Original scientific paper

https://doi.org/10.20901/ms.17.33.1

Kamala Harris in Russian Media: Gendered Character Assassination and the Deligitimization of Political Femininity in Authoritarian Discourse

Oleg Kashirskikh ; Weizenbaum Institute, Berlin
Katerina Tsetsura ; Gaylord College of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Oklahoma

Abstract

This article examines representations of Kamala Harris in Russian media during the 2024 U.S. presidential campaign to explore how character assassination operates in authoritarian contexts. Drawing on sociocultural approaches to character assassination and post-structuralist discourse theory, the study conceptualizes character attacks not merely as strategies of reputational damage but also as discursive practices that reproduce normative hierarchies of gender and political legitimacy. The analysis demonstrates that Harris is represented through recurring tropes of emotionality, domesticity, and personalized femininity, which serve to depoliticize her political agency. The findings further complicate interpretations of Russian conservatism by showing that representations of Harris cannot be reduced to a coherent traditionalist ideology. Rather, they reflect a hybrid assemblage of authoritarian normativity, patriarchal gender expectations, postfeminist individualization, and residual Soviet moral frameworks. The article argues that character assassination in authoritarian media discourse operates less through direct ideological confrontation than through the symbolic regulation of legitimate political subjectivity.

Keywords

Character assassination; gendered depoliticization; authoritarian media discourse; political femininity; political subjectivity

Hrčak ID:

350357

URI

https://hrcak.srce.hr/350357

Publication date:

27.8.2026.

Article data in other languages: croatian

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