Structuring the narrative of conflict in media communication

The article discusses the phenomenon of narrative, highly relevant in the field of media linguistics, due to the growing interest of researchers in mechanisms of politically oriented text formation, means of political propaganda, tools to affect mass consciousness. The aim of the article is to consider the structural features of the narrative that functions in media discourse when covering political events. The analysis of linguistic manipulation means in political narrative is carried out on the basis of Russian- and English-language articles devoted to the same event but carrying out political positioning from the opposite sides of the political conflict. The media discourse narrative as a complex communicative event is built on basic structural categories that simplify the reader's perception. It is found that the choice of narrative strategies for constructing the text, the plane of expression of the author's viewpoint, the method of implementing the evaluation predetermine the form of coverage of political events in media communication. The analysis of the material obtained by continuous sampling is carried out using contextual, definitional and discourse analysis. Manipulative influence within the narrative is carried out via hidden evaluation, appeal to the dichotomy of “US” / “THEM”, substitution of modality, imposition of opinions and assumptions. When creating a political narrative, tactics of imposing false presuppositions, changing the context and distorting the factual information are widely used. Structural and qualitative features make it possible to use the narrative as a tool for political positioning when creating politically oriented texts.