Conversações políticas na rede. A construção da opinião de Cidadãos Comuns e estratégias de visibilidade na Internet

Abstract

In this study we aimed to investigate how Ordinary Citizens explain the discursive strategies used by them for expressing their political opinions on the Internet. Based on theoretical discussions about the behavioral phenomena of the political culture and the reasoning of the reasonable citizen, in the face of diverse information flows, we focused on identifying possible relations between the visibility of the political positioning and the discursive strategies used by individuals during conversations in applications and social networks sites. For this purpose, we made use of an empirical investigation methodology, from in-depth interviews, with 15 citizens who maintained relations of interest with the theme politics during the 2014 elections. Therefore, the methodological framework sought conditions for a better understanding about how the available tools in the digital environment cooperate for the development of strategies and trends of use that gain evidence in the forms of interaction among individuals, observing more specifically the Facebook and WhatsApp scenarios. The analysis deployment demonstrated at least four more evident aspects in the strategies employed by the interviewees: (1) the sharing of contents that express an essentially personal value concerning politics; (2) the use of linguistic resources of the digital culture to emphasize or expose which they consider to be the truth in their personal opinion; (3) the differentiation of conducts according to the environment and the spectator; (4) the use of control mechanisms to a greater or lesser opinion exposure of the opinion, according to the positioning waves about the theme. Thereby, considering the contributions of the dramaturgical perspective formulated by Erving Goffman (1985), we observed that the discursive strategies employed by individuals when expressing their opinions revealed a performative understanding or an idea of self-representation, when in an interaction situation in digital environments. In other words, as they express themselves or manifest their desires, they develop specific senses for a [form of] communication with the imagined publics in which it was observed, therefore, an implicit relation between the opinion construction and the visibility strategies around the social profile on networks