The YouTubification of Politics, Impoliteness and Polarization

Abstract

This aim of this chapter is to relate deindividuation to impoliteness and impoliteness to polarization. To that effect, sequences extracted from the comments section to videoclips posted on YouTube and related to the 2008 US primaries and presidential elections were subjected to a quantitative and a qualitative analysis. The analysis sought to confirm the hypothesis that polarization, within this context, would be related to an increase in positive impoliteness strategies. Also, this chapter raises important questions regarding the applicability of current theories of impoliteness to the study of polyloguic, intergroup communication as most of their tenets were developed to tackle dyadic, interpersonal communication. Impoliteness is seen as multifunctional within the context analyzed and, contrary to general belief, it is argued that it can be also constitutive, rather than just disruptive, of communal life.