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Article published In:
Review of Cognitive Linguistics
Vol. 20:2 (2022) ► pp.476–503

Anti-Muslim semantic framing by politicians, Facebook groups, and violent extremists

ORCID logo | University of Queensland
Recent studies have shown that semantic framing can reveal bias and racism. The current study introduces a novel method for locating frames in texts, and employs this method to find frames for Muslims, Europeans and Australians in a range of texts by anti-Muslim and non-anti-Muslim authors. The study finds that several derogatory frames previously associated with racism are applied to Muslims in the anti-Muslim texts, supporting studies showing that anti-Muslim bias resembles other forms of racism. Moreover, different frames are preferred by more and less extreme anti-Muslim authors, with certain frames predominating in the manifestos of white supremacist gunmen. These frames may be a warning sign that frame users are potentially prone to violence.
Keywords: semantic framing, metaphoric framing, social media, Facebook, anti-Muslim, racism
Article outline
  • 1.Introduction
    • 1.1Racism and semantic framing
    • 1.2Previous work on framing and racism
    • 1.3Metaphoric and metonymic framing
  • 2.Methods
    • 2.1Texts examined in the study
    • 2.2Identifying frames applied to particular groups
  • 3.Results
    • 3.1The control texts
    • 3.2The political texts
    • 3.3The Facebook groups
    • 3.4The gunmen’s manifestos
  • 4.Discussion
    • 4.1Framing of Muslims
    • 4.2Framing of Australians and Europeans
  • 5.Conclusion
  • Notes
  • References
Published online: 8 December 2022
DOI logo
https://doi.org/10.1075/rcl.00119.sul
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