"The Other Side": Assessing the Polarization of Gender Knowledge Through a Feminist Analysis of the Affective-Discursive in Anti-Feminist Online Communities. (30th August 2020)

• Record Type: Journal Article
• Authors: Rothermel, Ann-Kathrin
• Is Part Of: Social politics. Volume 27:Number 4(2020:Winter)
• Page Start: 718
• Page End: 741
• Publication Date: 2020-08-30
• Subjects: Women -- Government policy -- Periodicals; Social policy -- Periodicals; Sex role -- Periodicals; 305.3
• DOI: 10.1093/sp/jxaa024
• Languages: English
• ISSNs: 1072-4745

Abstract

Abstract: Given the current polarization of gender knowledge in the public discourse, this article investigates the "other side" of gender knowledge production. Building on feminist standpoint literature, I conduct a close reading of the affective-discursive dynamics of knowledge production in two anti-feminist online communities in the United States and India. I find that anti-feminist communities appropriate feminist practices of consciousness-raising to construct a shared sense of victimization. This appropriation is, however, incomplete. In contrast to feminist practices, anti-feminist knowledge generation is premised on the polarizing themes of "ultimate victimhood" and "ultimate other, " which lead to violence and exclusion, rather than liberation.