Ethos and criminality: discursive analysis of extortion attempts

Abstract: This paper aims to analyze the discursive ethé built by the subjects at the communicative situation known as “Fake Kidnapping Scam”. To accomplish our goal, we made the analysis of the corpus, that is constituted by three recordings of “Fake Kidnapping Scams”, using the studies of Maingueneau (2008), Amossy (2005) and Charaudeau (2012; 2015), as well in some researchers of Forensic Linguistics, as Coulthard & Johnson (2007), Olsson (2008) and Souza-Silva (2009). After our analysis, we noticed that the fake kidnappers tries to construct to themselves some ethé which corroborates the arguments used by them on the interactional process. To the extent that the arguments are constituted, mainly, by intimidations and threats, the ethé built are of someone cruel and prepared to fulfill their threats: it is the ethos of potence subsidized about certain sociodiscursive imaginaries about criminality.