Narrative, intertextuality, and apologia in contemporary political scandals

Abstract

This study argues for a revised perspective on political apologia, using the dramatic 1990 Minnesota gubernatorial campaign as a case study. Jon Grunseth, Independent Republican candidate, was accused of sexual impropriety by several women, a situation that, predictably, eventuated in his use of apologetic strategies. However, this study argues that the failure of those strategies must be understood outside of conventional apologetic frameworks, which stress immediate material circumstances, and should instead be analyzed within a revised, narrativized, approach to apologia. This new approach emphasizes the intertextuality of scandal narratives and argues that critical understanding of Grunseth's apologia must be situated within a wider web of late 1980s/early 1990s cultural discourse concerning mediated scandal, sexual infidelity, and male behavior.