Abstract

This research paper tries to critically analyse the Self/Other representation by Obama and McCain in the American 2008 electoral campaign relying on the fundamental triangulation of discourse, cognition and society (van Dijk, 1998, 2001). This research anchors on the mental processes which link text production and text comprehension models to explicit text and talk products as well as to social and political pragmatic phenomena to study the two American candidates’ electoral marketing of the hope-maker Self against the hope-destructor Other. The data is composed of two speeches: the September 04, 2008 Acceptance Speech of McCain as a U.S. Senator from Arizona and the Republican presidential nominee, and Obama’s speech of October 15, 2008: Remarks of Senator Barack Obama Londonderry, NH.