The prison blogs: The Mind of Maurice Clarett and image repair on the Internet

Abstract

Maurice Clarett occupied the rarified air of sport stardom for a brief time. His ascent to glory was followed by an ignominious descent into trouble and scandal. This study examines Clarett’s blog, The Mind of Maurice Clarett, which was written while he was in prison, to understand how it is used in an image repair strategy. The results of this study show that Clarett’s image repair strategy focused on two main elements: reducing the offensiveness and corrective actions. This examination of Clarett’s blog reveals three important issues related to image repair by athletes. The first is how this context provides further support for Benoit’s framework within the world of sport. Second, it highlights the presence of the dialogic self in image repair strategies. Finally, the computer-mediated communication (CMC) platform of a blog provides an argument that an individual’s image repair strategy can be conceived, altered and ended over time providing platform for a more holistic understanding of CMC image repair strategies and their contexts in general.

Keywords:

• rhetoric
• Clarett
• blog
• self-presentation
• image repair