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Abstract
This article analyses the processes of identification that prevail on the websites of the Estonian extreme right. The extreme-right activists tend to articulate their nationalist ideas by relying on the signifiers adopted from the generally accepted discourses of multiculturalism. In order to explain this seemingly incompatible meaning generation, we employ the concepts of the hegemonic logic of signification and the empty signifier, as elaborated by Laclau, as well as the concept of the self-description and the self-model from the theoretical framework of cultural semiotics. Our analysis is based on the unexpectedly insistent public feedback that followed the discussions of Anti-Counterfeiting Trade Agreement ratification in Estonia.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.
Notes on contributors
Mari-Liis Madisson is a PhD student in University of Tartu. She has written articles about cultural semiotics, conspiracy theories and cultural identity in various academic journals as Semiotica, Acta Semiotica Estica and Methis. Studia humaniora Estonica.
Dr. Andreas Ventsel is a senior researcher in Department of Semiotics of Tartu University and has contributed articles on political semiotics, political rhetoric, visualizing of power relation and related subjects in various professional journals as Semiotica, Sign Systems Studies, Social Semiotics etc. He is also an author for a book titled “Toward semiotic theory of hegemony” (Tartu University Press, 2009).
Notes
3. http://bhr.balanss.ee/. BH indicates Blood & Honour, a worldwide neo-Nazi network.
4. http://nsblogi.com/. NS indicates National Socialism.
5. http://www.vabamotleja.info. This blog has now been erased but the same author continues his blog in another address: http://toomaskask.blogspot.com/
6. Charter of Fundamental Rights of the European Union.
15. ‘Tiigrihüpe’ (Tiger Leap) on was an Estonian national project that was started in 1996 by Toomas Hendrik Ilves (then ambassador of Estonia to United States, current President of Estonia) and Jaak Aaviksoo (then minister of Education). The main aim of the project was to develop the computer and network infrastructure in Estonia and promote IT education among pupils.
16. http://president.ee/et/meediakajastus/pressiteated/10203-2014-05-21-05-50-01/index.html (the speeches of president of Estonia Toomas Hendrik Ilves). See also Farivar (Citation2011).
18. http://rahvuslik.blogspot.com/. They quote paragraph 45 of the Estonian Constitution.
22. Tõnu Lehtsaar is a psychologist and a lecturer of practical theology in the Tartu University. He has publicly expressed his deprecating attitudes towards homosexualism.
23. Andres Põder on Archbishop of the Evangelical Lutheran Church of Estonia
24. Sinimäed is a place in Northeast Estonia where one of the most tragic battles of Eastern-Front, also known as a Battle of Tannenberg Line, took place in 1944. Since 1994, soldiers who fought on the side of Wehrmacht (and their sympathizers) arrange their annual gatherings there.
25. Vaivara is a village in Vaivara Parish, Ida-Viru County in Northeastern Estonia.
26. Ernst Zündel is a German Holocaust denier who has been jailed several times.