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Political Ideology, Rhetoric and Aesthetics in the Twenty-First Century: The Case of the 'Alt-Right'

Abstract

The tone and style of public political discourse have, it seems, become more blunt and aggressive. Often this is associated with online 'trolling' but the issue is broader than that. The internet has reduced 'entry costs' to the public sphere, introducing new audiences to new political voices using platforms (anonymous below-the-line comments, 140 character tweets, blogs building partisan audiences) which combine image and text. As a result the ideological landscape is changing and positions seem to be held more stridently. Just as the advent of printing, national newspapers, radio and television changed the shape of what could be thought and said politically (and how and by whom) changes in political communication today are also affecting the form and content of political thinking.

We argue that while all of this cannot be understood without attending to digital technologies it cannot be fully understood with reference to technology alone. New forms and styles of political thinking, arguing and communicating are also linked with, on the one hand, deep changes in democratic politics (such as the 'hollowing out' of political parties and related social-political institutions) and, on the other hand, to much longer histories of ideological theory and practice. For example, some 'trolling' and related forms of political communicative disruption (e.g. organized online attacks) are parts of a wider network of 'alt-right' and related political groups which have had a recognizable impact on Conservatism in the USA and, increasingly, in the UK and Europe. Adherents and participants engage in online dissemination of ideas, arguments with opponents, targeted online engagements and interventions into more traditional political action. They have created and distributed an ideologically charged political vocabulary, including terms such as 'cultural Marxism', 'cuckservative' and 'identitarianism', which has begun to enter the mainstream, changing the shape of Conservative and right-wing political thought and rhetoric. We will develop our study of general changes in political thinking and communicating through a case-study of these movements focusing on a range of political positions and groups including anti-state ultra-libertarians, white nationalists, men's rights activists and advocates of a form of 'scientific racism' known as Human Bio-Diversity (HBD).

Combining contemporary cultural and political theory, political science and political sociology, rhetoric and research into visual and digital cultures the project aims to:

1) develop concepts for understanding what happens to political thinking and ideology in digital culture.
2) develop and apply methods combining history of political thought, political science and (digital) Humanities.
3) refine and test these through a case-study of the 'alt-right' (interviews with alt-right/conservative thinkers and activists, study of the movement's historical & ideological lineage and analysis of how online forums, formats and visual styles contribute to and constitute its rhetorical form and ideological content).

The project thus refines and combines theories and methods for understanding and analyzing the relationships between political communication and ideologies and, through the case study, enriches research into the ideology and politics of the 'alt-right'.

As part of the project we will organise cross-disciplinary symposia leading to the publication of an edited book. We will publish the main findings of the project as a book about ideology and online communication and as academic articles in journals from across the fields with which the project is engaged. In addition the project will lead to the creation of a 'Dictionary of Trolling and Internet Argumentation' (to be made available online and disseminated to political commentators and activists) and a podcast series exploring the alt-right and wider changes to political ideologies, rhetoric, image and argument.

Abstract

Misinformation is widely seen as a fundamental flaw of social media, undermining public culture and posing an existential threat to democracy. Journalists, policymakers and academics have responded by emphasising fact-checking, better content moderation and Big Data analytics. Though valuable, these responses tend to overlook what attracts users to misinformation, and how everyday social media habits contribute to its circulation. The Lead and Co-Applicant of this project will map out new ways for studying misinformation in everyday life, blending quantitative and qualitative approaches to social media. They will enhance their applied skills in data analytics and visualisation by attending the Digital Methods Initiative 2023 Summer School at the University of Amsterdam. This will in turn spur the creation of mixed-method ‘recipes’ for social media research, shared via a wiki and critiqued, tested and revised across two researcher workshops. These recipes will then be disseminated online to the wider academic community.

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