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Part of
Discourse, Politics and Women as Global Leaders
Edited by John Wilson and Diana Boxer
[Discourse Approaches to Politics, Society and Culture 63] 2015
► pp. 315–344

Chapter 13. Ellen Johnson Sirleaf

Media’s “Ma Ellen” or the “Iron Lady” of West Africa? Textual discourse & brand of a leader

| University of Florida

Incumbent president of Liberia, Ellen Johnson Sirleaf, currently serving her second term, is the first democratically elected female head of state in modern Africa. During the 2005 and 2011 elections, Sirleaf strategically performed multiple discursive identities, appealing to both male and female constituents. This qualitative pragmatic discourse analysis supplemented by quantitative data, reveals media stylizations of Sirleaf ranging from that of a “grandmother” to the “Iron Lady” to “Ma Ellen,” mother of a country. The present study demonstrates the gendered and non-gendered discourses Sirleaf employs, and introduces the theoretical framework of gender-neutral, gender-polar and gender-biased text. The political brands Sirleaf discursively establishes for herself are compared with and contrasted to brands of the Liberian president as styled by international media.

Keywords: gender-biased, gendered discursive strategies, gender-neutral, gender-polar, media stylization, textual discourse
Published online: 30 October 2015
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/dapsac.63.14jon
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2017. Cracking the Concrete Ceiling in Male-Dominated Societies: A Tale of Three ‘Presidentas’. In Challenging Leadership Stereotypes through Discourse, ► pp. 195 ff. DOI logo
Lumala, Masibo & Louise Mullany
2020. Language, Gender and Leadership: Applying the Sociolinguistics of Narrative and Identity in East Africa. In Professional Communication [Communicating in Professions and Organizations, ], ► pp. 65 ff. DOI logo

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