Authors

Discussion

The study presents the author's method of psycholinguistic analysis of media texts, which is used to identify indirect and manipulative hate speech. This method was applied in the study of hate speech (HS) disseminated in Russian media between 2014 and 2021. I aimed to provide a scientific basis for the existence of manipulative and indirect hate speech using an interdisciplinary approach. The method reveals the linguistic methods and non-linguistic tools that journalists employ to disseminate indirect and manipulative HS, influencing the audience's worldview. 

In the research discovered that three basic types of hate speech (HS) were used to influence the audience’s consciousness: direct; indirect hidden; and manipulative HS. The study reveals that in most cases (97% of the selected texts), journalists utilise hidden or manipulative language of hostility which does not contain direct images or manifestations of intolerance.  Despite the absence of obscenities, direct insults, and explicit calls for violence, these types of HS are no less dangerous than the direct form, because such content presents readers with a negative attitude towards certain groups and individuals, which can be used by stakeholders to incite violent actions.

The negative rhetoric disseminated by journalists in the analysed publications contained numerous examples of manipulations and indirect HS: strengthening the existing negative prejudices and stereotypes; creating new stereotypes, prejudices, fake news; creating negative associations on the basis of negative archetypes of the past; a systemic and frequent repetition of negative information and so on.

The method is appropriate for forensics linguistics, psycholinguistics.