Journal articles on the topic 'Rojava revolution'

Although the gendered media portrayal of female Kurdish fighters has drawn academic attention, the representation of the socio-political model of Rojava by the British and American media is often neglected. This paper surveys the British and American media to understand the kinds of opinions found in the media, the discursive means that make the Rojava model intelligible, and what is rendered either commonsensical or unimaginable. The Rojava project is framed as “a separatist rebellion”, “an experiment”, and “a genuine social revolution”. By excluding the anti-capitalist and ecological principles of Rojava, and either dismissing or romanticising its achievements, these discourses render an alternative to capitalism and the nation-state unthinkable, and reproduce Orientalist images of the region, thus serving capitalist and imperialist interests. This study suggests that we should pay more attention to socio-political imaginations and representations of non-state paradigms in order to understand the hegemony of the state. Abstract in Kurmanji Fehmbarkirina şoreşê, pêşkêşkirina nemumkiniya tesewira polîtîk: Xwendineke postkolonyal a temsîlên Rojava di medyaya Brîtanya û Amerîkayê de Li hember teswîra zayendî ya şervanên kurd ên jin ku gelek bala akademiyê kişandiye, temsîla modela sosyo-polîtîk a Rojava ji teref medyaya brîtanyayî û emerîkî ve pirî caran hate paşguhkirin. Ev nivîs li medyaya brîtanyayî û emerîkî dinêre da ku cureyên fikrên di medyayê de, amûrên vegotinê yên ku modela Rojavayê fehmbar dikin vebikole û fehm bike ka çi û çiqas beraqil an jî nexeyalbar tê pêşkêşkirin. Projeya Rojava, weke “serhildaneke cudaxwaz”, “ceribandek” û “şoreşeke civakî ya resen” tê resmkirin. Bi derkirina prensîbên dij-kapîtalîst û ekolojîk yên Rojava û bi paşguhkirin an jî romantîzekirina destkeftên wê, ev dîskûr nemumkiniya alternatîfa kapîtalîzmê û netewe-dewletê îfade dikin û wêneyekî Oryantalîst ya herêmê diafirînin ku xizmeta berjewendiyên kapîtalîst û emperyalîst dike. Ev xebat pêşniyar dike ku divê em bêtir bala xwe bidin tesewirên sosyo-polîtîk û temsîlên paradîgmaya ne-dewlet ji bo fehmkirina hegemonyaya dewletê. Abstract in Sorani Be têgeyandin kirdnî şorrş, bê mana kirdnî endêşe syasîyekan: Xwêndneweyekî postkolonyalaney wênakirdnî mîdyay berîtanî û emrîkî bo rojawa Egerçî wêne mîdyayye cênderekanî jne şervanekanî kurd sernicî ekadîmîyekanî rakêşawe, zorcar wênakirdnî modêlî syasî-cvakî rojava lelayen mîdyay berîtanî û emrîkayewe feramoşkrawe. Bo têgeyîştin lew bîruboçunaney le mîdyakanda bedî dekrêt, em babete rumallêkî mîdyay berîtanî û emrîkî dekat, amraze gutarîyekan ke modêlî rojava bê mana deken û yan wek ştêkî asayî yan xeyallî dexrête rû . Projey rojava xrawete çwarçîwey “yaxîbunêkî cudaxwazî”, “ezmunêk” we “şorşêkî rasteqîney komellayetî”. Be wedernanî bnema dje-sermayedarî û îkolojîyekanî rojava, we yan be nadîdekirdin û romantîkirdnî deskewtekan, em gutarane bedîlêk bo sermayedarî û dewllet-netewe dexate derewey bîrkirdnewe. Em twêjîneweye pêşnyar dekat ke bo ewey le hejmûnî dewllet têbgeyn, pêwîste bayexî zyatir be endêşey syasî-cvakî û nwênerayetîkrinî paradaymî nadewlletî bdeyn. Abstract in Zazaki Şoreşî dayîşfehmkerdiş, fikranê sîyasîyan nêdayîşfikirîyayîş: Medyaya Brîtanya û Amerîka de temsîlê Rojawanî ser o wendişêko postkolonîyalîst Herçiqas ke nawitişê medyaya cinsîyetperwere de rolê şêrvananê cinîkanê kurdan bala akademîkan ante, modelê komel û sîyasetê Rojawanî zafê reyan hetê medyaya Brîtanya û Amerîka ra peygoş bî. Na meqale qayîtê medyaya Brîtanya û Amerîka kena ke wina tede qeneatê ci yê cîya-cîyayî, usûlê munaqeşeyî yê îzahkerdişê modelê Rojawanî û çîyê bimantiqkerde yan zî nefikrbarî fehm bibê. Projeyê Rojawanî sey “serewedaritişo cîyaker”, “ceribnayîş” û “şoreşê komelî yo raştikên” name beno. Bi îhmalkerdişê prensîpanê Rojawanî yê antîkapîtalîst û ekolojîkan û bi redkerdiş yan zî romantîzekerdişê serkewtişanê ci, nê munaqeşeyî alternatîfê kapîtalîzm û dewleta netewe nêdanê fikirîyayene. Wina herêm ra resimo oryantalîst yeno xêzkerdene ke menfeatanê kapîtalîst û emperyalîstan rê fayde dano. No cigêrayîş pêşnîyaz keno ke ma hîna zaf bala xo bidîme fikranê komelkî û sîyasîyan û estbîyayîşê paradîgmayanê nedewlete ser ke bandura dewlete fehm bikerîme.

Abstract This study critically analyzes representations of Kurdish women fighters in US mainstream media from January 2014 to December 2018. The article argues that the narrative articulated through the presentation of Kurdish women in the US media as “badass” soldiers fighting against the violence and extremism of the Islamic State serves to eschew a deeper understanding of their political and ideological motivations. Although they do not fit into the stereotypical category of oppressed Muslim women in need of saving, Kurdish women too are the subject of misrepresentation in US media in ways similar to the monolithic and essentialized representations of Afghan women in the post-9/11 era or Iranian women following the 1979 Iranian Revolution. The present work questions why this misrepresentation takes place and what renders the representation of Kurdish women Orientalist despite its differences from the previous discursive constitutions of Muslim women in US media.

Rojava is a region in Northern Syria, which, after its abandonment by the Syrian government in 2011 following the outbreak of the Civil War, has undergone a profound social and political transformation carried out by its Kurdish population, who are a majority in the region. The aim of this article is to analyse to what extent these transformations constitute a true social revolution which have shifted the focus towards gender equality, direct democracy, diversity and sustainability. This is done not only by looking at the scholarly work surrounding Rojava, which allows us to understand the project more thoroughly and critically than through media coverage and self-representation; but also, by analysing the works of the two most influential thinkers of the movement: Murray Bookchin and Abdullah Öcalan. Simultaneously. The article also analyses some of the limits of the project in Rojava and some of the negative comments it has received from recent scholarly work.

Abstract The Syrian conflict has contributed to major debates in culture, media and politics around transitions linked to borders, ethnicity and identity. Against this backdrop, this article explores the use of ‘Rojava’, a keyword referring to Kurdish-majority areas in the country. It examines the term’s changing meanings and usage against the evolving backdrop of the governance project led by Kurds since the post-2011 power vacuum in North(eastern) Syria. The article identifies how the term has been both operationalized and later abandoned and replaced by other nomenclature while highlighting the implications of these changes on public and political discourse. The term ‘Rojava’ traces its origins to the context of (pan-)Kurdish nationalism, with its literal meaning of ‘western’ (Kurdistan) implying a notion of trans-border Kurdish identity. From this point of departure, the author considers how it has been popularized in anarchist and Western solidarity circles as well as through international media in expressions such as the ‘Rojava experiment’ and ‘Rojava Revolution’. The article unpacks how it has become shorthand in Western media for an ideology of women’s liberation and leftist grassroots governance, as well as considering the term’s less favorable reception in the Arab press, where the word ‘Rojava’ itself is treated as a foreign, and sometimes threatening, concept. Finally, the article presents how from 2016 the Kurdish-led authorities in this region of Syria sought to formally distance themselves from the term they had introduced. This change was due to realpolitik imperatives to re-brand their governance project under the ‘Syrian Democratic’ banner when incorporating non-Kurdish-majority territories (Raqqa, Deir ez-Zor and Menbij). In the context of its official abandonment, the term has nonetheless retained currency in the media as well as popular everyday contexts among Kurds on street level.

After the outbreak of the Syrian war, the armed resistance of the Kurds against the radical Islamists drew considerable attention from across the world. Although the Kurdish movement has a history of forty years of armed fight in the region, especially against Turkey, they gained global fame during the war in Syria. Apart from media attention to the resistance of women, in particular, the establishment of a political system, democratic confederalism, which the world was not familiar with, came to exist in the area liberated from the religious fundamentalists in Syria. The Kurds during the Syrian civil war, on one hand, gained international fame for their fight against the radical Islamists; on the other hand, they put a new theory of governance, democratic confederalism, in practice in northern Syria. This paper seeks to provide a brief review of the theory of democratic confederalism and its practices in Rojava to build an argument regarding its future. This case study aims to explore how and why the theory and practices of democratic confederalism co-exist and which factors may influence the Rojava revolution’s future. This review’s central argument is that while democratic confederalism is a revolution in the field, it is also an experiment whose future depends on how the people will adopt it and how the global and regional powers will approach it.

Thomas Schmidinger, Krieg und Revolution in Syrisch-Kurdistan: Analysen und Stimmen aus Rojava, Wien: Mandelbaum, 2014, 262 pp., (ISBN: 978-3-85476-636-0).Bahar Baser, Diasporas and Homeland Conflicts: A Comparative Perspective. Farnham: Ashgate, 2015, 302 pp., (ISBN-10: 1472425626). Bryan R. Gibson, Sold Out? US Foreign Policy, Iraq, the Kurds, and the Cold War, New York: Palgrave, 2015, 284 pp., (ISBN: 978-1137487117). Alex Danilovich, Iraqi Federalism and the Kurds: Learning to Live Together, Farnham, Surrey and Burlington: Ashgate, 2014, 181 pp., (ISBN: 9781409451112).Sherko Kirmanj, Identity and Nation in Iraq, Boulder Colorado and London: Lynne Rienner, 2013, xviii + 321 pp., (ISBN: 978-1-58826-885-3).Cenk Saraçoğlu, Kurds of Modern Turkey: Migration, Neoliberalism and Exclusion in Turkish Society, London : IB Tauris, 2011, 228 pp., (ISBN: 978-1-84885-468-0).Tatort Kurdistan. Demokratische Autonomie in Nordkurdistan, Rätbewegung, Geschlechterbefreiung und Ökologie in der Praxis. Hamburg: Tatort Kurdistan/Informationsstelle Kurdistan, 2012, 183 pp., (ISBN: 978-3-941012-60-8).Anja Flach, Ercan Ayboğa and Michael Knapp, Revolution in Rojava, Frauenbewegung und Kommunalismus zwischen Krieg und Embargo, Hamburg: VSA Verlag, 2015, 352 pp., (ISBN: 978-3-89965-665-7).

This commentary seeks to examine the extent to which Kurdish liberation projects are free from the global colonial continuities. While the discussion on colonialism and Kurdistan typically centres on the Kurds’ relationships with their immediate colonisers, it obscures at least two forms of colonial continuities in Kurdish liberation projects. A decolonial perspective built on the coloniality concept enables these colonial continuities. Firstly, the manifestation of politico-tribal domination in Başûr (South Kurdistan, Iraq) is a common feature of postcolonial states that perpetuates the originally colonial power relations within internal structures. Secondly, the Rojava (West Kurdistan, Syria) revolution, which, despite its extensive criticism of orientalism, inadvertently reproduces the frustration of Rojava’s people arising from the feeling of abandonment, by equating “we fight for humanity” with “we fight for Western values.” The reproduction of internal coloniality and Western superiority are, I argue, inextricably linked to the colonial nature of modern power.

Abstract This article discusses how the ongoing conflict in Syria and the Rojava Revolution gave way to newly imagined futures and political possibilities for displaced Kurdish Syrians. It examines the Syrian war and the broader Middle Eastern context as a system of unpredictable escalations (Højer et al. 2018) and the liberation of Kobanî as a “critical” and “generative” moment (Das 1995; Kapferer 2015) in the Kurdish imaginary. Using ethnographic (audiovisual) material, I point to how people in forced displacement must constantly navigate uncertainty and reconfigure and consolidate their unknown future paths. I argue that my interlocutor Mihemed stabilized these uncertainties through his capacity to hold multiple future possibilities open simultaneously in order to keep every outcome viable.

There can be no doubt that among many problems of the Middle East inadequate status of women is of paramount importance. It might come as a surprise, then, that the most radical doctrine of feminine emancipation was formulated by the Kurdish socialist freedom movement from Turkey and is being implemented in war-torn Syria in the de facto autonomy called the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria, better known as “Rojava”. The doctrine is named jineology (in Kurdish jineolojî) and constitutes one of three pillars of democratic confederalism (together with libertarian democratic socialism and ecologism), the ideology of Abdullah Öcalan. Apo, as he is called, proposed a socialist revolution that would include women’s liberation and would take place in human hearts and minds rather than on the battlefields. First, the system of education needs to accept progressive methods and contents. Second, women ought to become active participants in the political, social, and economic life, especially in order to marginalize the state through creation of a multi-level self-government. Third, they need to be able to defend themselves (also physically) against men, nations-states waging wars, industrialists, and capitalists. The theoretical foundation of these changes is referred to as jineology, understood as a discipline belonging to social sciences, similar to gender studies. These are the ideals that are being implemented in Rojava and manifested in the Social Contract, the constitution of the Democratic Federation of Northern Syria.

Thomas Schmidinger, Rojava: Revolution, War and the Future of Syria’s Kurds, London: Pluto Press, 2018, 298 pp., (ISBN: 9780745337722).Nazand Begikhani, Aisha K. Gill and Gill Hague, Honour-Based Violence: Experiences and Counter-Strategies in Iraqi Kurdistan and the UK Kurdish Diaspora, Farnham: Ashgate Publishing, 2015, 189 pp., (ISBN: 9781409421900).Mehmet Orhan, Political Violence and Kurds in Turkey: Fragmentations, Mobilizations, Participations and Repertoires, Oxon: Routledge, 2016, 294 pp., (ISBN: 978-1-317-42044-6) & H. Akin Ünver, Turkey’s Kurdish Question: Discourse and Politics since 1990, Oxon: Routledge, 2015, 196 pp., (ISBN: 978-1-138-85856-5).Veli Yadirgi, The Political Economy of the Kurds of Turkey – From the Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2017, pp. 334, (ISBN: 9781316848579).Burak Bilgehan Özpek, The Peace Process between Turkey and the Kurds: Anatomy of a Failure, London: Routledge, 2017, 80 pp., (ISBN: 9781138564107).

Apart from the traditional Kurdish gender regime, which originates from the Kurdish tribal structure and which to some extent restricts the visibility of women in society, the status of Kurdish women is considered to be relatively high in comparison with that of their neighbors, since Kurdish women enjoy relative tolerance in society. This includes the possibility of reaching high professional positions, their presence in public spaces, and entertaining guests in the absence of their husbands. Certain socio-economic and political transformations took place in recent decades, which improved Kurdish women’s social standing, turning it into a symbol representing fundamental change in the gender role model in the Middle East. Although there are some studies on the status of Kurdish women in different individual Kurdish regions throughout the Middle East, not many reviews have compared the four parts of Kurdistan simultaneously, and there are hardly any specific analyses dealing with Kurdish women’s interactions in public spaces. This review aims to investigate the status of women in Kurdish society in different Kurdish regions according to a comparative approach. Although the path of Kurdish female emancipation was initiated first in the region of Rojhalat in 1946 and the Kurdish region of Iraq was granted some opportunities toward national liberation in 1991, the Bakur in Turkey can be considered a successful movement, establishing a sustained approach to the liberation of Kurdish women from patriarchal structures. During the Rojava Revolution in northern Syria, this movement proved itself able to build an indigenous alternative to Western-type egalitarian societies.

This paper examines the role of women in the Mexican Revolution starting from the novel La Negra Angustias written by the Mexican writer Francisco Rojas González. The research is based on the assumption that the protagonist of the novel, Angustias Farrera, symbolically represents a powerless and downtrodden part of the Mexican population that, after centuries of suffering oppression, rises up in arms demanding a respect of basic human rights. We point out that in the period of the Mexican Revolution (1910– 1920), Angustias gets the opportunity to transform from a marginalised and passive mulatto peasant woman into an active social factor that tends to change the social system. As the military officer that forms part of the Liberation Army of the South, guerrilla force led by Emiliano Zapata, one of the most famous Mexican revolutionaries, Angustias stands up for the vulnerable part of the Mexican population, primarily women, demanding the right to freedom, independence and education. Her initial enthusiasm, however, gradually weakens under the influence of the teacher with whom she falls in love. The teacher Manuel in this Novel of the Mexican Revolution plays the role of an opportunistic intellectual who joins the Mexican Revolution in order to gain material benefit. By getting married with a greedy opportunist, Angustias abandons the revolution, and betrays her friends and ideals. From an active military officer, Angustias once again becomes a passive woman whose role in the context of the patriarchal Mexican culture is reduced to a self-sacrificing wife and mother. Therefore, following the fate of this revolutionary woman from childhood to adulthood, we try to follow the course of the Mexican Revolution in terms of armed rebellion, from the initial excitement, through the heated struggles to a status quo return.

The article presents theological thoughts on eschatological themes of Sergei Bulgakov, one of the most prominent theologians and priests in the Russian Orthodox Church in the late 19th and early 20th century. These themes touch on theological concepts of God’s last judgment, heaven and hell. Bulgakov interprets God’s last judgment in a very modern way, as a confrontation of the truth with its own primordial image in the idea of God. To the extent that the ‘final’ life of the person who has lived it differs from the best version of what it could have been if God’s will had been followed, so does the pain of unrealised happiness. The outcome of such a confrontation with truth is either heaven or hell. For Bulgakov, hell is not infinitely eternal. He believes that at the very end, when time and space no longer exist, those in hell can still experience God’s mercy. Hell is a lost God, heaven is a found God. Such thoughts are made all the more dramatic by the fact that Bulgakov’s work took place at a difficult political, economic and cultural time, both in Russia and in Europe, with the Bolshevik October Revolution, the First World War, and the Second World War. The influence of these processes on theology is also a focus of the article.

Abstract For the most part, Machiavelli’s Libro dell’arte della guerra has been studied as a military treatise, which had produced different interpretations and applications. Whereas military historians assumed that Machiavelli somewhat underestimated the role of the so-called gunpowder revolution, recent scholarship stresses the political dimensions of the text and its reception in different contexts. This article focuses on the poetics of the dialogue, which cannot be reduced to propositional contents. Instead of teaching specific strategies and tactics of warfare, the Libro engages its readers in a military dialogue in a more radical sense. It enacts the very dynamics of war and battle by staging the complex and often contradictory conditions and foundations of speech and (military and political) theory on the one hand and its potential interactions with conflicting historical realities on the other. By combining different generic traditions of the literary dialogue from Plato to Cicero and Petrarch it performs a Machiavellian arte della guerra as the very form of military and militant intervention which concerns not only the practice of warfare, but human activity as such.

Abstract This article offers an insight into life and work of the French author and politician Olympe de Gouges as well as an analysis of her positions on the French Revolution and on other contemporary issues such as anti-colonialism, class differences and women’s rights. The article argues that the author used literature as a space to develop a political stance that, due to the legal situation, she could not carry out professionally. In her play “L’Esclavage des Noirs, ou l’Heureux naufrage” (1792) and in the essay “Réflexions sur les hommes nègres” (1788), de Gouges openly criticizes the brutality of white plantation owners, invokes the equality of all people, and condemns human trafficking. In “La Nécessité du Divorce” (1790), the author demands the right to divorce, a fair division of property, protection of one’s own property also for women, and a financially secure future for the children born out of wedlock. In her famous “Déclaration des Droits de la Femme et de la Citoyenne” (1791), the author called for truly universal suffrage, as well as for the right to liberty, property, security, and resistance to oppression.

Thomas Schmidinger’s Rojava: Revolution, War, and the Future of Syria’s Kurds provides an in-depth overview of latest political developments in the Kurdish-led Democratic Federation of Northern Syria (DFNS) over the past eight years...

This paper argues that sociological analysis of social movements has undertheorized non/anti-state social movements. It is argued that an alternative modality of resistance to that of movements seeking reform through the state or the capture of state power through revolution is to exit the world-system and set up parallel structures of governance and production. A conjunctural inter-regional comparison is taken up in order to map the inter-scalar and historical causal factors that led to exit-with-autonomy in Syrian Kurdistan (Rojava) and autonomy-without-exit in Iraqi Kurdistan (Kurdish Regional Government). The paper shows that in order to exit the world-system social movement actors in Rojava used strategic loyalty bargains and political voice at specific historical conjunctures in order to maintain their movement and seize on non-state political opportunities. These same non-state political opportunities were not available for the social movement actors hoping to exit the world-system in the Kurdish Regional Government.

What happens when sacrifice is imagined in terms of a debt that can be repaid? In the ongoing conflict begun in 1984 between the Kurdistan Workers’ Party and the Turkish state, Kurdish revolutionary discourse has characterized death as the required price for liberation. After 2002, a shift away from revolutionary violence and an increase in civil politics with more diverse actors allowed for public recognition of sacrifice other than death. This ethnography in Diyarbakır conceptualizes “the afterlives of revolutionary sacrifice” to unearth the multiple temporalities of revolutionary struggle. Rather than viewing sacrifice through the lens of the revolutionary sacred, the article rethinks revolution through the vulnerabilities, relationships of care, and hopes that such temporalities entail. It highlights the afterlives of sacrifice to complicate the traditional narratives of heroism and martyrdom, sheds light on everyday struggles, affects, and relationships, and questions how we value sacrifice for political change. ÖZET Bedelin geri ödenebilecek bir karşılığı tahayyül edildiğinde ne olur? Kürdistan İşçi Partisi ile Türkiye devleti arasında 1984 yılında başlayan ve halen devam eden çatışmada, Kürt devrimci söylemi ölümü özgürlük için ödenmesi gereken bir bedel olarak nitelendirmiştir. 2002’den sonra devrimci şiddetten uzaklaşılması ve daha çeşitli aktörlerin yer aldığı sivil siyasetin oluşması, ölüm dışındaki bedellerin de kamuoyu tarafından görülmesini sağladı. Diyarbakır’da geçen bu etnografik çalışma, devrimci mücadelenin çoğul zamansallıklarını ortaya çıkarmak için «devrimci bedelin sonraki yaşamlarını» kavramsallaştırıyor. Makale, bedeli devrimci kutsalın merceğinden görmek yerine, devrimi bu tür zamansallıkların barındırdığı kırılganlıklar, ihtimam ilişkileri ve umutlar üzerinden yeniden düşünüyor. Geleneksel kahramanlık ve şehitlik anlatılarını karmaşıklaştırmak için bedelin sonraki yaşamlarını vurgulamakta, gündelik mücadelelere, duygulara ve ilişkilere ışık tutmakta ve siyasi değişim için bedel nasıl değer verdiğimizi sorgulamaktadır. KURTE Çi dibe dema bedêl wek deynekê tê xeyalkirin ku paşê dikaribe bê dayîn? Di şerê navbera Partiya Karkerên Kurdistanê û dewleta Tirkiyeyê de ku di 1984an de destpêkirî û hê jî berdewam e, gotara şoreşger a kurd mirinê wek bihayeke ji bo azadiyê lazim wesf kiriye. Piştî 2002yan, dûrketina ji şîdeta şoreşger û bi geşbûna siyaseta sivîl ya bi aktorên cihêtir, rê li ber vekir ku derveyî mirinê jî bedelên din ji aliyê raya giştî ve werin dîtin. Vê xebata etnografîk a li Diyarbekirê, ji bo derxistina holê ya pirhejmariya wextînî ya têkoşîna şoreşger, “jiyanên paşê yên bedêlên şoreşger” têgînî dike. Gotar, di dewsa dîtina bedêlê ya ji rojika pîroziya şoreşgerê de; şoreşê bi rêya şikestinbarî, têkiliyên îhtîmamê, hêviyên ku wextîniyên vî cureyî dihewînin ji nû ve difikire. Ji bo tevlîhevkirina vegotinên şehîdî û qehremaniyên kevneşopî, bal dikişîne ser jiyanên piştî bedêlê, ronî dide ser têkoşîn, hest û têkiliyên rojane û pirsiyar dike ka ji bo guherînên siyasî em çawa qîmet didin bedêlê.

ABSTRACTReflecting upon international peace studies at the start of 2025, this piece looks both at the contexts of the 2023 IPRA global conference held in Trinidad and at the 2024 US elections. With a tribute to and extensive quote from Grenadian academic Don Rojas, we articulate the ways in which past “peaceful revolutions” such as the New Jewel Movement may provide guideposts for peace work in the years ahead.

AbstractFrench suburb movies are a relatively new film genre that tends to represent a challenge for sociolinguistic analysis, especially in the fields of language contact and variation. In many movies of this genre, the representation of contact between French and migratory languages, particularly Arabic dialects, and French variation (“verlan”) has a central function in vehiculating the filmic message. District 13 can be considered one of the exceptions to this rule. Language contact and variation are sensibly less important than in other “banlieue”movies. Themain issue of the present paper is hence a methodological one: the conceptualization of film analysis from a linguistic point of view necessitates an approach in discourse analysis. The sociodiscursive approach of the Bakhtin School is a particularly promising analytic tool for this objective. The application of the sociodiscursive method to the District 13 movies reveals the films’ central message, i.e., the defense of the republican values rooted in the French Revolution.

Disclaimer: The situation on PixelCanvas is constantly changing due to raids from both sides. The figures in this article represent the state as of April 2020. In the politicized digital environment, the superiority of the alt-right’s weaponization of memes is often taken for granted. As summarized in the buzzword-phrase “the left can’t meme”, the digital engagements of self-identified leftist activists are usually seen as less effective than the ones of the right: their attempts at utilizing Internet culture described as too “politically correct” and “devoid of humour”. This supposedly “immutable law of the Internet” (Dankulous Memeulon) often found confirmation in research.Described by Phillips and Milner, Internet culture – “a highly insular clique”, now seeping into popular culture – is by design rooted in liberalism and fetishized sight. Through its principles of “free speech”, “harmless fun”, and dehumanizing detachment of memes from real-life production and consequence, meme-sharing was enabling deception, “bigoted pollution”, and reinforcing white racial frames, regardless of intentions (Phillips and Milner). From Andersson to Nagle, many come to the conclusion that the left’s presence online is simply not organized, not active, not transgressive enough to appeal to the sensibilities of Internet culture. Meanwhile, the playful, deceptive online engagements of the alt-right are found to be increasingly viral, set to recruit numerous young rebels, hence upholding a cultural hegemony which has already transcended over to the offline world. This online right style is one where a rejection of morality and nihilistic nonconformity reign supreme – all packaged in carnivalesque laughter and identity-bending “trolling” (Nagle 28-39). Even if counterculture and transgression used to be domains of the left, nowadays the nihilistic, fetishizing landscape of online humour is popularized via alt-right aligned message boards like 4chan (Nagle 28-39).Left-wing alternatives, encompassed by Nagle in the term “Tumblr liberalism”, were often described as “fragmented” through identitarianism and call-out-culture, enclosed in echo chambers, “nannying, language policing, and authoritarian” (68-85). This categorization has been rightfully criticized for reductionism that lumps together diverse political strands, focuses on form only, and omits the importance of subcultural logic in its caricature of the censorious left (Davies). However, it would be difficult to deny that this is exactly how the online left is, unfortunately, often perceived by the right and liberals/centrists alike, evidenced by its niche quality.The solutions to the problem of the right’s dominance in the memeosphere – and their Gramscian cultural hegemony – offered by Phillips and Milner could include disavowing fetishized sight while maintaining “slapdash, quippy, and Internet Ugly” qualities to deconstruct meme culture’s whiteness; Davies suggests that “if the left is to have the same degree of success in translating online cultures into political movements then it needs to understand both the online world and its own IRL history”.Nonetheless, some strands of the online left have been rather close in style and form to the ones of the alt-right, despite their clear difference of “stance” (Shifman 367). In this article, I demonstrate an example of a multi-faceted, united, witty, and countercultural meme leftism on PixelCanvas.io (PixelCanvas): a nearly unlimited online canvas, where anyone can place coloured pixels with an obligatory cooldown time after each. Intended for creative expression, PixelCanvas became a site of click-battles between organized dichotomous extremes of the left and the alt-right, and is swarmed with political imagery. The right’s use of this platform has been already examined by Thibault, well-fitting into the consensus about the efficiency of right-wing online activity. My focus is the rebuttal of alt-right imagery that the radical left replaces with their own.With a brief account of PixelCanvas’s affordances and recounting the recent history of its culture wars, I trace the hybrid leftist activity on PixelCanvas to argue that it is comparably grounded in dissimulation and transgression to the alt-right’s. Based on the case study, I explore how certain strands of online left might reappropriate the carnivalesque, deceptive, and countercultural meme culture sensibilities and forms, while simultaneously rejecting its “bigoted pollution” (Phillips and Milner) aspects. While arguably problematic, these new strategies might be necessary to combat the alt-right’s hegemony in the meme environment – and by extension, in popular culture.PixelCanvas as a Metapolitical Platform of Culture WarsPixelCanvas affords a blend of 4chan-style open-access, no-login anonymity and the importance of organized collective effort. As described by Thibault, it is an “online ‘game’ that allows players to colour pixels ..., either collaborating or competing for the control of the shared space” (102). The obligatory cooldown period on PixelCanvas results in most of the works requiring either dedication of long periods of time or collaboration: as such, the majority of canvas art has a “shared authorship” (102). As a space for creative expression, PixelCanvas encourages expressing aspects of genuine personal identity (political views, sexuality, etc.) albeit reduced to symbols and memes that rarely remain personal. Although the primary medium of information transfer on the platform is visual, brief written catchphrases are also utilized. While the canvas is not lacking in free areas, competition for space is prevalent: between political viewpoints, nationalist groups (Bakalım), and other communities (PixelCanvas.io).Given this setup, it might be expected that battling for hegemony took over the game. The affordances of PixelCanvas as accepting anonymous unmoderated expressions of identity/political views encourage dissimulation similarly to boards such as 4chan; its immediate visual/one-liner focus overlaps with the prerequisites of meme culture. Meanwhile, the game’s competition aspect leads to large-scale organization of polarized metapolitical groups and to imagery that is increasingly larger, more taboo-breaking, and playful: meant to catch the eye of a viewer before the opponents do. PixelCanvas, as such, is a platform fitting into transgressive, trolling, fetishizing, and “liberal” affordances of Internet culture: the same affordances that made it, according to Nagle or Phillips and Milner, into a space of desensitized white supremacy and right-wing dominance.Such a setup may seem to work in favour of the 4chan-style raids and against the supposed identitarianism of “Tumblr liberalism”. One could recall the importance of united collective efforts on 4chan: from meme-sharing to Gamergate raids (Beran). Meanwhile, suggested by Citarella, a problem of the online left is its fragmentation, and its “poorly organized and smaller followings” (10). As he observed on Politigram, “DemSocs, Syndicalists, ML’s, AnComs, … and so on, all hated each other. The online right was equally divided but managed to coordinate cultural agitations” (Citarella 10).Indeed, the platform displayed the effects of alt-right virality multiple times, involving creations of self-identified Kekistanis (KnowYourMeme), anarcho-capitalists, 4chan-aligned “bronies” (My Little Pony fans), etc. However, since 2017, the left joined the game, becoming another example of a united, well-organized and strongly participatory group, which continuously resists alt-right attacks and establishes its own raids, often gaining an upper hand.Named “Battle of Pixelgrad”, the influx of leftist activity began to combat the forming Reich Iron Cross posted by “a user on 4chan's /pol/” which has caught the attention of Leftbook/meme groups and subreddits (PLK Wiki) (Wrigley). The groups involved spanned “all beliefs under a unified socialist umbrella” (Pixel Liberation Front) ranging from communism through anarchism subtypes to identity politics: all associating with the “left unity” flag that they replaced the Iron Cross with. Their efforts against alt-right raids were coordinated through Discord servers and a public Facebook group. Soon, a Facebook page for Left Unity Fighting Front (LUFF) was set up, with the PixelCanvas flag in the banner and the description: “We decided to form the new rival of 4chan, LUFF. We are the new united front of the internet. Promoting left unity, trolling Nazis, and taking on sectarianism.”Figure 1: The ’Left Unity’ flag. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1554,3594.The concept of left unity has been criticised before, as one that would lead to “the co-optation of anarchism under a Marxist leadership”, charged with the history of anarchist-Bolshevik clashes in USSR, and marred by a “lack of willingness among some Marxists to actually engage with anarchists in legitimate debate” (Springer). Still, the PixelCanvas left unity is one of the rare instances of Marxist, anarchist, and other leftist online groups working together on rather equal grounds, without cracking down on discourse and historical contexts: which is afforded by a subcultural logic and focus on combating a common enemy. The PixelCanvas leftists support common projects, readily bending their beliefs/ identity to create an efficient community that can resist 4chan: self-identifying as an “allyship” with anonymous “soldiers”/comrades belonging together on the left side of the pixel “war” (Pixel Liberation Front). While the diversity of their beliefs is made clear through the variously aligned flags/thinkers they choose to represent with pixels, the union stands without in-fighting, emulating simplistic versions of history as a dichotomous struggle between left and right (which deliberately rejects centrism): from Nazi/communist battles to Cold War imagery. Although reductionist, this us/them thinking is especially necessary in the visual, time-sensitive, and competitive space of PixelCanvas. No matter how extreme the common projects are, what matters in the pixel war is camaraderie and defeating the enemy in the most striking manner possible. After all, the setup of the platform (and the immediacy of Internet culture) supports attention- grabbing transgression and memes better than nuanced discourse. Figure 2: Representation of the left uniting against Nazism and anarcho-capitalism. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-143,-782.As of April 2020, hardly any Nazi/4chan/ancap imagery on PixelCanvas stands without being challenged by the Left Unity. Although some of the groups involved in Pixelgrad do not exist anymore, Discord servers (e.g. RedPixel) and Pixel Liberation Front (PLF) Facebook group remain, defending the platform from continued raids. These coordinating bodies are easily accessible to anyone willing to contribute (shall one wish for complete anonymity, they are also free to participate without joining the servers). Their efforts could be understood as “clicktivism” (Halupka); however, the involved leftists view it as a “war” (PLF) or “Memeolution” (Wrigley), an important way in which the “virality of right-wing populism” (Thibault) must be resisted. This use of language highlights their serious awareness of the need for combating the right’s digital hegemony, no matter how playful their activity seems.Even if this phenomenon is specific to PixelCanvas, one should acknowledge that the identity-bending unity of the left has been enough to challenge continued raids. Niche practices, as seen through 4chan, might break into the mainstream: according to Hobson and Modi, online spaces “are a rich recruiting ground for previously antithetical/apolitical young people” (345) who find refuge in memes and trolling. The agenda of the PixelCanvas left (counterplatforming activism) in this case differs from 4chan’s. However, the forms they assume to reach their goal are often “pithy, funny, or particularly striking” enough to potentially make one “pause to think, and/or laugh” (Hobson and Modi 345) regardless of political alignment.The Form, Content, and Stance of PixelCanvas Left ActivityDespite the unity in the organization of the PixelCanvas left, the approaches/strategies of its various pixel artworks are far from uniform. At the first sight, the creations of RedPixel members already appear as a multi-faceted (and potentially confusing) mixture of serious real-life agenda and playful Internet culture. Guided by Shifman’s communication-oriented typology of memes, I analyze the different “contents, forms, and stances” (367) that the PixelCanvas left displays in its creations. For analytical clarity, I distinguish three main approaches which overlap and play various roles in contributing to the collective image of RedPixel as simultaneously activist, serious, inclusive, and Internet-culture-savvy, transgressive, deceptive.The first approach of PixelCanvas leftist creations is most serious and least grounded in Internet culture. A portion of RedPixel activity directly reproduces real-life protest chants, posters, flags, murals, movement symbols, and portraits of leftist icons, with little alteration to the form other than pixelating. The contents of such creations vary, however, they remain serious and focused on real-life issues: voicing support for contemporary leftist movements (Black Lives Matter, pro-refugee, Rojava liberation, etc.), celebrating the countercultural, class-centric leftist history (anarchist, communist, socialist victories, thinkers, and revolutionaries), and representing a plethora of identities within hyper-inclusive flag clusters (of various sexualities, genders, and ethnicities). The stance of these images can be plausibly interpreted as charged with serious/genuine “keying” (Shifman 367), and “conative” (imperative) or “emotive” (367) functions. Within those images, the meme culture’s problematic affordances (“fetishization” and “liberalism” (Phillips and Milner)) are disavowed clearly: exemplified by a banner on the site suggesting that “just a meme” mentality created a shield for “meme Nazis” that led to the 2019 Christchurch mosque shooting. Although this strand of RedPixel’s works could be criticized as “humourless” and rather detached from the platform’s affordances, its role lies in displaying the connection to the real world with potential suggestions for mobilization, the awareness of meme culture’s problematic nature, and the image of radical left cooperation. Figure 3: The Christchurch memorial. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-2815,3321. Figure 4: Posters and symbols in support of Rojava, Palestine liberation, and Black Lives Matter. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@5340,4121. Figure 5: Early Paris Commune poster reproduced on PixelCanvas. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@7629,2134. Figure 6: Example of a PixelCanvas hyper-inclusive flag cluster. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@2741,-3508.The second approach, while similar in the diversity of content, adopts memetic forms, and the light-hearted “harmless fun” of Internet culture. Through popular meme formats (molded to call for action), slang expressions, pop-cultural references (anime/cartoon/video game characters), to adopting “cutesy” aesthetics, these creations present identity politics, anti-fascism, and anti-capitalism in a light, aestheticized form. Popular characters, colourful art, and repetitive base colour schemes (red, black, rainbow) are likely to attract attention; recognition of the pop-cultural references, and of known meme formats might sustain it, urging one to focus on the only uncertain element: the politics behind it. Being visually and contextually appealing to online youth, this political-memetic imagery is well-adapted to the platform. Simultaneously, the carnivalesque forms contrast with the frequently more transgressive contents this approach employs. As a result, the tone of their work seems lighthearted even in its incitement to “kill the Nazis” and “eat the rich”. Clearly aware of the language of its opposition, RedPixel reacts similarly to how 4chan reacted to Tumblr liberalism: responding to “lightly thrown accusations” (Nagle) by intensifying them to the point where they can be seen as “owning” the labels they have been given – instead of “getting offended”. Through memes and reappropriated posters they present themselves as “Red Menace,” as a direct threat to 4channers, and as a “trigger-warning” club, using the existing criticisms to self-identify as formidable enemies of the right. While the transgression in RedPixel style often remains acceptable by radical left standards, it is certainly not the same as “virtue signalling”, “hypersensitive”, “vulnerable” Tumblr liberalism (Nagle 68–85); and it might be shocking or amoral to some. Much of their imagery is provocative: inciting violence, glorifying deeply problematic parts of communist history, using religious symbols in a potentially blasphemous way, supporting occultism/ Satanism, and explicitly amplifying (queer) sexuality. In the mix of (sometimes) extreme contents and forms that suggest a light-hearted attitude, it might be difficult to determine the keying of their stance. Although it is unlikely that RedPixel would avow politics they do not actually believe (given the activist, anti-fetishizing agenda of their first approach), their political choices are frequently amplified to their full “tankie” form, and even up to Stalin support: raising the question how much of it is serious intent masked with humour, and what could be written off as deliberate identity play, deceptive “trolling” and jokes, similar in style to 4chan’s. Figure 7: Revolution-inciting appropriation of a popular meme format. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1765,3376. Figure 8: Fictional characters Stevonnie (Steven Universe) and Cirno (Touhou) with leftist captions. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-847,-748. Figure 9: Call for fighting fascism referencing a Pacman video game and Karl Marx. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-712,-395. Figure 10: Joseph Stalin reimagined as a My Little Pony character. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1197,966. Figure 11: “A spectre is haunting Kekistan.” Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-2196,3248. Figure 12: “Trigger Warning Gun Club” badge. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@2741,-3508.Figure 13: “Have you heard that Nazis get vored?” anime catgirl. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@1684,928. Figure 14: Rainbow genitals on a former Kekistan flag. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-2513,3221. Figure 15: “Eat the Rich — OK Boomer” wizard ghost. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-4390,-697.The third approach can be read as a subset of the second: however, what distinguishes it is a clearly parodic stance and reappropriating of 4chan’s forms. The PixelCanvas activists, unlike the supposed “anti-free speech” left (Lukianoff and Haidt) do not try to get the alt-right imagery removed by others, and do not fully erase it. Instead, they repurpose 4chan memes and flags, ridiculing them or making them stand for leftist views. An unaware viewer could mistake their parodies of 4chan for parodies of the left made by 4chaners; the true stance sometimes only suggested by their placement within RedPixel-reclaimed areas. Communist and LGBTQ+ Pepes or Ponies, modified Kekistan flags, and even claiming that “the right can’t meme” all point to an interesting trend that instead of banning symbols associated with alt-right groups wants to exploit the malleability of memes: confusing and parodying their original content and stance while maintaining the form and style. This aim is perhaps best exemplified in the image The Greatest Game of Capture the Flag where Pepes in anarcho-communist, communist, and transgender Pride hoodies are escaping from a crying white man while carrying a 4chan flag. Interpreted in context, this image summarizes the new direction that leftists take against 4chan. This is a direction of left unity (with various strands of radical left maintaining their identities but establishing an overarching collective “allyship” identification), of mixing identity politics with classic ideologies, of reconciling Internet culture with IRL socio-political awareness, and finally, of reappropriating proven-effective play, dissimulation, and transgression from 4chan. Figure 16: Pride flag cluster with Pride-coloured Pepes. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1599,3516. Figure 17: Communist/anarchist thinkers and leaders reimagined as Pepes. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1885,3203. Figure 18: “The Right Can’t Meme.” Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1885,3203. Figure 19: The reclaimed Kekistan area. Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-2439,3210. Figure 20: “The Greatest Game of Capture the Flag.” Source: https://pixelcanvas.io/@-1885,3203.ConclusionThe PixelCanvas left can serve as an example of a united stronghold which managed to counterplatform the alt-right: assuming dominance in 2017 to later rebuild and expand their pixel spheres of influence after each 4chan raid. Online culture wars are nowadays recognized as Gramscian in their roots: according to Burton, “the young people confronting this reactionary shift head-on with memes normalizing are … on the front lines of a culture war with global repercussions” (13). By far, this “war” for digital hegemony has been overwhelmingly evaluated as one that the alt-right is simply better at, due to the natural affordances of Internet culture. However, the “united front of the internet” “promoting left unity and trolling Nazis” (LUFF) exemplifies a possible direction which the online radical left could follow to take on 4chan’s digital dominance. This direction is complex and hybrid: with overlapping/combined approaches. The activities of PixelCanvas left include practices that are well-adapted to the immediate meme culture and those based on IRL movements; practices similar to 4chan’s problematic transgression and those that are activist, disavowing fetishized sight; serious practices and deceptive/ironic ones. Their 2017 PixelCanvas victory and later resistance persisting despite continuing raids might suggest that this strategy works, with the key to its coordination laying in the subcultural logic of an “allyship” that privileges fast-paced mobilization and swift comebacks over careful nuance: necessitated by meme culture affordances. 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