Linguistic techniques of image modeling in media space (as exemplified in newspaper headings)

The article is devoted to the identification of speech means used to form the image of the politician in the American Mass Media as exemplified in electronic articles’ versions which are related to the election campaign in the United States and are published in The Washington Post, USA Today, The New York Times, Los Angeles Times, The Wall Street Journal, Daily Newsza. The period covers articles dated from September 2015 till April 2016. Having based on the presented in the scientific literature classification of headings, we found out that the analyzed articles contained titles with the greatest impact on the reader: the title-question, the title in the form of a “question and answer”, title which appeals to the opinion, experience or activities of a credible person, intrigue-title, bid-title. To create the image of the presidential race participants, journalists tend to use epithets, metaphors, metonymy, irony, hyperbole to a greater extent, and comparison, antithesis, rhetorical question, parallel constructions to a lesser extent. As a result it is shown how different types of titles by means of linguistics units create the destructive image of D. Trump, M. Rubio’s image of politician-“smalltimer”, the negative image of Clinton and the positive image of B. Sanders.