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Animating CVE: Online Animation as a
Form of Counter-Narrative
Orla [email protected] Candidate @orlitaSchool of Law and GovernmentDublin City University
CVE & Animation
Abdullah - X
•Series of animated shorts , developed with CVE aims in mind•Support from YouTube and Google•Deliberate attempt to combat the ‘increasingly innovative and modern techniques jihadist recruiters…using to influence young Muslims.’ •Home Affairs Committee Report 2014: hope that ‘given the role that social media is playing in the dissemination of extremist messages… other large multi-national social-media companies will follow suit.’
Outline
Animation and Internet – Propaganda
Extremist narratives – online messaging
Counter-narrative and animation
Raises many questions – an area that warrants further study
Proposed study
Animation & Propaganda
•Near ideal vehicle for propaganda•Disney and World War II•9/11 – shift to alternative media Propaganda – many forms, not only media systems where coercive control is used.
Internet: Battleground of Discourses
Visuality and interactivity of Web 2.0: with almost all forms of online media allowing and empowering users to generate their own content and interact, jihadist groups have increasingly made use of sites such as Twitter, Facebook, YouTube and Tumblr (Prucha & Fisher, 2013:19).
Allows for the development of new virtual communities – jihadi groups, through their use of the Internet, can influence young people across the world.
New production, distribution, and exhibition site for animators to create and exhibit animated narratives (Van Buren, 2006: 538).
The Draw of Narratives – Extremist Propaganda
Narratives – key to understandings of ourselves, our identity and place in the world.
Narratives: offer clear meaning to complex world events, instruments of psychological warfare, ‘allows rebels without a cause to connect to a cause’ (Holtman, 2013).
Increasingly sophisticated dissemination of extremist narratives – particularly online
Islamists ‘are tapping into new media technologies as a very effective vehicle for their anti-Western narratives’ (Stevens, 2010: 114).
Extremist Animation
Counter-Narrative and Animation
Abdullah – X
Online Animation – The Way Forward for Counter-Narrative?
Longstanding/acknowledged difficulties measuring impact (both CVE and media studies)
Need to move beyond figures, statistics, (perceived) popularity
All examples of ‘grassroots efforts’ of some kind
Role of government and private organisations
The ‘counter’ in counter-narratives…
The nature of animation – ‘a near ideal vehicle for propaganda?’
Proposed Study
Grounded theory study into the use of animation as a form of counter-narrative
Move beyond the statistics, numbers of viewers etc to deeper understanding of counter-narrative and use of animation
Open ended (no a priori hypothesis) qualitative study, participant driven
Starting point: interviews with creator of Abduallah – X
Conclusions
The suggestion that there is something about the animated form that particularly lends itself to this type of messaging warrants further research
In addition there is also a need to critically question current understandings of the idea of ‘counter-narratives.’
Orla LehaneSchool of Law and GovernmentDublin City [email protected] @orlita
