Abstract:
The study has analyzed the linguistic strategies politicians use to build public
confidence following the public panic caused by the outbreak of the COVID-19
pandemic. Five public speeches by John Pombe Magufuli, Samia Suluhu Hassan,
and Dorothy Gwajima were accessed from YouTube for qualitative analysis. Results
indicate that discourses for public confidence-building involved 1) emphasizing the
norms of social events and practices; 2) requiring the public to rely on both scientific
authorities and reliable information; 3) requiring the authorities to be responsible
for the knowledge disseminated to the public and deconstructing possibilities of
untruths during the pandemic; and 4) emphasizing positive-self presentation and
negative other presentation. It is argued that building public confidence requires
powerholders to consider their role in dominating and disseminating knowledge.
They should emphasize truth, norms of practices, negative other-presentation, and
positive self-presentation, while at the same time deconstructing the possibilities of
untruths. A detailed study is needed to investigate the use of power in building
public confidence during crises.
