The Language of Hate

A Corpus Linguistic Analysis of White Supremacist Language

Andrew Brindle

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• eBook ISBN: 9781317552598
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Languages & Linguistics
• Subtopic: Linguistics
• Index: Languages & Linguistics

In this book, Andrew Brindle analyzes a corpus of texts taken from a white supremacist web forum which refer to the subject of homosexuality, drawing conclusions about the discourses of extremism and the dissemination of far-right hate speech online. The website from which Brindle's corpus is drawn, Stormfront, has been described as the most powerful active influence in the White Nationalist movement (Kim 2005). Through a linguistic analysis of the data combining corpus linguistic methodologies and a critical discourse analysis approach, Brindle examines the language used to construct heterosexual, white masculinities, as well as posters' representations of gay men, racial minorities and other out-groups, and how such groups are associated by the in-group. Brindle applies three types of analysis to the corpus: a corpus-driven approach centered on the study of frequency, keywords, collocation and concordance analyses; a detailed qualitative study of posts from the forum and the threads in which they are located; and a corpus-based approach which combines the corpus linguistic and qualitative analyses. The analysis of the data demonstrates a convergence of reactionary responses to not only women, gay men and lesbians, but also to racial minorities. Brindle's findings suggest that due to the forum format of the data, topics are discussed and negotiated rather than dictated unilaterally as would be the case in a hierarchical organization. This research-based study of white supremacist discourse on the Internet facilitates understanding of hate speech and the behavior of extremist groups, with the aim of providing tools to combat elements of extremism and intolerance in society.

1 Introduction

DOI: 10.4324/9781315731643-1

The aim of this book is to describe and explain the construction of masculinities on a white supremacist web forum called Stormfront in texts centred on the topic of homosexuality. In detailing the language used to create the heterosexual masculine identities found within the Stormfront forum, I will also examine how posters construct certain minority groups, particularly gay men, but also lesbians, racial minorities and other political groups, who were found to be inseparably interlinked by the supremacist discourse observed within the forum. Through a linguistic analysis of the data, I attempt to demonstrate how the forum members endeavour to construct themselves as the in-group and those they consider as ‘other’ as part of the out-group. This positioning is achieved utilising various rhetorical strategies which I aim to make apparent throughout the book.

This focus of study was arrived at through my interest in the construction of masculinities, initially in all-male speech groups and the linguistic means utilised to achieve solidarity among such groups. This led to a consideration of the notion of male ‘backlash’, which has been described as a reaction by some men to their inability to cope with the instability and erosion of the patriarchal, hegemonic position traditionally held by men in Western societies due to social, political and economic changes in contemporary Western culture. Although there are multiple responses which may be understood as constituting a backlash, one is becoming associated with an extreme right-wing group such as a militia or white supremacist group. Once I had decided upon such a course of study to be undertaken, and a site of data was identified, the web forum Stormfront, it was necessary to refine the focus of analysis in order to concentrate on texts where issues relating to masculinity were most likely to be found. Ultimately, forum posts which were about homosexuality were understood to be the most productive source of data, so postings on this topic were collected. Although even here, the amount of data collected ran into many thousands of words, which resulted in me needing to find a balance between showing the overall picture in the data, and being able to carry out a detailed qualitative analysis. For this reason, my analysis is composed of several parts, combining corpus linguistics methods of research based around frequency patterns with more traditional methods involving the close analysis of shorter extracts of texts via critical discourse analysis (CDA). I explain the methodologies for these two approaches in Chapter 3, this volume. However, it is useful to give a short definition here as these terms are also encountered in this chapter. Corpus linguistics involves the collection of large amounts of language data, which are stored as electronic texts and then subjected to analyses via specialist computer software. Much of the analysis is focussed around quantitative and statistical procedures, although the data can often be presented in various ways so that people can identify patterns more easily when carrying out qualitative analyses (see McEnery and Hardie 2012). Critical discourse analysis is a framework for studying discourse, which views language as a social practice and focuses on highlighting social inequalities. It uses a range of different analytical techniques, but often involves the close qualitative study of a small number of texts, for example, by looking at patterns of agency, argumentation or use of metaphor. An important aspect of CDA is that the analysis is taken beyond the text itself, to consider aspects of context, such as the methods of production and reception of the text, the ways that a text refers to other texts and how the text is embedded within the social structures of a particular society (see Wodak and Meyer 2015).

In this chapter, I first outline the research questions this book will attempt to answer. Then I spend some time describing some of the key theoretical concepts that are used in the book: discourse, ideology, identity, gender, masculinity and hegemonic masculinity. I also consider theories around homophobia and prejudice. I introduce the data by means of an analysis of a short extract. Finally, I describe the structure of the book.

This Study

The over-arching aim of this book is to study how language employed within Stormfront postings about homosexuality construct discourses primarily of heterosexual masculinity, but also of sexuality, gender and race, and how do such discourses interact?

However, this is broken down into chapters. In Chapter 4, this volume, I will demonstrate how a corpus-driven approach reveals the ways that language in Stormfront postings about homosexuality is used to construct discourses primarily of heterosexual masculinity but also of sexuality, gender and race, and the ways that such discourses interact. In Chapter 5, this volume, I will use a critical discourse analysis to study single postings written by Stormfront members and the threads from which the postings were taken, looking at how language employed within the texts construct discourses primarily of heterosexual masculinity but also of sexuality, gender and race, and how do such discourses interact. In Chapter 6, this volume, I discuss how the corpus linguistic and critical discourse analysis approaches are able to inform each other.

I believe that this book is relevant at multiple levels. Although affiliation with a white supremacist group is not a common response among men to the difficulties of living in modern society, and the days of the white-hooded, crucifix-burning Ku Klux Klan¹ are all but gone, such movements and organisations have transformed and modernised themselves in an attempt to be accepted by a greater proportion of mainstream white society. The fact that the data for this study was collected solely from the Internet instead of pamphlets and other more traditional means of spreading their ideology is testament to one aspect of their modernisation. As a further indication which demonstrates that white supremacists are not seen as an insignificant minority, the U.S. Department of Homeland Security (2009) circulated a document which warned of the increased threat of right-wing extremism that was undergoing resurgence in radicalisation and recruitment caused by an economic downturn and the election of the first African American president in the U.S. Other reports, such as Shane (2015) demonstrate that in the years since the Al Qaeda attacks on New York and the Pentagon, white supremacists have murdered twice as many people in lethal assaults carried out in the U.S. than by Muslim extremists.

The data for this research is, to varying degrees, homophobic, which adds another aspect to the significance of this work, for although gay men and lesbians have made certain political and legal gains in recent years, prejudice and negative attitudes towards homosexuality remain a global phenomenon. Lastly, I believe that the analysis undertaken in this study highlights the fact that a considerable proportion of ideology expressed by white supremacists is shared by certain mainstream political or religious conservative groups or individuals who are held to be part of mainstream society in comparison to white supremacists who are regarded as fringe elements.

In the last twenty-five years, information technology has greatly affected Western society, both socially and culturally, and impacted on the communicative and discursive practices of society. Thus, computer-mediated communication (CMC) has become omnipresent in contemporary Western society and the study of such a medium of communication provides significant insights into the ways that social actors construct their own identities and the identities of others. The analysis of CMC is, therefore, of great relevance to social scientists and particularly discourse analysts. Internet forums allow researchers to gain access to very large data sets, which show interactions between individuals, allowing new kinds of research to be carried out. I am also interested in considering how CMC and especially Internet forums impact on the nature of white supremacist groups, which in the past exchanged information in very different ways.

Post-structuralists (e.g., Burr 1995: 160) point out that the idea of an objective scientific researcher is a fallacy: Everyone approaches research with preconceived beliefs, and their own identities may impact on the analysis process. Indeed, CDA researchers are encouraged to be clear about their own positions and reflect on them as the research process develops. Throughout the research I have attempted to remain impartial and objective, and using corpus analysis helps to remove some human bias. However, being a white heterosexual male married to a non-white person, I found myself positioned among one of the minority groups who are denigrated by Stormfront members. Despite this, it was not my goal to expose any of the Stormfront members but study how they constructed masculinity.

Key Terms and Theoretical Concepts

Discourse

Discourse has a range of meanings; linguistically, it could be understood as a stretch of written or spoken language (Sunderland 2004: 6) or more specifically interaction between people and a specific context, for example, ‘white supremacist discourse’. For others the study of discourse is the study of language use. A further understanding of discourse, which is influenced by Foucaultian theories of discourse and power (Foucault 1960), would be ways of structuring areas of knowledge and social practice (Reisigl and Wodak 2001). However, Schiffrin, Tannen and Hamilton (2003: 1) write, “Critical theorists can speak, for example of ‘discourse of power’ and ‘discourses of racism’ where the term ‘discourses’ not only becomes a count noun, but further refers to a broad conglomeration of linguistic and non-linguistic social practices and ideological assumptions that together construct power and racism.”

Of these definitions, the most relevant for this study takes into consideration the concept of discourse as social practice; Wodak and Reisigl (2003: 383) define discourse as follows:

“Discourse” can be understood as a complex bundle of simultaneous and sequential interrelated linguistic acts which manifest themselves within and across the social fields of action as thematically interrelated semiotic (oral or written) tokens that belong to specific semiotic types (genres).

A method of critical discourse analysis which claims affinity with Foucault has been constructed by Fairclough (1992). The concept is three dimensional; first, a discourse-as-text approach is taken in which the linguistic features and organ-isation of the discourse are studied. Secondly, a discourse-as-discursive-practice study is undertaken whereby the discourse is understood to be produced, circulated, distributed and consumed in society. The third dimension sees discourse-as-social-practice; the ideological effects and hegemonic processes in which the discourse operates, is studied.

As social structures are of such relevance to discourse, the concept of power, in particular the power of institutions or groups, is a principle issue. Discursive practices may produce unequal power relations between social groups due to possible ideological effects that are achieved through certain presentations within a discourse. Analysis of a text may illustrate varying discourses and ideologies, which, it could be argued, demonstrates that dis-cursive differences are negotiated and that, due to the influence of power, a text is rarely the work of one person alone. Such a theory could claim affinity with Habermas (1968) who claims that language is a site of domination and social force, which legitimises organised power, and that language is ideological.

Discourse Communities

Much of CMC is about the creation of a community, albeit in a virtual sense. Many of the patterns of language behaviour utilised in informal CMC replicates those linked with the construction of social groups or discourse communities (a term first used in Nystrand 1982). This includes a shared lexis exclusive to the group, linguistic accommodation, a group history and memory.

Seargeant and Tagg (2014) define a discourse community as a local and temporary constraining system, defined by a body of texts that are unified by a common focus. A discourse community is a textual system with stated and unstated conventions, a vital history, mechanisms for wielding power, institutional hierarchies and vested interests. The data for this study was taken from Stormfront, a white supremacist web forum, which I consider possesses the necessary characteristics to be defined as a discourse community (Swales 1990). Swales (1990: 24–27) presents six essential features of a discourse community, which I list below and attempt to relate to Stormfront:

1. “A discourse community has a broadly agreed set of common public goals.” This is true for Stormfront, which attempts to mainstream white supremacism while articulating the pro-white, anti-Semitic, racist, homophobic ideological stance of the group.
2. “A discourse community has mechanisms of intercommunication among its members.” Evidently, an Internet forum such as Stormfront is the mechanism of intercommunication between members.
3. “A discourse community uses its participatory mechanisms primarily to provide information and feedback.” This characteristic is met by the bulletin board format of the forums within Stormfront in which group members are able to correspond with each other.²
4. “A discourse community utilises and hence possesses one or more genres in the communicative furtherance of its aims.” If genre is understood as a socially accepted way of using language in connection with a particular type of social activity (Wodak 2008: 15), then it can be understood how the discoursal expectations of a discourse community are fashioned by the genres that communicate the opera...

Table of contents

• Cover Page
• Halftitle Page
• Series Page
• Title Page
• Copyright Page
• Table Of Contents
• List of Tables
• List of Figures
• 1 Introduction
• 2 Setting the Scene: What We Already Know
• 3 Approaching the Problem: Studying Hate on the Internet
• 4 Extremist Language: The Rhetorical Strategies of Stormfront Contributors
• 5 Digging Deeper: Two Case Studies
• 6 Interface: Combining Critical Discourse Analysis and Corpus Linguistics
• 7 Conclusion
• References
• Index