Keyword – public rhetoric

N. Varagya, Szilvia:

In crisis: communication! Is communication in crisis?

The Covid-19 pandemic, caused by the SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus, reached Slovakia before the campaign period of the parliamentary elections. The intensity of the pandemic coverage by the Hungarian-language daily newspaper Új Szó was influenced by several factors such as the election campaign topics, unexpected election results and other relevant events for the Hungarian enthnic comunity, the new government’s political priorities, scandals and pandemic control measures. The frequency of pandemic thematisation in the daily newspaper followed the curves of each Covid-19 wave in Slovakia. During the studied period, as a result of party-neutral journalism, the pandemic did not become a divisive political issue for Hungarians in Slovakia. The examined contents of Új Szó (editorials, opinion articles, caricatures, op-eds of the above mentioned newspaper) mostly relied on the linguistic and stylistic turns of Slovak political communication, its hidden messages, and the emerging ‘war rhetoric’ concerning the national testing.

Keywords: Covid-19, epidemic communication, media communication, New Word journal, pandemic, political communication, propaganda, public rhetoric, Slovakia, war rhetoric