The subject of the study is the discursive dimension of reputation in the contemporary media communication space – the set of textual and communicative mechanisms through which the reputation of a subject is constructed, consolidated, and transformed in media discourse. The relevance of the work is determined by a profound transformation of reputation formation mechanisms in the digital media environment: algorithmic content filtering, viral information dissemination, the growth of user-generated content, and the platformization of the information space have caused reputation to acquire a dynamic, distributed, and multidimensional character. Traditional approaches that reduce reputation to the dichotomy of "positive / negative" or to an instrumental interpretation within managerial practices prove insufficient for describing complex discursive processes in the digital environment. The aim of the article is to identify the structural levels of the discursive realization of reputation and to analyze the mechanisms of their textual embodiment. To achieve this aim, the following objectives are addressed: substantiating the transition from simplified models to a multi-level approach, identifying the key levels of reputational construction, analyzing the textual and discursive mechanisms of reputation formation at each level, and defining the functions of reputation in the media space. The methodology is based on mediatization theory, critical discourse analysis, the media-linguistic toolkit of evaluativity, and the theory of symbolic capital. Systemic analysis of the structure of reputational discourse and the method of structural modeling are employed. The scientific novelty of the study lies in the systemic description of the discursive dimension of reputation as a multi-level system of textual practices functioning in the digital media environment. For the first time, five structural levels of the discursive realization of reputation are identified and described – cognitive-informational, evaluative, narrative, metaphorical, and pragmatic – and for each of them specific textual mechanisms are defined: agenda-setting and headline constructions, modal and lexical coding of evaluation, narrative framing, conceptual metaphorical models, and credibility construction strategies. The interrelation between the structural levels of reputational discourse and the mechanisms of their textual embodiment is revealed. Four functions of reputation in the media space are defined: orienting, legitimizing, structuring, and constitutive. It is demonstrated that the stability of the reputational effect is determined not by individual evaluative markers but by the interaction of all levels of discursive realization. The proposed analytical model provides a foundation for further operationalization of the phenomenon of reputation in media communication studies and makes it possible to account for the complexity and multidimensionality of contemporary discursive processes in the digital environment.
Andrey Viktorovich Yablonskikh (Wed,) studied this question.