Em busca de um herói: a construção discursiva de Joaquim Barbosa no julgamento do Mensalão por Veja e Época

This paper analyzes the discursive strategies of the two largest magazines in Brazil, Veja and Epoca , to build the image of Joaquim Barbosa during the trial of Mensalao , one of the major corruption scandals of the recent Brazilian history. We reflect on the notion of the journalistic discourse, focusing special attention on how journalism constructs the image of social actors. The corpus is scrutinized by categories of Critical Discourse Analysis: the meaning of words, use of metaphors, transitivity, interspeech and political and ideological effects of discourse. Resulting from the crossing linguistic techniques and critical social theory, these sociological categories help to understand how the media create specific semantic constellations that, when associated with people with ontological existence, turn them into paper beings, as Roland Barthes would say. The analysis shows that both magazines have resorted to strategies of heroization of Joaquim Barbosa, stressing the overcoming of the “poor boy who changed Brazil” as highlights one of the publications. As at other times in Brazilian history, the media have given to Joaquim Barbosa, although for a specific time, the national hero epithet, a post always put in the process of being occupied in a country historically lacking of heroic references. Keywords: discourse, journalistic discourse, Joaquim Barbosa, Veja, Epoca.