Final published version
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - Civil courage as a communicative act
T2 - Countering the harms of hate violence
AU - Iganski, Paul
PY - 2020/7/22
Y1 - 2020/7/22
N2 - Hate violence which denigrates a person’s social identity whether it involvesphysical or verbal aggression off or online – is a communicative act. It transmitsa message to the victim that they are devalued and unwelcome. It is amarginalising and exclusionary message. Answering back to hate violenceby challenging hateful expression is one way of responding. It is a form of‘civil courage’. Yet why should anybody want to take a stand – given the risksinvolved that perpetrators might turn on those who intervene or respond insome other way? This paper proposes that the importance of civil couragegoes beyond being the right thing to do, or the humane thing, when abystander witnesses hate violence off- or online. Instead, if we comprehendhate violence as a communicative act, and if we understand the particularimpact of the exclusionary message it sends (and understand how bystanderinaction can magnify the felt sense of social exclusion), then we mightappreciate the potential value of an act of civil courage in response. There isa moral imperative for civil courage as it answers back to hate violence bysending an inclusionary message to the victim – as reasoned in this paper.
AB - Hate violence which denigrates a person’s social identity whether it involvesphysical or verbal aggression off or online – is a communicative act. It transmitsa message to the victim that they are devalued and unwelcome. It is amarginalising and exclusionary message. Answering back to hate violenceby challenging hateful expression is one way of responding. It is a form of‘civil courage’. Yet why should anybody want to take a stand – given the risksinvolved that perpetrators might turn on those who intervene or respond insome other way? This paper proposes that the importance of civil couragegoes beyond being the right thing to do, or the humane thing, when abystander witnesses hate violence off- or online. Instead, if we comprehendhate violence as a communicative act, and if we understand the particularimpact of the exclusionary message it sends (and understand how bystanderinaction can magnify the felt sense of social exclusion), then we mightappreciate the potential value of an act of civil courage in response. There isa moral imperative for civil courage as it answers back to hate violence bysending an inclusionary message to the victim – as reasoned in this paper.
KW - Hate Speech
KW - Hate crime
KW - Communicative acts
KW - Inclusion
KW - Exclusion
KW - Civil Courage
U2 - 10.1075/ps.18075.iga
DO - 10.1075/ps.18075.iga
M3 - Journal article
VL - 11
SP - 316
EP - 335
JO - Pragmatics and Society
JF - Pragmatics and Society
SN - 1878-9714
IS - 2
ER -