to help
education, health service and looking after students go on to university.
people who are vulnerable. There are too GB: Tuition fees?
many people now who aren‟t vulnerable GD: Yes. I'm thinking about my
but they can claim and people who are grandchildren. What will they have to pay
vulnerable can‟t get claim. to get into university?
GB: We've got forty per cent of young
GB: But they shouldn‟t be doing that, there people now going to university...
is no life on the dole anymore for people, if
you‟re unemployed
18. Simon Danczuk: More than ever.
GD: They‟ve just come back from
GB: More than ever. So you got to have Australia where they‟ve been stuck
some balance. If you get a degree and you
earn twice as much after you get the for ten days they couldn‟t get back
degree then you got to pay something with this ash crisis
back as a contribution. GB: They got through now?
But there are grants for your GD: Yes.
grandchildren. There are more grants than GB: We‟ve been trying to get people
ever before. You know more young people back quickly. But are they going to
are going to university than ever before. university, is that the plan?
And for the first year the majority of GD: I hope so. They‟re only 12 and
people going to university are women. So 10.
there's big opportunities for women.
GB: They‟re only 12 and 10! But
So education, health and helping people. they‟re doing well at school?
That's what I'm about.
GD: Yes. Very good.
GD: I hope you keep to it. GB: A good family. Good to see you.
GB: It‟s been very good to meet you. And GD: And the education system in
you‟re wearing the right colour today! Rochdale I will congratulate it.
(Laughter) How many grandchildren do you
have? GB: Good. And it's very nice to see
GD: Two.
you, take care.
GB: What age are they?
GD: They‟ve just come back from Australia
where they‟ve been stuck for ten days they
couldn‟t get back with this ash crisis.
.
19. GB: You're a very good woman you've served
the community all your life.
GD: I am, I‟ve worked for the Rochdale council
for 30 years. And I work with children and
handicapped children.
GB: Oh well I think working with children is so
important isn‟t it? So important. Have you
been at some of the children‟s centres?
20. Look come back to what your initial principles:
helping people - that's what we're in the
business of doing.
A decent health service, that's really important,
and education. Now these are things that we
have tried to do.
We're going to maintain the schools so that
people have that chance to get on.
21. Politely framed but substantive
responses to her criticism: Rational-
political engagement on immigration
GD: You can‟t say anything about the immigrants
because you‟re saying you‟re, but all these
eastern Europeans coming in, where are they
flocking from?
GB: A million people come in from Europe, but a
million British people have gone into Europe,
you do know there‟s a lot of British people
staying in Europe as well.
(GB changes the subject)
(but also vague, implausible, repetitive,
minimal)
22. You can‟t say anything about the immigrants
because you‟re saying you‟re, but all these
eastern Europeans coming in, where are they
flocking from?
You can‟t say anything about the immigrants
because you‟re saying you‟re RACIST, but all
these eastern Europeans coming in, where are
they flocking from?
Gillian Duffy is also reflexively aware of political
„presentation of self‟ issues: cf Van Dijk, „I‟m not a
racist but...‟
23. Interpretation
GB is dissatisfied with his own performance, caught out, as
he sees it, by Gillian Duffy‟s unexpectedly critical stance. To
retrospectively maintain his own face to himself and to his
aides, he needs to propose rationalisations for the
imperfections of that performance. He chooses character
attack as one of these rationalisations. If Duffy were indeed
„bigoted‟, then his own failure to deploy intelligent and
persuasive reasoning to convince her is explicable. Rational
political discussion is not an option with people who are
bigoted. They are beyond the reach of rationality, their views
guided by prejudices that resist all evidence and all logic.
24. The open-mike comment, though it was not
meant to be heard by Duffy or the wider voting
public, was meant to be heard by a more
immediate grouping – the aides who were
present in the car as he spoke. This set of
people is also an audience, but an affiliated
audience, part of „team GB‟, who share a
concern with the efficacy of their leader‟s
campaigning.
25. What GB says is
“onstage” (live radio
broadcast, publicly
audible)
What he does (hand to
head) is “offstage”
(visible only locally).
Open-cam gaffe?
26. Although the „bigoted‟ comment was taken to
index Gillian‟s comment on immigration
specifically, this interpretation is misleading.
Politicians and those who help them need to be
careful in the „always-on‟ political era.
(Thompson)
The offstage political sphere is not innocent of
„presentation of self‟ considerations, varying
according to context. There are audiences in this
sphere too.
In multimodal configurations, performances can
be simultaneously onstage and offstage.
27.
28. John Corner 2000: Mediated Persona and
Political Culture: Dimensions of Structure and
Process. European Journal of Cultural Studies,
3(3), 386-402
Erving Goffman 1959: The Presentation of
Self in Everyday Life. New York: Anchor Books
John Thompson, 2005: The New Visibility.
Theory, Culture and Society 22 (6), 31-51
Teun van Dijk, 1987: Communicating racism:
Ethnic prejudice in thought and talk. Newbury
Park, CA: Sage.
