“Desmoronando”: ethos and pathos analysis on a Veja cover

Abstract

This paper, having as its main theoretical scope the Semiolinguistics of Discourse Analysis, created by Patrick Charaudeau, analyses a cover of Veja magazine, in order to verify the way the “communicating self” constructs  the semiotized political person, articulating both verbal and nonverbal texts. Thus, it is observed if the “communication self”, as representative of the magazine, reinforces or refutes the image (ethos) normally constructed by the person portrayed. Moreover, in order that people are not only considered  bankroll readers, but effective buyers and assiduous readers of the issue, Veja, among various credibility and grasp strategies, makes use of two main ones – engagement and role play, with pathos effects. In this sense, besides the study of ethos, we intend to analyse, through Discourse Analysis bias, the emotion from the intended effects. The initial analysis reveals that there is no impartiality in transforming a gross event into a semiotized event and, therefore, already interpreted through the speaker’s point of view. This analysis is expected to contribute to the critical teaching of reading and textual interpretation.