Contemporary American television news centers pundits as key voices in national political discourse. The most prominent pundits anchor their own programs, often during primetime hours, reaching large audiences . This paper analyzes pundits’ performance of a type of news talk that is designed to appear unscripted and therefore authentic, enhancing parasocial interaction (PSI) with viewers and affirming pundits’ roles as experts. Data collected from two of the most-watched pundit-helmed news shows— Hannity and The Rachel Maddow Show—suggests that pundits use greeting tokens, personal pronouns, repetition, and rhetorical questions during their opening monologues. We discuss the mechanisms through which punditry may contribute to political polarization by creating emphasis frames.

中文翻译：

---

“感谢您和我们在一起”：准社交互动以及专家谈话对汉尼蒂和马多节目的影响

当代美国电视新闻中心的专家是国家政治话语中的关键声音。最著名的专家通常在黄金时段主持自己的节目，吸引大量观众。本文分析了专家在某种新闻谈话中的表现，这种新闻谈话旨在显得无脚本，因此是真实的，增强了与观众的准社会互动（PSI），并肯定了专家作为专家的角色。从两档由专家主持的收视率最高的新闻节目——《汉尼提》和《雷切尔·玛多秀》中收集的数据表明，专家在开场白中使用了问候语、人称代词、重复和反问句。我们讨论了专家通过创建重点框架可能导致政治两极分化的机制。