History of knowledge, terrorism and gender

Journal article | Zeitschriftenartikel

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 individual and symbolic, but also institutional facets of the bourgeois gender order influence the way terrorism has been conceptualized and historicized thus far.

Object Details

• Alternative title: Geschichte des Wissens, Terrorismus und Gender
• ISSN: 0172-6404
• Extent: Seite(n): 82-99
• Language: Englisch
• Notes: Status: Veröffentlichungsversion; begutachtet (peer reviewed)

References and Relationships

• Bibliographic citation: Historical Social Research, 39(3)

Classification and Topics

• Subject: Sozialwissenschaften, Soziologie ; Geschichte ; Frauen- und Geschlechterforschung ; Sozialgeschichte, historische Sozialforschung ; Bundesrepublik Deutschland ; Frau ; Massenmedien ; Diskurs ; Geschlechtsrolle ; Geschichtsschreibung ; Stereotyp ; Gender ; Feminismus ; Männlichkeit ; politische Gewalt ; Terrorismus ; RAF

Contributors, Places and Time

• Event: Geistige Schöpfung
• (who): Grisard, Dominique
• Event: Veröffentlichung
• (where): Deutschland
• (when): 2014

Further information

• DOI: https://doi.org/10.12759/hsr.39.2014.3.82-99
• URN: urn:nbn:de:0168-ssoar-393821
• Rights: GESIS - Leibniz-Institut für Sozialwissenschaften. Bibliothek Köln
• Last update: 21.06.2024, 4:27 PM CEST