In 2019, Jason Kenney was elected Premier of Alberta, Canada. Alberta is an oil rich province with a long history of electing (almost) exclusively conservative governments. Jason Kenney’s politics and election win followed on the 2016 election victory of Donald Trump, and much of Kenney’s platform followed a similar populist rhetoric. A significant visual component of Kenney’s election campaign was his use of a blue Dodge Ram 1500 truck as his campaign vehicle. He and his truck traveled around Alberta campaigning to "Unite the Right" – a tactic that ultimately put him into power in 2019. Our chapter considers Jason Kenny’s blue Dodge Ram truck as a form of visual communication. The semiotics of the vehicle are rich and nuanced. The truck is a dog-whistle symbol, communicating (without explicitly saying) that the neo-liberal populist myths are on the road again. Our reading of Kenney’s pickup as a form of visual communication revels much about our current political climate in western democracies. We suggest the truck acts as a symbol of populist politics and a version of political culture that wants to "Make Whatever Place Great Again". Such symbols, the truck, the border wall, the confederate flag, mobilize myths of cultural and political identities that are (we argue) larger and more powerful than the politicians that conjure them. In other words, the blue truck—like Stephen King’s Plymouth Christine—has a life of its own.

Authors:
Chaseten Remillard, Royal Roads University, Canada
Tyler Nagel, Southern Alberta Institute of Technology, Canada

About the Presenter(s)
Dr Chaseten Remillard is a University Associate Professor/Senior Lecturer at Royal Roads University in Canada

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