Countering Ethno-Religious Propaganda: A Multimodal Analysis of Anwar Ibrahim’s Political Communication on TikTok
摘要
In the 2022 General Election, Anwar Ibrahim’s multiethnic coalition formed a national unity government. Following the change of government, overwhelming ethno-religious propaganda circulated on social media platforms, containing elements that could trigger a repeat of the 1969 racial unrest. As the new Malaysian Prime Minister, Anwar Ibrahim was advised by the media to counter the racist and religious propaganda of the opposing coalition through TikTok, a micro-video platform popular among young people. In light of this recommendation, this chapter examines how Anwar Ibrahim utilized TikTok’s multimodal features to navigate and address ethno-religious issues in Malaysia, applying Halliday’s (2004) Systemic Functional Linguistics (SFL) within a multimodal discourse analysis framework. Four of Anwar’s posts on TikTok during the first six months of his tenure as prime minister were analyzed. The findings show that Anwar strategically used speeches and selected TikTok videos to present a positive image and promote unity by endorsing the 3R principles, respect for race, royalty, and religion, along with intellectual exploration and the concept of Malaysia Madani. This study reveals valuable insights for government officials and political strategists that multimodal platforms encourage critical assessment of political speeches and media content, promoting informed citizenship and active engagement for the betterment of the nation.