CPSA/ISA-Canada section on International Relations

C10(a) - Terrorism, Securitization and Gendered Stereotypes

Date: Jun 3 | Time: 10:30am to 12:00pm | Location:

Chair/Président/Présidente : Veronica Kitchen (University of Waterloo)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Andy Knight (University of Alberta)

Discussant/Commentateur/Commentatrice : Heather Smith (University of Northern British Columbia)

Mothers, Motherhood and Terrorism: Veronica Kitchen (University of Waterloo)
Abstract: The literature on women and terrorism is now fairly extensive, and has highlighted the media stereotypes of women terrorists including “ISIS brides”, “Black Widows”, and duped victims. This paper extends that research to look specifically at how mothers and motherhood are portrayed in media reports about terrorism. Mothers show up in a number of contexts in terrorism: as victims and perpetrators, but also as mothers of victims and perpetrators, counter-terrorist operatives, and protectors of their communities from radicalizing processes. What discourses are used to describe these various roles, and how do they shape the political and discursive space in which policies about women and terrorism are made? In this preliminary study, I look at major English-language news reports after 9/11 in order to begin to understand these discourses, using thematic qualitative discourse analysis based in feminist security studies.

Gender Dissonance in Ukraine's Quest for Ontological Security: Tanya Narozhna (University of Winnipeg)
Abstract: The proposed paper draws on the concept of ontological security to examine gender(ed) dynamics of Ukraine's quest for ontological security. The continuity of self-identity across time and space constitutes the core of ontological security. Such continuity is ensured by dual dynamics in the construction of self-identity through routinized relations with the outside others and by means of internally sustained biographical narrative. In other words, ontological security reveals the synergism of external and internal referential logics in the constitution of self-identity. Traumatic experiences disrupt self-identity and generate existential anxiety, prompting mobilization of two potent identity signifiers, i.e., nationalism and religion. What is often overlooked in the existing scholarship on ontological security, however, is that usually the search for a coherent self-identity is also deeply gendered. The proposed paper will demonstrate that the crisis that ensued in Ukraine in 2014 prompted concerted efforts by the state to secure collective identity by activating nationalist project. Viewed through a gender lens, Ukraine's quest for ontological security is marked by gender dissonance: its internally sustained biographical narrative displays a strong tendency towards remasculinization through militarization, at the same time as externally Ukraine emphasizes a feminized self-image of the victim of Russian aggression, in need of Western assistance and NATO protection. This gender dissonance has profound implications for Ukraine's ontological security seeking. External dynamics of ontological security-seeking reinforce Ukraine's feminized position vis-à-vis Western states, while the privileging of masculine values in its internal biographical narrative leads to the securitization of identity.

How Does Terrorism Succeed? Using CDA and Media Framing to Analyze the Impact that the Media Coverage of ISIL has had on State Legitimacy: Eliana Glogauer (Royal Military College of Canada)
Abstract: In 2014, the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) made international headlines by releasing a video clip depicting the murder of American journalist James Foley. Simone Molin Friis suggests that this video clip (and the subsequent clips depicting other ISIL’s beheadings) has had a substantial impact on Western countries’ foreign policy. Friis asserts that this is not only due to the graphic content of these video clips, but even more because of the apparent importance ascribed to these video clips by the international news media. Despite there being a clear potential value in studying the media coverage of terrorist groups and their actions, these topics remain understudied, with the media studies and communications literatures thus far having failed to fully integrate the connections and insights from ‘terrorism and media’ analyses and scholarly research addressing the relationship between violence and state legitimacy. This paper uses media framing and critical discourse analysis to examine how the media coverage of ISIL and the terrorist activity that it perpetrates undermines the legitimacy of the state. I extend Ayşe Zarakol’s distinction between “system affirming” and “system threatening” terrorists to suggest that media coverage of ISIL and its activities furthers legitimation claims that necessarily conflict with those of the state. Ultimately, this paper analyzes media coverage of ISIL between 2006 and 2017 to facilitate an understanding of media coverage as the operational level (mode) that links terrorist activity as an element of the means to legitimacy as the ends of post-modern warfare.