“Influenciador digital” como encarnação do conceito de marca e estilo de vida

Abstract

Research focused on the figure of the “digital influencers” and their strategies for building an image of themselves that adds differentiation value (distinction). We start from the hypothesis that this distinction is modalized in a kind of aura, a term that taked from Benjamin, through Didi-Huberman's interpretive bias, for the construction of which the influencer creates circulating value-objects modalized by power and desire. The general objective of the research is to examine the process by which digital influencers, through their social media profiles, subscribe to this circuit by constructing values and constituting themselves as such. We defend the thesis that thus positioned the influencer converts to value from value, as in narrative processes in general, someone search for objects of value and, through them, an overvaluation for the social modalization that it receives (power or knowledge), thanks to the narrative pathways that develops and, as a result, the states that define it as a subject made from such actions. Thus, we propose that the digital influencer operates in order to construct its own value, initially linked to the brands it disseminates and, being successful, becomes itself a brand that attaches importance to others already existing. Therefore, this research is part of the overlap of studies on consumption, brands, persuasion and valorization strategies, emphasizing the way digital influencers commercialize and spectacularize their image and life, linked to certain values disseminated in contemporary culture. The research is based on authors considered relevant for the discussion, such as Antoine Lilti, Andrea Semprini, Walter Benjamin, Georges Didi-Huberman, Michel Foucault, Byung-Chul Han, Paula Sibilia and Christoph Türcke. Semioticists of the discursive and tensive lines, such as Algirdas Julius Greimas, Jacques Fontanille and Claude Zilberberg are our main bases when we weave the analysis of the research from the corpus. The methodology used is the collection, analysis and discussion of bibliographic and empirical material, through analysis of verb-visual languages and social aspects. The construction of values moves between influencers and brands and is approved by followers, because of the manipulation carried out by the recipients of messages uttered on social media. In this process, the subject that discloses a brand or a way of being reveals itself as a brand, and over-determines the value of a brand due to its supposed competence to legitimize the importance, status, prestige, to what it promotes. To this end, procedures are triggered within the narrative path, through which the enunciative metamorphosis of the influencer occurs, which becomes a brand incarnation.