Political Myth Research Articles

Поисковые системы как механизм производства границ «воображаемых сообществ» (На примере образа внутреннего мигранта в сибирских региональных цифровых медиа)

The article analyzes the process of constructing boundaries of imagined communities by search engines, using the case of the image of internal migrants arriving in Tomsk, Krasnoyarsk, and Irkutsk. Combining quantitative and qualitative content analysis, the authors analyzed the image of internal migrants created by the texts that make up the first pages of search results of Google, Yandex, Bing, DuckDuckGo, and Mail.ru. They found that in most texts, an internal migrant is presented as a poor, low-skilled man who constantly finds himself in extreme situations, more often — crimes, in which he is either a victim or an offender. At the same time, some essential details of the image may differ depending on the chosen ethnohoronym and the name of the host city in the search query. According to the authors’ hypothesis, the fact that all the search engines under question modify the image of a migrant depending on the host city indicates the presence of regional specifics in the agenda formation. At the same time, the similarity in social actions, spaces and actors that make up the image of an internal migrant in the search results with the same components in the image of a cross-border migrant indicates that crossing regional borders becomes a sufficient condition for classifying a person who crossed borders into a separate, stigmatized category. Search engines fragment the “imagined community” in the agenda by putting first texts that draw regional groups as outsiders who are dangerous to each other. This finding allows to hypothesize that algorithms construct/reproduce perceptions of local communities about themselves, which falls out of the political myth of a unified Russian community defined by national borders. If the hypothesis is true, it could mean that search engines are beginning to function as an actor (or its representative) that defies contemporary political mythology.

Conspiracy Narratives as a Type of Social Myth

It has long been recognized that conspiracy narratives may be seen as a special kind of myth. In most cases, however, this is taken as a sign of their irrational and unsubstantiated nature. I argue that mythical modes of reasoning are actually far more pervasive in modern political and cultural discourse than we commonly admit and that the difference between mainstream discourse and conspiracy narratives is not one between “rational” and “mythical” thought but rather one between different types of mythical thinking. The specific nature of conspiracy myths is best understood in relation to two other types of social myths: political myths and fictional myths. Conspiracy myths are a hybrid of these two genres: like fictional myths, they make use of imaginative elements, but like political myths, they are understood as having a relatively straightforward relation to reality and not just a metaphorical one. They are essentially anti-systemic, and their chief ethos is that of distrust. Nevertheless, the degree to which they reject the system varies, and it is thus useful to distinguish between weaker and stronger conspiracy myths. While the latter reject the system altogether and are incompatible with political myths, the former are capable of co-operating with them.

A Critical Cognitive Analysis of Metaphors in Dr. Kwame Nkrumah’s Political Speeches

This thesis analyzes the use of various types of metaphors in a self-built corpus of political speeches delivered by the first president of the Republic of Ghana, Dr. Kwame Nkrumah, on his fight for Independence for Ghana and the whole of Africa. It aims to uncover how Dr. Nkrumah used rhetoric as a weapon to achieve his political aims and ideologies. In order to identify the metaphorical expressions, I used the Metaphor Identification Procedure developed by scholars at the VU University Amsterdam (abbreviated as MIPVU), which is a systematic and transparent procedure for identifying linguistic metaphors. By adopting MIPVU, lexical units of the sentences were examined, and then the contextual meaning of the unit was established to determine the more basic meaning. If the contextual meaning is contrasted with the basic meaning but can be understood in comparison with it, then the unit will be marked as a metaphor. A total sum of forty-three metaphorical expressions was identified in my self-built corpus. After the metaphors were identified, I followed the procedures of Critical Metaphor Analysis (CMA) to analyze the use of metaphors to reveal the underlying ideologies and rhetorical functions. It is found that Nkrumah frequently used the journey, war and religious metaphors to convey the intended message and achieve his political objectives. These metaphors can serve a series of functions, such as attracting attention to establish trust, providing an explanation through framing, expressing empathy, emotion or motivation, fulfilling aesthetic purpose as well as creating a political myth. More generally, metaphors as a powerful tool help make Nkrumah’s political speeches more convincing.

Editors’ introduction: political myth in the twentieth century

Editors’ introduction: political myth in the twentieth century

The sorcerer’s apprentices of interwar France

ABSTRACT No concept attracted as much controversy, or muddled ideological identifications so thoroughly, as ‘myth’ in interwar France. By the late 1930s, ‘la mythomanie’ was drawing systematic attention from existentialists, Surrealists, ethnologists, sociologists, and nascent fascist movements. This essay reconsiders this polemical and misunderstood moment in interwar thought. It focuses on the intellectuals most central to its notoriety: the members of the Collège de sociologie and their fascination with Georges Sorel. Though interwar mythomania has long been treated as an antiparliamentary cultural politics designed to secure enthusiastic mass conformity, this essay argues that such accounts are incomplete. They misunderstand the deeper philosophical debate unfolding about the conditions of revolutionary agency in a desacralized society. Bringing this debate back into focus helps liberate mythomania from historiographic commonplaces. It emphasizes how, for better or worse, many of those who advocated for new political myths aimed to spur human agency, not confiscate it.

To the Question of Political Mythology as a Component of Ukrainian Political Culture on the Modern Stage

The purpose of the article is to analyse a myth-symbolic dimension of the Ukrainian political culture as a semantic catalyst of social-political discourses and an important means of political identity designing in the conditions of today’s challenges. Methodology of the research. We have applied a culturological approach that establishes a connection between political processes and organisations with the original cultural context, while we interpret political culture as a part of social culture that keeps its noticeable signs. Moreover, this approach, in the connection between structural-functional and problematic-diagnostic approaches, helps to understand the role and peculiarities of applying political myths and symbols in the context of the Ukrainian political culture including current challenges. Scientific novelty of the research. For the first time, the very cultural aspects of the Ukrainian political mythology and symbolic functioning in the XXI century have been revealed in the article. Conclusions. We have demonstrated how the narratives, values, and archetypes connected with a mythological worldview, work on a non-reflective level of collective and individual political consciousness. Constructive and destructive political myths have been highlighted and specifics of its realization in the frames of symbolic politics has been considered. The connection between different modern political practices of symbolic and cognitive-communicative structures of national memory has been proven, especially through the dynamics of symbolic schemes of projects and interactions in political culture. The detection and disclosure of the potential of political myth-symbolic activity through the prism of cultural analysis allows considering it as an instrument of social design of political identity and the manifestation of the civilised choice of Ukraine.
 Key words: Ukraine, political culture, political mythology and symbolism, mythological narrative, archetype, pseudomyths, culturological approach.

Genealogical Myth in Land Grant Charters of Bengal and Bihar of the 8th–13th Centuries as a Variety of Political Myth

The paper deals with the genealogical parts of the land grant charters of Eastern India dating back to the reign of the Pāla dynasty (mid-VIII – early XIII centuries. The characteristic of these parts of land grant charters was given: they were panegyrics by their shape, and starting from the second half of the early medieval period (7th–13th centuries), were composed of rhythmic stanzas. A subset was also ascertained for further consideration, consisting of 26 charters. For studying the genealogical parts, the method of comparative formal analysis was applied. Based on the content of the text, the stanzas of each genealogical part were divided into the following groups: directly genealogical, indirectly genealogical, historical descriptive and mythological descriptive. Historical information in one form or another is contained in the first three of these groups. A detailed examination of this information shows that the degree of its reliability is relatively low because, being a panegyric, it has an exclusively positive color, in addition, there are intentional omissions in the genealogical lists. To testify the reliability of this information, it is necessary to involve new independent sources (inscriptions) related to the reign of other dynasties, contemporaneous with the dynasty under study. We draw a conclusion that genealogical parts of letters of commendation of the rulers of East India in the 8th–13th centuries should be considered as a genealogical myth.

Shadows of Being: Encounters with Heidegger in Political Theory and Historical Reflection by Jeffery Andrew Barash

Reviewed by: Shadows of Being: Encounters with Heidegger in Political Theory and Historical Reflection by Jeffery Andrew Barash Rylie Johnson BARASH, Jeffery Andrew. Shadows of Being: Encounters with Heidegger in Political Theory and Historical Reflection. Stuttgart: ibidem-Verlag, 2022. 260 pp. Paper, $42.00 ELIZABETH C. SHAW AND STAFF* Composed of a series of unique yet thematically connected chapters, Jeffrey Andrew Barash's latest book carefully addresses the relationship between Martin Heidegger's thought and political theory and how these are connected through the thematization of historical narrative. In light of the publication of the controversial Black Notebooks, Barash's book serves as a significant contribution to debates regarding Heidegger's political engagement with National Socialism. However, rather than simply rehash this engagement, Barash takes a critical approach, arguing that Heidegger's historical narrative, that is, the history of Being, buttressed a "political mythology" and "fatalism" that absolved human beings of historical, ethical, and political responsibility. Thus, through a confrontation with Heidegger, Barash demonstrates the danger of denying human agency in the future course of history, since "fatalism only makes more probable the outcome it claims to foresee." While invested in explicating the political and ethical implications of Heidegger's thought, Barash is critically oriented around demonstrating a presupposition within the Seinsfrage, or the question of being that motivated Heidegger's philosophy. Heidegger presupposed that reraising the question of being was the fundamental task of philosophy, one that rendered "subordinate" other forms of historical reflection. Consequently, Barash argues that Heidegger established a "strategy of interpretation" that privileged his own standpoint in the history of Western thought and allowed him to set aside contrary ethical, political, and historical interpretations. Ultimately, this resulted in the formulation of the myth of the history of Being that placed Heidegger himself at the culminating point of Western history. The essays that compose Barash's book address the various implications of Heidegger's presupposition. The book is separated into two parts. The first consists of direct interpretations of Heidegger's thought and is composed of six chapters. The second addresses the critical reception of that thought, reflected in such figures as Hannah Arendt and Emanuel Levinas, and is composed of chapters seven through ten. [End Page 541] Chapter 1 focuses on Heidegger's broad legacy today, which according to Barash is threefold: the prevalence of historical deconstruction, his complicity with "Germanic ideology," and his criticisms of Western scientific rationality, all of which Heidegger rendered into an effect of metaphysics and the forgetting of the Seinsfrage. Chapter 2 discusses Heidegger's metaphysics of memory, showing that his inversion of the traditional eternal view of memory in favor of one grounded in mortality obscured other forms of "collective remembrance." Through a reading of St. Paul and Spinoza, chapter 3 investigates Heidegger's presupposition by revealing that the radical separation of the ontological from the ontic matters of theology, politics, and ethics is in fact an ontic decision of the "ethical order." Chapter 4 extensively discusses Heidegger's understanding of race and its relationship to Nazi orthodoxy. Highlighting that Heidegger was certainly critical of biological racism, Barash nevertheless shows that Heidegger articulated a "metaphysical" racism at the level of the history of Being. Chapter 5 reflects on Heidegger's Being-historical interpretation of World War II. Barash shows Heidegger's fatalism whereby the war was not a matter of human choices but was "attributed to an abandonment of Being." Chapter 7 closes part 1 by discussing the status of mythology in Heidegger's thought. Criticizing mythology as a form of historical production, Heidegger nonetheless creates his own myth: the history of Being. This mythological dimension is perhaps the most problematic aspect of Heidegger's thought. In the second part, Barash changes the trajectory of his arguments, addressing the critical reception of Heidegger's legacy by other philosophers. In chapter 7, Barash discusses the influence of Heidegger on Hannah Arendt's view of the public world, a world that theoretically rests on Heidegger's Dasein. But while Heidegger failed to adequately grapple with the public, Arendt radicalized it, showing that political reflection served as the basis for the philosophical problem of truth. Chapter 8 reflects upon the influence that the...

Влияние пантюркизма в республиках ПФО (на материале националистических организаций Башкортостана). Часть 2

The article is a logical continuation of the previously published research on the subject of pan-Turkism in the modern Republic of Bashkortostan (Vlast’ 06, 2022). It is devoted to identifying the main features of the genesis, directions, nature, degree and trends of the influence of pan-Turkism in the socio-political and religious life of the Volga Federal District on the material of the Republic of Bashkortostan and the political mythology that has developed around it. The task is to consider the national and religious directions of the influence of pan-Turkism in the Republic of Bashkortostan. An analysis is carried out on the example of Bashkir nationalist associations Union of Bashkir Youth and Bashkir People Congress. The authors conclude that the manifestations of pan-Turkism in the Bashkir nationalist organizations under consideration sporadically concern mainly elements of attributes and have an imitative character of a cargo cult. A separate comprehensive study of the religious direction of this problem is considered promising.

Ontological security, crisis and political myth: the Ukraine war and the European Union

ABSTRACT The paper’s aim is two-fold. First, it wants to explore if and how the war in Ukraine has exposed tension in the EU’s foundational myth as a political community forged in crisis with the aim to bring peace and stability to Europe. Second, it highlights how the war reveals that the EU ultimately fails to be an ontological security provider for member states and Europeans. The paradox of the EU’s myth of crisis is that it, like all foundational myths, is supposed to lead to a more secure sense of self and continuity. However, the war in Ukraine is a crisis that cannot be addressed without putting into discussion the other part of the foundational myth of how integration leads to peace and how this may help to explain limits to how much the EU can do to guarantee peace and stability.

The symbolic work of political discourse. Populist reason and its foundational myth

This article locates Ernesto Laclau’s populist reason as a point of departure to understand the contemporary democratic logic and its so-called ‘excesses’. It argues that, even if resourceful, Laclau’s findings can be supplemented with a theory of the imaginary as developed by Cornelius Castoriadis, as well as with key remarks from a discussion of the theologico-political as this was characterized by Claude Lefort. The aim is to construct an understanding on the political as it is structured by language and the symbolic, presenting thus democracy and populism as two opposing sides of a foundational political myth.

Innovations in the EU communication policy

The objectives and mechanisms of the European Union (EU) communication policy are considered. The article is based on the author's definition of the EU political myths as the main messages of its official communications, which contain imaginative ideas about the values of the EU and a guide to action to achieve the ideal. Communication policy has been studied as a tool to preserve the sustainability of EU values and to consolidate them on the agenda. A review of the official sources and the works of European think tanks allowed us to reveal its transformations in modern conditions. They consist in greater wastefulness and regularity of communications, increased requirements for communicators. Official Brussels gives priority to active communications (conferences and other forms of discussion of norms and strategies involving stakeholders) as the most effective in terms of influencing public opinion and, presumably, uses triangulation tactics. In passive communications (in reports, brochures, communitations on the results of activities), transformations consist in the establishment of mandatory organization standards and criteria for submitting information - modernity, reasonableness, added value for the EU. Taking into account the experience of the EU, recommendations are given for the EAEU.

Was Theresa May a One Nation Conservative?

It took the Conservative Party seventy-eight years to come to a final decision as to what Disraeli’s vision of One Nation formally signified. By that time, One Nation Conservatism had already been elevated to the status of political myth with many endowing it with much more meaning than it may actually have had. What the 1950 Pamphlet put forward was a far cry from the progressive, let-alone ‘left-wing’, Toryism which was putatively promoting a more equal nation in which a whole people, united by a spirit of solidarity, would forge ahead as one. The Pamphlet reflected the differences between 1950s’ Britain and Disraeli’s conceptions, and how the Conservative Party was adapting to the changes. It revealed divisions even amongst its authors and the One Nation Group that was subsequently formed, notably over economic policies. Be that as it may, influenced by a certain Disraelian spirit of noblesse oblige, conferring a moral duty to look after the weaker and less privileged in society, One Nation Conservatives accepted that, for the sake of social peace, it was the responsibility of a Conservative government to promote social harmony and preserve the capitalist order which delivered economic growth. From then on, One Nation Conservatism became increasingly associated with a group of high-profile Conservatives who, from Lord Hailsham to Iain MacLeod and Edward Heath, contributed to its reputation as socially paternalistic, Europhile, economically interventionist (its most controversial aspect) and generally favourable to a strong United Kingdom acting as one nation. This was a ‘big state’Conservatism that was prepared to intervene to spur the development of a Britain that would provide opportunities for all across the UK.Some sixty years later, to distance himself from the toxic legacy of Thatcherism – the so-called antithesis to ‘big state’ One nation Conservatism – David Cameron claimed to be a One Nation Conservative, thus reactivating a qualifier that had not been used for over forty years. Theresa May did likewise, albeit indirectly, announcing that ‘David has led a One-Nation government, and it is in that spirit that I also plan to lead’ (T. May, 13 July 2016). Unlike Cameron however, she was not a member of the One Nation Group. And yet, I will argue that from the launch of her leadership campaign in 2016 to the publication of the 2017 Conservative Party Manifesto, she was consistently more attuned to the One Nation tradition than either Cameron or, arguably, Johnson, who, on succeeding May, would also declare that his government was One Nation. May was a complex political figure who came to power in extremely difficult circumstances, notably with regard to the negotiations taking place on Britain’s exit from the European Union. May’s One Nation Conservatism would become the first victim of a combination of bad decisions, of a lack of conviction and clarity, and of extreme tensions within the party and the government over Brexit. The second victim would be May herself.

Репрезентація національних історій у ілюстрованій науково-популярній літературі (на прикладі ілюстрацій Артура Кампфа і Георга Белве до «Preußens Geschichte» («Історії Пруссії»,1913) Рудольфа Герцога)

This study looks at illustrated popular literature as a tool for shaping its readers–viewers’ perceptions of national histories. The author explores this issue through the example of Rudolf Herzog’s book for German school students «History of Prussia» ("Preußens Geschichte'', 1913) illustrated by Arthur Kampf and Georg Belwe. Despite the book’s popularity in the 1910s, this paper offers its first academic examination. The study combines terminology and methods coming from the fields of history of representations, political mythologies’ and visual cultures studies as well as art history. The author also adheres to methodological recommendations formulated by researchers in illustrated literature. The paper demonstrates that «Preussens Geschichte» exemplifies personality- and event-centred «official-nationalist» approach to history writing. The book’s contents reflect the current political situation and seek to promote the imperial government’s agendas as well as certain moral values. The author argues that the specific purpose of Kampf and Belwe’s illustrations consisted in stressing and simplifying the book’s key subject matter and facilitating its memorisation. The ballads performed the same function. The author maintains that the stylistic unity and repetition of similar subject-matter in Belwe and Kampf’s work contribute to the book’s overall representation of Prussia’s history as a coherent narrative. Belwe’s pictures encapsulate the book’s main ideas through the use of generalised images rather than directly translating Herzog’s prose and poetry into pictures. Kampf’s illustrations further stress the role of monarchy and army as the key actors of Prussian history through the artist’s selection of subject-matter and employment of artistic devices. Together with Herzog’s text, his pictures promote determination, courage, and self-sacrifice for the sake of the country. Two other themes that dominate Kampf’s illustrations are the bond between the monarchy, the nation, and the church (an element of The Second Reich’s official nationalism) as well as Prussia’s technological advancement as an epitome of its political power.

Political Mythology in the Work of Valerius Maximus

The article examines the ideas about the republic in the work of the Roman author Valerius Maximus, who lived at the beginning of the principate. The most revealing elements of the republican structure are taken for analysis: the People's Assembly, the Senate, the Tribunes of the Plebs, freedom, the enemies of freedom, as well as the image of Cato the Younger as the embodiment of the moral spirit of the republic. Valerius's narrative is dominated by outstanding personalities and the Senate, which fully corresponds to the current political situation. Such attention to the individual reflects a certain departure from polis collectivism. "Freedom" is perceived by Valerius undoubtedly as the antipode of the sole power, although the special position of the princeps in the new political system was also realized by our author. However, the contradiction here is only external, since already under Augustus an understanding of freedom as “security” (securitas) was formed, which linked freedom with authoritarian power. The views of Valerius Maximus basically correspond to the optimate’ worldview, i.e. the res publica of the past for him is primarily associated with the leadership of the Senate. But this optimate’ view reflects the opposition of the “best citizens” not only to the unreasonable people, but also to the claims of an outstanding personality to sole rule. In this respect, this “program” has come into clear contradiction with the new political situation, changing and adapting as the monarchical principle strengthens. The transformation of optimate’ views is shown by the example of an ardent supporter of the republic Cato the Younger, whose image in Valerius Maximus’ work reflects the transformation of past events into textbook examples outside the historical context.

Federal Archival Projects Aimed at Countering the Falsification of History and Political Mythology

Federal Archival Projects Aimed at Countering the Falsification of History and Political Mythology

US POLITICAL MYTHOLOGY WITHIN JUNGIAN MODEL OF THE COLLECTIVE SOUL

In this article, the US political mythology, its main symbols, archetypes and plots are analyzed within the framework of the original methodological model - the so-called "map of the collective soul", developed by M. Stein on the basis of the psychoanalytic theory of K.G. Jung. The author applies the Jungian model to the study of political and mythological material, based on the objective commonality of the roots from which both various socio-political myths and individual archetypal contents grow. This common ground is the space of the collective unconscious, the territory of a specific mass psychodynamics, where trauma gives rise to a complex, and a complex produces a myth. The study of American political mythology from this point of view provides valuable theoretical material that helps to understand the specifics of the mentality and identity of Americans, as well as the models on which the popular US political discourse is built.

Snaga iracionalnog u politici - mit kao vrednosno-motivaciona osnova ideologije

The text asserts the thesis that myths determine not only the foundational values of political culture and communication but also the entire cognitive perspective and its boundaries. Moreover, myths have an undisputed function in affirming political will, both in accepting the way society is organized and in radically opposing certain aspects or the totality of it. Therefore, myths, as an irrational, axiological, and motivational foundation, represent an endless source for all forms of political persuasion. They constitute the core of modern ideological systems, which rationalize myths for the reproduction of social practice. The first part of the work offers a general critique of the essential demand of Enlightenment rationalism for 'liberation' from a mythical experience of existence. The second part presents arguments for why political myth as a phenomenon persists in modern times. The third part explains the reasons for the emergence and mechanisms of functioning of ideologies as responses to the crisis of meaning in mass, technologically structured societies.

Political myth design as a technology for mass consciousness manipulation

In this article, the authors consider political myth design as a political technology to manipulate and control mass consciousness and unconsciousness with the mass media. The reasons to use the myth design in politics are systematized and the principles under which the political myth design result is formed are emphasized. The features and reasons to use this technology in politics are highlighted, and a number of principles are given, according to which a political myth design constructs the necessary information and ideological result. Theoretical provisions are analyzed and systematized and the practical methods of myth design in politics are described in the article. The main ways to use myths in politics are structured. The paper focuses on the mythological techniques actively used in political myth designing, and on the three main practical tasks of political myth design. The research conducted makes it possible to define a political myth as a result of political myth design, which can be described as a socio-cultural technology for the development of modern myths perceived by the «political result» consumers as the reality of their worldview. This technology uses archetypes, storylines, heroes, and other elements of traditional mythology when creating, disseminating, and transmitting various mass messages, including political communication in the media reality.

Հերոս-փրկչի կերպարը` քաղաքական լիդերության սոցիալ-հոգեբանական ազդեցության գործոն

The article reviews the main techniques and technologies of socio-psychological influence used in mass media to create the myth of the hero-savior. The article aims to reveal the features of the myth of the hero-savior, which are substantiated by examples taken from Armenian reality. The task of the work is to present a number of examples that reveal the way to create the image of a political leader from the image of a politician․ The methodological basis of the article is the methods of analysis, comparison, and generalization. During the research, we also applied the methods of combining and historicizing archival video materials, as well as other scientific materials. It became clear from the study that every political subject is in need of mythification․ The relevance of political myths grows in times of social crisis when society needs new, unifying symbols․ Like the conspiracy myth, this becomes a form of communication between the society and the subject in politics. Summing up this article, we can argue that the myth of the Hero-Savior gives political forces charismatic features, creates a certain image, without which it cannot be loved by the public.