Features of Persuasive Media Discourses of Russia and Serbia (based on the Election of the Mayor of Moscow and the Mayor of Belgrade in 2018)
The aim of the study was to establish what is a persuasive speech culture in modern political cultures of Russia and Serbia. As a material, 12 texts in Russian and 12 texts in Serbian were analyzed, these texts refer to candidates Sergei Sobyanin (candidate for mayor of Moscow) and Zoran Radojičić (candidate for mayor of Belgrade). The article shows that in both analyzed discourses the thesis “It is necessary to vote for candidate X” is substantiated by the following arguments: “Because the X team is the best”, “Because the country's president supports the X nomination”, “Because a number of famous people support the candidacy of X”, “Because ordinary citizens support the nomination of X”. Media discourses of Russia and Serbia are distinguished by the rhetorical design of these arguments in the media discourse of Russia and Serbia. Media discourses in Russia and Serbia also differ in: a) the discourse of the Moscow candidate for mayor actively uses data on the positive results of his team's work, while in the discourse of the Belgrade candidate for mayor the main means of creating a positive image of his team was the use of evaluative adjectives; b) the president of Russia assesses only the business qualities of the Moscow mayor, and the president of Serbia characterizes the Belgrade candidate as a person; c) ordinary Moscow citizens, whose images are represented in the Russian media discourse, have names and actively expressed civic position, while ordinary citizens of Belgrade have no names and are passive; d) the Moscow candidate does not comment on the criticism of opponents, while the Belgrade candidate puts label on the messages discrediting him and doesn't counter-prove; e) an important place in the discourse of Belgrade mayoral elections is occupied by the self-presentation strategy of the candidate for mayor (as opposed to the discourse of elections in Moscow).