Cover not available
Article published In:
Journal of Language and Politics
Vol. 17:4 (2018) ► pp.552–572

Aliud pro alio

Context and narratives within a neo-Nazi community of practice

ORCID logo | University of East Anglia
 | Center for Research on Extremism (C-REX), University of Oslo, Norway
This article explores how narratives create connections between the micro-context and the macro-context, focusing on the narratives produced by a neo-Nazi group within ‘Blood and Honour’, a neo-Nazi gathering in Italy. The analysis presents a series of thematic narratives that describe how the neo-Nazi members see themselves in daily life, with their private and family sphere and how they aim to impact the political and cultural world. From these narratives, it is possible to understand how the neo-Nazi group sees society and justify the marginal role that they occupy in modern society. From this perspective, narratives operate as symbolic practice of identity creation in which members of the group negotiate new images of themselves and of their political and cultural movement. As we show, the neo-Nazi members aim to obtain legitimation and recognition in order to express a greater symbolic and social power.
Keywords: narrative, context, neo-Nazi, ideology, community of practice
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
  • 2.Data and subjects
  • 3.Narratives and micro-context
    • 3.1Being a neo-Nazi in daily life
      • The topic of the narrative
      • Activity within the event
      • The identity of the participants
    • 3.2Neo-Nazi and private/family relationships
      • The topic of the narrative
      • Activity within the event
      • The identity of the participants
    • 3.3The role and the position of the neo-Nazi in cultural and political world
      • The topic of the narrative
      • Activity within the event
      • The identity of participants
  • 4.Narratives and macro-context
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 9 January 2018
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/jlp.17014.pop
References (55)
References
Albanese, Matteo, Giorgia Bulli, Pietro Castelli Gattinara, and Caterina Froio. 2014. Fascisti di un altro millennio? Crisi e partecipazione in CasaPound Italia. Roma: Bonanno.Google Scholar
Barkhuizen, Gary. 2015. “Narrative Knowledge in Second Language Teaching and Learning Contexts”. In The Handbook of Narrative Analysis, ed. by Anna De Fina and Alexandra Georgakopoulou, 97–116. New York: John Wiley & SonsGoogle Scholar
Bauman, Richard. 1986. Story, Performance, and Event: Contextual Studies of Oral Narrative. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Blee, Kathleen M. 2007. “Ethnographies of the Far Right”. Journal of Contemporary Ethnography 36 (2): 119–128. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Bourdieu, Pierre. 1977. Outline of a Theory of Practice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Brown, Andrew D., Patrick Stacey, and Joe Nandhakumar. 2008. “Making Sense of Sensemaking Narratives.” Human relations 61 (8): 1035–1062. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Caldiron, Guido. 2013. Estrema destra. Rome: Newton Compton Editori.Google Scholar
Castelli Gattinara, Pietro, and Caterina Froio. 2014. “Discourse and Practice of Violence in the Italian Extreme Right: Frames, Symbols, and Identity-Building in CasaPound Italia.” International Journal of Conflict and Violence 8 (1): 154–170. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Catellani, Patrizia, Patrizia Milese, and Alberto Crescentini. 2006. “One root, different branches.Identity, Injustice and Schism”. In Extreme Right Activists in Europe: Through the Magnifying Glass, ed. by Bert Klandermans and Nonna Mayer, 204–223. New York: Psychology PressGoogle Scholar
Comber, Barbara, and Anne Simpson, 2001. Negotiating Critical Literacies in Classrooms. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
De Fina, Anna. 2008. “Who Tells Which Story and Why? Micro and Macro Contexts in Narrative.” Text & Talk 28 (3): 421–442. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
. 2013. “Positioning Level 3: Connecting Local Identity Displays to Macro Social Processes.” Narrative Inquiry 23 (1): 40–61. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
De Fina, Anna, and Alexandra Georgakopoulou. 2008. “Analysing narratives as practices.” Qualitative Research 8 (3): 379–387. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
De Fina, Anna, Deborah Schiffrin, and Michael Bamberg, 2006. Discourse and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Duranti, Alessandro, and Charles Goodwin, 1992. Rethinking context: Language as an interactive phenomenon. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.Google Scholar
Eckert, Penelope, and Sally McConnell-Ginet. 1992. “Think practically and look locally: Language and gender as community-based practice.” Annual review of anthropology 21 (1): 461–488. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Esseveld, Johanna, and Ron Eyerman. 1992. “Which side are you on? Reflections on methodological issues in the study of ‘distasteful’ social movements.” In Studying collectiveaction, ed. by Mario Diani and Ron Eyerman, 218–37. London: Sage.Google Scholar
Ezekiel, Raphael S. 1995. The Racist Mind: Portraits of American neo-Nazis and Klansmen. New York: Viking Press.Google Scholar
2002. “An ethnographer looks at Neo-Nazi and Klan groups: The racist mind revisited.” American Behavioral Scientist 46 (1): 51–71. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Fassin, Didier. 2015. “In the name of the Republic: Untimely meditations on the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attack (Respond to this article at [URL]).” Anthropology Today 31 (2): 3–7.
Ferrari, Saverio. 2006. Da Salò ad Arcore: la mappa della destra eversiva. Roma: L’Unità.Google Scholar
. 2011. Fascisti a Milano: da Ordine nuovo a Cuore nero. Torino: BFS.Google Scholar
Freeman, Mark. 2015. “Narrative as a Mode of Understanding”. In The Handbook of Narrative Analysis, ed. by Anna De Fina and Alexandra Georgakopoulou, 19–37. New York: John Wiley & SonsGoogle Scholar
Froio, Caterina, and Pietro Castelli Gattinara. 2015. “Neo-fascist mobilization in contemporary Italy. Ideology and repertoire of action of CasaPound Italia.” Journal for Deradicalization 21: 86–118.Google Scholar
Castelli Gattinara, Pietro, and Caterina Froio. 2014. “Discourse and Practice of Violence in the Italian Extreme Right: Frames, Symbols, and Identity-Building in CasaPound Italia.” International journal of conflict and violence 8 (1): 154.Google Scholar
Georgakopoulou, Alexandra. 2006. “Thinking big with small stories in narrative and identity analysis.” Narrative inquiry 16 (1): 122–130. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Golder, Matt. 2016. “Far right parties in Europe” Annual Review of Political Science 191: 477–497. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Goodwin, Matthew J. 2006. “The rise and faults of the internalist perspective in extreme right studies.” Representation 42 (4): 347–364. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Gordon, Cynthia. 2015. “Framing and Positioning.” In The Handbook of Narrative Analysis, ed. by Anna De Fina, and Alexandra Georgakopoulou, 311–328. New York: John Wiley & SonsGoogle Scholar
Griffin, Roger. 2003. “From slime mould to rhizome: an introduction to the groupuscular right.” Patterns of Prejudice 37 (1): 27–50. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Halikiopoulou, Daphne, Steven Mock, and Sofia Vasilopoulou. 2013. “The civic zeitgeist: nationalism and liberal values in the European radical right.” Nations and Nationalism 19 (1): 107–127. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Halikiopoulou, Daphne, and Sofia Vasilopoulou. 2010. “Towards a ‘civic’narrative: British national identity and the transformation of the British National Party.” The Political Quarterly 81 (4): 583–592. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Hammack, Phillip L. 2008. “Narrative and the cultural psychology of identity.” Personality and Social Psychology Review 12 (3): 222–247. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Holmes, Janet. 2006. “Workplace narratives, professional identity and relational practice.” Studies in Interactional Sociolinguistics 11: 1661–187.Google Scholar
Klandermans, Bert, and Nonna Mayer. 2006. Extreme right activists in Europe: through the magnifying glass. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge.Google Scholar
Labov, William. 1972. Language in the Inner City: Studies in the Black English Vernacular. Oxford: Blackwell.Google Scholar
Labov, William, and Joshua Waletzky. 1997. Narrative Analysis: Oral Versions of Personal Experience. Omissis editor.Google Scholar
Lee, Martin A. 2013. The Beast Reawakens: Fascism’s Resurgence from Hitler’s Spymasters to Today’s Neo-Nazi Groups and Right-Wing Extremists. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Linde, Charlotte, 1993. Life stories: The creation of coherence. Oxford University Press.Google Scholar
MacIntyre, Alasdair. 2013. After virtue. New York: A&C Black.Google Scholar
Marchi, Valerio. 1997. Nazi-ock: pop music e destra radicale. Rome: Castelvecchi,Google Scholar
Meleagrou-Hitchens, Alexander, and Edmund Standing. 2010. Blood & Honour: Britain’s Far-Right Militants . London: The Centre For Social Cohesion.Google Scholar
Mondon, Aurelien. 2015. “The French secular hypocrisy: the extreme right, the Republic and the battle for hegemony.” Patterns of Prejudice 49 (4): 392–413. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Mudde, Cas. 2007. Populist Radical Right Parties in Europe. Cambridge, UK; New York: Cambridge University Press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Ochs, Elinor, and Lisa Capps. 2009. Living narrative: Creating lives in everyday storytelling. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.Google Scholar
Pascual, Esther. 2006. “Questions in legal monologues: Fictive interaction as argumentative strategy in a murder trial.” Text & talk 26 (3): 383–402. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Petö, Andrea. 2017. Gender and Far Right Politics in Europe. Berlin: Springer International Publishing.Google Scholar
Polkinghorne, Donald E. 1988. Narrative knowing and the human sciences. New York: Suny Press.Google Scholar
Pollard, John. 2016. “Skinhead culture: the ideologies, mythologies, religions and conspiracy theories of racist skinheads.” Patterns of Prejudice 50 (4–5): 398–419. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Scrinzi, Francesca. 2017. “A ‘New’ National Front? Gender, Religion, Secularism and the French Populist Radical Right.” In Gender and Far Right Politics in Europe, ed. by Michaela Köttig, Renate Bitzan and Andrea Petö, 127–140. Berlin: Springer International Publishing. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Smith, Sidonie, and Julia Watson. 2010. Reading autobiography: A guide for interpreting life narratives. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press.Google Scholar
Vertovec, Steven, and Susanne Wessendorf, eds. 2010. Multiculturalism backlash: European discourses, policies and practices. Abingdon-on-Thames: Routledge. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wenger, Etienne. 1998. Communities of practice: Learning, meaning, and identity. Cambridge: Cambridge university press. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Whitsel, Brad. 2001. “Ideological mutation and millennial belief in the American Neo-Nazi Movement.” Studies in Conflict and Terrorism 24 (2): 89–106. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Wodak, Ruth. 2015. The politics of fear: What right-wing populist discourses mean. London: Sage. DOI logoGoogle Scholar
Cited by (12)

Cited by 12 other publications

Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo & Alfredo Ardila
2023. In nomine Diaboli: The ideologies of organized crime. European Journal of Criminology 20:2 ► pp. 401 ff. DOI logo
Tan, Yan & Kaibin Xu
2023. #Metoo as communities of practice: a study of Chinese victims’ digital narratives of sexual harassment. Journal of Applied Communication Research 51:3 ► pp. 302 ff. DOI logo
Indìo Massimo Poppi, Fabio
2021. Sancte et sapienter. Pragmatics and Society 12:3 ► pp. 437 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo
2020. Omnia Vincit Amor: Narratives of Sexual Promiscuity. Sexuality & Culture 24:3 ► pp. 922 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo
2021. Pro Domo Sua: Narratives of Sexual Abstinence. Sexuality & Culture 25:2 ► pp. 540 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo
2022. Fiat panis: identity representation and identity change in food narratives. Consumption Markets & Culture 25:5 ► pp. 429 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo
2023. Non serviam: Narrative dimensions of organized crime resistance and susceptibility. International Journal of Law, Crime and Justice 75 ► pp. 100627 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo
2024. Resistentia feminarum in visionibus: Joint fantasizing as a practice of migrant women’s narrative resistance to the Caporalato system. International Review of Victimology DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio Indìo Massimo & Alfredo Verde
2021. Odi et amo: Discursive strategies and ambiguity in the narratives of violence. European Journal of Criminology 18:6 ► pp. 918 ff. DOI logo
Carthy, Sarah L., Colm B. Doody, Katie Cox, Denis O'Hora & Kiran M. Sarma
2020. Counter‐narratives for the prevention of violent radicalisation: A systematic review of targeted interventions. Campbell Systematic Reviews 16:3 DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio I. M. & Sveinung Sandberg
2020. A bene placito*. Narrative Inquiry 30:2 ► pp. 294 ff. DOI logo
Poppi, Fabio I. M. & Giovanni A. Travaglino
2019. Parea non servin:strategies of exploitation and resistance in the caporalato discourse. Modern Italy 24:1 ► pp. 81 ff. DOI logo

This list is based on CrossRef data as of 9 january 2025. Please note that it may not be complete. Sources presented here have been supplied by the respective publishers. Any errors therein should be reported to them.