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Article published In: Hate speech: Definitions, interpretations and practices
Edited by Fabienne H. Baider, Sharon Millar and Stavros Assimakopoulos
[Pragmatics and Society 11:2] 2020
► pp. 291–314

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“They cowardly attack US, so we nobly eliminate them…”

The emergence of the translocal group in the propaganda of the Islamic State

 | Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
ORCiD logo with link | Universidad Autónoma de Madrid
Published online: 13 July 2020
DOI logo with link
https://doi.org/10.1075/ps.18072.may
Abstract
The threat of the Islamic State is realised both in its attacks and its discourse. To illustrate the role of linguistic threats, the present study investigates the ISIS online propaganda magazine Dabiq by combining Critical Discourse Analysis and Corpus Linguistics (Romero-Trillo, Jesús (ed). 2008. Pragmatics and Corpus Linguistics: A Mutualistic Entente. Berlin: Mouton de Gruyter. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar; Baker, Paul, Costas Gabrielatos, Majid KhosraviNik, Michal Krzyzanowski, Tony McEnery, and Ruth Wodak. 2008. “A Useful Methodological Synergy? Combining Critical Discourse Analysis and Corpus Linguistics to Examine Discourses of Refugees and Asylum Seekers in the UK Press.” Discourse and Society 19 (3): 273–306. Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar). Following the two groups described by van Dijk, Teun A. 2003. “Ideology and Discourse: A Multidisciplinary Introduction.” Unpublished manuscript, Pompeu Fabra University, Barcelona.Google Scholar logo with link to Google Scholar, which are represented by the in-group (ISIS) and the out-group (against ISIS), we propose a third element: the translocal group (i.e., the people in between). The results show the substantial presence of linguistic strategies enhanced by Dangerous Speech (Benesch, Susan. 2013. Dangerous Speech: A Proposal to Prevent Group Violence. The Dangerous Speech Project. [URL]) to create a high segregation between the groups. Also, the analysis shows the inextricable relationship between conflict and dangerous language and the need to investigate this link further, with special reference to the polarisation of the groups and to the subsequent escalation of violence in discourse.
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Literature review
    • 2.1Geopolitical context
    • 2.2Theoretical background
  • 3.Methodology and data description
  • 4.Analysis and results
    • 4.1Analysis of the categories
    • 4.2ISIS’ positive self-representation vs. negative other-representation
  • 5.Discussion
  • 6.Conclusion
  • Acknowledgements
  • Notes
  • References
References (43)
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Bartley, Leanne
2022. “They fabricated lies against us and described us in the harshest of ways”. Pragmatics and Society 13:3 ► pp. 431 ff. DOI logo
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2022. Utopia, war, and justice. Journal of Language and Politics 21:5 ► pp. 675 ff. DOI logo

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