The Practices of Construction Vladimir Putin's Personality Cult in Modern Russian Media Discourse

The article focuses on practices of modern Russian media discourse contributing to the formation of the cult of Vladimir Putin. The following practices, which occur mainly in the pro-government media forming the officious ideology, were detected and described: 1) the use of the specific nomination 'national leader' emphasizing the unique status of Vladimir Putin; 2) building up his image as the star of popular culture, balancing between the ordinary and the unique; 3) the equalization of Vladimir Putin and Russia. At the same time it is shown that the practices mentioned above meet resistance mainly by the so-called opposition media. The major means of resistance are 1) critical interpretation of these practices, for example by including concepts of the official ideology into critical context; 2) an explication of the cult of personality, which is negatively perceived in Russian society.