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History of knowledge, terrorism and gender
Geschichte des Wissens, Terrorismus und Gender
[journal article]
Abstract This article focuses on 20th-century terrorist phenomena as gendered objects of knowledge produced and disseminated through history books, mass media and state institutions. By taking 1970s West German terrorism as my field of inquiry, this article will critically discuss how a bourgeois understandi... view more
This article focuses on 20th-century terrorist phenomena as gendered objects of knowledge produced and disseminated through history books, mass media and state institutions. By taking 1970s West German terrorism as my field of inquiry, this article will critically discuss how a bourgeois understanding of violence as fundamentally masculine has shaped the way terrorism has been represented, conceptualized and historicized thus far. I will go on to problematize the mas-culine gaze of mass media and state institutions and their tendency to objectify the terrorist. Last but not least, I will delineate how mass media and historiog-raphy of terrorism have relied on a narrative structure that pits rebellious sons and masculine daughters against figural and literal fathers, a frame that is overtly masculine and familial. In so doing I will point to blind spots in the study of 1970s terrorism, namely masculinity and the gender of state institutions. My goal is thus to show how not just individual and symbolic, but also institutional facets of the bourgeois gender order influence the way terrorism has been conceptualized and historicized thus far.... view less
Keywords
discourse; gender role; Federal Republic of Germany; historiography; RAF; feminism; masculinity; mass media; gender; stereotype; woman; political violence; terrorism
Classification
Social History, Historical Social Research
Women's Studies, Feminist Studies, Gender Studies
Free Keywords
oedipal narrative
Document language
English
Publication Year
2014
Page/Pages
p. 82-99
Journal
Historical Social Research, 39 (2014) 3
Issue topic
Terrorism, gender, and history
DOI
https://doi.org/10.12759/hsr.39.2014.3.82-99
ISSN
0172-6404
Status
Published Version; peer reviewed