Among Donald Trump’s tendencies, one that often goes unnoticed is his penchant for superlatives. He frequently that no one has ever witnessed anything like virtually everything he mentions. Why does he do this? And what does it reveal?
This type of rhetoric is not new. Vesna Mikolič, a Slovenian linguistics scholar, analyzed the speeches of four original Italian fascists from the 1920s. She found that an increased intensity of their language, including hyperbole and superlatives, correlated with their detachment from reality, incitements to violence, and actual violence. Mikolič refers to this kind of oratory as exemplified when Trump promises to “lead America to new heights of greatness like the world has never seen before.” the “fascist imaginary.”
Editorial Cartoon Paco Baca.