Language in the Trump era: Scandals and emergencies analyses examples of former president Donald Trump's discourse using a sociolinguistic and/or linguistic anthropology lens. The book is divided into four parts, each including numerous chapters by distinguished authors. The key strength of the book is how it provides an excellent encyclopaedic overview of the fascinating and diverse discursive strategies of political discourse as it unpacks each in the context of Trump's discourse.
The first part explores examples from Trump's discourse wherein he creates a sense of Self and Other. It provides an interesting perspective as to why, while Trump's discourse was perceived incoherent and non-sensical by many, it made perfect sense to his followers and supporters. A strong thread throughout the book is that Trump's discourse excludes people and communities, spreads disinformation, and is self-serving and attempts to depict himself as a masculine, macho, alpha-male. The editors explicitly see his discourse as an ‘emergency’ as clearly articulated in the first introductory chapter.
The second part is dedicated to discursive means that Trump draws on to spread misinformation and falsehoods to his audiences, while chapters in the third section explore Trump's discourse using feminist theory and unpack his discourse on the Access Hollywood Bus wherein Trump made derogatory comments about women. The analyses in this section are fascinating as they discuss the differences and similarities between banter and gossiping and the social purpose they serve, as well as the function that metaphors play in Trump's discourse. Chapter 12, for example, (by Carol Cohn) is particularly interesting. After a well-written introduction, inducting the reader to the features of military discourse, it argues how Trump's use of metaphors could have had severe consequences in making decisions about politically sensitive issues.
The various chapters use qualitative analyses to present arguments about Trump's discourse. These are supported by examples of Trump's discourse collected from databases and sources such as Factba.se. While the arguments and the supporting evidence certainly provide a coherent and sound reasoning for those who are more anti-Trump on the political spectrum, they do not provide information regarding the frequency of the use of these discursive devices. In other words, for those who may need persuading via numbers, it is not clear how representative of Trump's discourse they are. Moreover, the transcription adopted throughout the book may not be familiar to some, but the initial note on the transcription convention used in the book is very helpful.
Overall, the book provides fascinating insight into the language of Trump and would be of interest to postgraduate students, scholars/researchers in linguistics, as well as the broader social sciences and/or those who are interested in understanding the discursive features of one of the world's most controversial presidents.
