Tactics of self-presentation in literary reviews: speech turns and their pragmatic functions

The article discusses the strategy of self-presentation as a special form of speech behavior of the author of literary reviews. The relevance of this tactic in the media discourse is based on the importance of the fact that the ratio of the received information to the recipient depends on the sender of the information. The tool for implementing communication tactics in a particular text is the speech code (ST), so the goal of this article is to characterize pragmatic functions of typical ST, forming the image of the author, and thereby affecting the angle of reviews` perception by mass audience. In addition, a description of the nature of the interaction of speech turns representing a strategy of self-presentation is suggested. The factual material for analysis were the literary reviews published in “Literaturnaya gazeta” (“Literary newspaper”). The analysis of the factual material showed that within this tactic the author of the review aims to present in a good light his professional and personal qualities. To create a “professional” component of the image of the author the following speech turns are used: the professional identity, the creative workshop, the intertextuality, the truism and the advice; to create a “personal” component - a memory / life event, the recognition, the impression of reading, the subjectivation of the judgment, the self-criticism / self-irony, the concession / justification, the appeal to eternal values. The quantitative comparison of the two groups proves the desire of the author’s of the review to state his personal qualities, no less, and perhaps even more than professional ones. In conclusion it should be emphasized that the collective image of the modern critic, on the one hand, includes such qualities as professionalism, literary knowledge, linguistic and communicative competence. On the other hand, the critic has positioned himself as an emotionally responsive reader to the read units, expressing assessments correctly and at the same time frankly, and as a human being characterized by the sincerity to the audience, commitment to traditional values of the Russian mentality, self-criticism and self-irony.