Online Library

Violent Jihadist movements have increasingly produced online English language magazines in order to encourage young Muslims into terrorism. This article argues that sociological approaches to the study of these magazines should engage with theories of political myth, understood as the collective “work” on dramatic and figurative narratives which provide significance to the political conditions of social groups. The utility of this approach is demonstrated through an analysis of al-Qaeda’s online magazine, Inspire. Targeted toward an alienated young Western Muslim readership, Inspire stylistically mimics Western magazines by using satirical representations of politicians and making references to popular culture. The authors seek to convince their readership that they are part of a violent conflict with Western “crusaders” and treacherous false Muslims. Through a rhetorical strategy of “legitimization via proximization,” perceived injustices committed by the purported enemies of Islam throughout the world are seen as direct attacks on the reader and all Muslims. The reader must sacrifice his/her livelihood in order to become a “hero” and defend the Umma against its enemies. The article concludes that the mobilizing potential of the work on myth in these magazines necessitates further research.

VOX-Pol Blog Post.

VOX-Pol Guest Lecture Series, Autumn 2023

Name: Kristina Kirk, Principal Advisor, Christchurch Call Unit, New Zealand Government

Title: The Christchurch Call

Outline: This presentation will discuss the establishment and evolution of The Christchurch Call, an initiative arising as a consequence of the livestreaming of an horrific terrorist event in New Zealand in 2019. The Call outlines collective, voluntary commitments from Governments and online service providers designed to address the issue of terrorist and violent extremist content online and to prevent the abuse of the internet as occurred during and after the Christchurch attacks.

In response to the data revolution, academic research and media attention have increasingly focused on the technological adaptation and innovation displayed by the far right. The greatest attention is paid to social media and how groups and organizations are utilizing technological advancement and growth in virtual networks to increase recruitment and advance radicalization on a global scale. As with most social and political endeavors, certain technologies are in vogue and thus draw the attention of users and regulators and service providers. This creates a technological blind spot within which extremist groups frequently operate older and less well regarded technologies without the oversight that one might expect. This article examines the less well-studied traditional and official websites of the Ku Klux Klan, the most established and iconic of American far-right organizations. By incorporating non-participant observation of online spaces and thematic analysis, this research analyzes the evolution of 26 websites, from their emergence in the early 1990s to the present day. We examine the ways in which traditional printed communications and other ephemera have progressed with advances in technology, focusing on the following central elements of Klan political activism and community formation: Klan identity, organizational history, aims and objectives; technology and outreach, including online merchandise and event organization; and the constructions of whiteness and racism. The results add value and insight to comparable work by offering a unique historical insight into the ways in which the Klan have developed and made use of Web 1.0, Web 2.0, and Web3 technologies.

VOX-Pol Guest Lecture Series, Autumn 2022

Speaker: Dr. Ashton Kingdon

Title: Alternative Histories and Far-right Occult Subcultures

As contemporary society becomes immersed in a visual culture, extremist imagery is becoming progressively organized around a network of symbols, rituals, and collective meanings. The research presented here employs one distinctive meme of the Waco Siege as a template to guide the reader through three different manifestations of anti-government extremism, and provides a conceptual framework on which future research can build. The significance of this approach lies in its ability to capture both the universality of an individual meme—its overarching message on which all viewers can agree—and its peculiarity—the inherent crystallizations and contrasting narratives perceived by individual users, operating on different social media platforms, at particular moments in time. This chapter will also outline the primary methodological and ethical considerations that need to be taken into consideration by researchers using memes as the primary object of study.