Fractured narratives and pop-up diaspora: Re-theorizing the capillaries of power, terror and intimacy

Abstract

The problem of terrorism is both an immediate threat and a long-term issue of safety and social cohesion, locally and globally. An immediate threat requires relatively straightforward interventions. Our public debates seem to be focusing too much on “fire-fighting” crisis management, and congratulating ourselves on instant emotional displays of solidarity, without paying enough attention to the substantial challenges of developing a broader social consensus, and a culture of mutual respect. More specifically, we need to find new ways to understand how local and global issues intersect, and why the global hegemony of one or two superpowers no longer seems to deliver stability and security (even for themselves). This is particularly true in a world where national borders have less and less relevance for the homogeneity of populations, cultures or values, and where whole communities, for instance, continue practices with impunity which are completely unacceptable to others – as well as being illegal, e.g. female genital mutilation. This paper explores some key theoretical issues which might help us to understand some of the underlying longer-term issues: the articulation of identity, culture, and power, and impact of micro-practices on global cohesion and security. The new globally connected social media have a central role to play in this analysis.

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

^1.Private Eye is a weekly newspaper of comment and satire, published in London by Private Eye Productions, and published this satirical front cover, following the “je suis Charlie” (Hebdo) marches in Paris:

^2. There does seem to be some consensus that martyrs will receive sensual rewards in Heaven, including a possibility of “72 virgins” (per martyr). But there seems to be ongoing controversy as to whether they are virgins, or doe-eyed maidens, or even white raisins – it seems to depend on the translation, the source of the translation, and the pronouncements and status of specific Koranic commentators. And there seems to be some controversy about whether suicide bombers are all martyrs too. There even seems to be some controversy about whether martyrs would need to be prepared to return to earth to be killed 10 times over before taking up eternal life, which might put a dampener on the appeal of the sensual delights (see Thayer & Hudson, 2010; and a review article: Warraq, 2002).

However, these nuances are apt to be completely lost on the aspirant young jihadists (particularly males), who in the age of the internet may just cut (click) to the most appealing option, that of Al-Suyuti, the sixteenth century commentator quoted in lurid detail in Warraq's review, and such a person would be likely to feature prominently in the research samples used by Thayer and Hudson, see above for details.

^3. Conway's Game of Life is an excellent, animated example of this (Gardner, 1970).

^4. Semiotics is the study of signs. One way to understand the meaning of signs is that signs of any kind are relational; they embody relations between experience and action – e.g. the relationship between what you see, and what you do when you communicate it. For example, “He was such a beautiful person” is a rather surprising quote from one of the people who best knew “Jihadi John” (the Daesh jihadist, who appeared in several videos of the beheadings of hostages in Syria in 2014–2015 (BBC News, 26 February 2015). The sign for this person shifts all over the place, depending on whether you are using his media name (Jihadi John) or his family name (Muhammed Emwazi). This is an excellent example of how semiotics is an ecology, a system, of differences – which in turn depends on who you are, and where you are sited, sighted and cited.

^5. Synaesthesia is now recognized to go beyond involuntary synaesthetic perception – e.g. seeing particular numbers in a particular colour; it is now also recognized that it provides us with the neurological basis for enactive, embodied, cross-modal learning and behaviour, providing a substantial foundation for language, and for abstraction in the arts and sciences (see Ramachandran, 2003; Williams, Mackness, & Gumtau, 2015).

^6. “The old “individualistic” print society was one where the individual was “free” only to be alienated and dissociated, a rootless outsider bereft of tribal dreams; our new electronic environment compels commitment and participation, and fulfils man's psychic and social needs at profound levels.

The tribe, you see, is not conformist just because it's inclusive; after all, there is far more diversity and less conformity within a family group than there is within an urban conglomerate housing thousands of families. It's in the village where eccentricity lingers, in the big city where uniformity and impersonality are the milieu. The global-village conditions make being forged by the electric technology stimulate more discontinuity and diversity and division than the old mechanical, standardized society; in fact, the global village makes make maximum disagreement and creative dialog inevitable. Uniformity and tranquillity are not hallmarks of the global village; far more likely are conflict and discord as well as love and harmony – the customary life mode of any tribal people.” (McLuhan, 1969, p. 23)