Twitting genre in Gennady Zyuganov's political discourse

The paper analyses a politician's linguistic personality, presented in the genre of twitting. An attempt is made to describe the genre characteristics in the framework of T. V. Shmeleva's questionnaire. Chosen as the source for the analysis were the politician's more than 1500 statements registered in the social networks of Twitter within the period from 2012 till 2015. Defined on the basis of the analysis of the twit statements was the multidimensionality of the politician's communicative aims. Unfolded is the essence the problem of the linguistic personality's strategic activity in a virtual discourse. Differentiated and described are the characteristic features of the author's image. Presented in the paper are the problems of the polyfunctional and pragmatically oriented area in the politician's discourse. Note is made of the abundance and diffusivity of addressing. Revealed are the images of the past and of the future, the politically oriented dictum as well as the language organization of the twitting.