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Part of
Influencer Discourse: Affective relations and identities
Edited by Pilar Garcés-Conejos Blitvich and Alexandra Georgakopoulou
[Pragmatics & Beyond New Series 349] 2024
► pp. 175–198

Chapter 7
Influencers’ conflictual responses to posters’ offensive comments on Instagram

Insights from Greek

| National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
| National and Kapodistrian University of Athens
This chapter aims to contribute to the study of Social Media Influencers’ (SMIs) discourse. More specifically, it explores the language practices of five prominent Greek SMIs, based on their responses to (perceived) impoliteness levelled against them on Instagram. After taking a close look at the acts provoking the conflictual reactions, we analysed 107 influencers’ responses to aggressive comments posted under their feed photos. Drawing on models of response options to impoliteness, we argue that the majority of SMIs who choose to respond to aggressive comments (mostly involving accusations and criticism) do so by resorting to offensive rather than defensive or mixed strategies (i.e., a combination of offensive and defensive ones), while the most salient offensive strategy used involves sarcasm. Interestingly, it seems that SMIs do not always avoid aggression to attain their strategic goals.
Keywords: influencers, impoliteness strategies, conflict, (offensive / defensive) responses, sarcasm, Instagram, Greek
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Online impoliteness/aggression
  • 3.Influencers
  • 4.Methodology and data
  • 5.Analysis
    • 5.1Photos
    • 5.2Posters’ negative reactions
    • 5.3Influencers’ responses to conflictual comments
      • 5.3.1Offensive strategies
        • 5.3.1.1Sarcasm
      • 5.3.2Defensive strategies
      • 5.3.3Mixed responses
  • 6.Discussion
  • 7.Concluding remarks
  • Notes
  • References
  • Appendix
This content is being prepared for publication; it may be subject to changes.
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