Abstract
This article examines the political deployment of elite-centred historical narratives in Timor-Leste, focusing on the ‘ Maun Boot ’ (‘Big Brother’) discourse and its enduring resonance in Timorese electoral politics. Adapting Norman Fairclough’s critical discourse analysis, we investigate how political elites mobilize this normative historical framing to claim authority, produce legitimacy and shape public memory and perceptions, particularly in moments of electoral contestation, using Timor-Leste’s 2023 parliamentary election as a case study. We analyse electioneering documents and party platforms, pre- and post-election media coverage, and formal reports and assessments of the electoral process to demonstrate how the generation of 1975 discourse is deployed in political practice. We show how this narrative is both normalized and reproduced across these texts, embedding a hierarchical and generational understanding of political legitimation. Our analysis demonstrates that this dominant discourse works to stabilize an elite stratum identified with the so-called ‘Generation ‘75’ (1975 resistance leaders and veterans) while delimiting the political imagination available to future generations and alternative histories.