History of knowledge, terrorism and gender

Abstract: This article focuses on 20th-century terrorist phenomena as gendered objects of knowledge produced and disseminated through history books, mass media and state institutions. By taking 1970s West German terrorism as my field of inquiry, this article will critically discuss how a bourgeois understanding of violence as fundamentally masculine has shaped the way terrorism has been represented, conceptualized and historicized thus far. I will go on to problematize the mas-culine gaze of mass media and state institutions and their tendency to objectify the terrorist. Last but not least, I will delineate how mass media and historiog-raphy of terrorism have relied on a narrative structure that pits rebellious sons and masculine daughters against figural and literal fathers, a frame that is overtly masculine and familial. In so doing I will point to blind spots in the study of 1970s terrorism, namely masculinity and the gender of state institutions. My goal is thus to show how not just indi

Object Details

• Alternative title: Geschichte des Wissens, Terrorismus und Gender
• Location: Deutsche Nationalbibliothek Frankfurt am Main
• Extent: Online-Ressource
• Language: Englisch

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: History of knowledge, terrorism and gender ; volume:39 ; number:3 ; year:2014 ; pages:82-99 ; Veröffentlichungsversion ; begutachtet (peer reviewed) ; Historical social research ; 39, Heft 3 (2014), 82-99

Classification and Topics

• Classification: Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie, Anthropologie ; Geschichte

Contributors, Places and Time

• Creator: Grisard, Dominique

Further information

• DOI: 10.12759/hsr.39.2014.3.82-99
• URN: urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-393821
• Rights: Open Access; Open Access; Der Zugriff auf das Objekt ist unbeschränkt möglich.
• Last update: 14.08.2025, 10:53 AM CEST