Me, myself and I: selfies as vehicles of personalised politics in social media era

The chapter examines the ways in which political actors perform authenticity by personalising politics (i.e. practicing self-personalisation) in their visual communication. Theoretically, the chapter discusses three key concepts: performed authenticity, personalisation of politics, and visual political communication. The interplay of the three is examined with reference to past research; from the early studies of politicians' performance in television interviews and talk shows, through analyses of posters and television ads in election campaigns, to investigations of politicians' use of visuals on social media. With regards to the latter, particular attention is paid to politicians' sharing of selfies, self-portrait digital photographs taken by themselves, on social media. Specifically, selfies are discussed as a visual communication practice that enables politicians to meet key elements of performed authenticity (consistency, intimacy, ordinariness and immediacy) through communication of personalised content. Several case studies are presented to examine this. Namely, social media practice of posting selfies is examined on examples of India's Narendra Modi, Canada's Justin Trudeau, and UK's Boris Johnson, i.e. most followed heads of the executive in 2020 on Instagram, the key visual social network, across three continents. The chapter concludes with the summary of main arguments and suggestions for future research.

This is the original submitted version of the chapter. The final version is available in Research Handbook on Visual Politics edited by Darren Lilleker and Anastasia Veneti, published in 2023, Edward Elgar Publishing Ltd.