ENUNCIATIVE STRATEGIES AND THE CONSTRUCTION OF DISCURSIVE AUTHORITY: AN ANALYSIS OF THE DISCURSIVITY OF DIGITAL INFLUENCERS ON INSTAGRAM

Abstract

This article analyzes the discourses of digital influencers in advertisements posted on the social network Instagram, paying attention to the enunciative strategies employed by the subjects who enunciate. It examines how the construction of the figure of discursive authority occurs in this environment, since in the current technological era, it is from these media personalities that companies seek an insertion in this space and a greater approximation with their target audience.  As a guiding question, the study asks: how is the discourse of digital influencers on Instagram constituted from the point of view of the enunciative strategies they employ when advertising products? It is a discursivity that has determined behaviors in specific social groups. In this context, the research brings a reflection on this cultural phenomenon based on the theory of Discourse Analysis of the French strand, analyzing publiposts of digital influencers when advertising products, based on the idea that discourse is a social practice. Methodologically, this is a descriptive-interpretative study of a qualitative nature. The theoretical contribution of this work is the studies of Kotler (2020), Torres (2009), Pêcheux (2014), Foucault (2019; 2012), Orlandi (2015), among others. The analyses indicate that the discourse of digital influencers has enunciative regularities, such as the discursive process of anticipation, the reproduction of the advertising discourse of the brands themselves that act in an attempt to build a will to truth, control the effects of meaning and the conditions of production, and point to a discursive and compositional regularity.