Imagery of Online Hate – a book project

Images play a crucial role in the spread of hate ideologies online. Memes, doctored photographs, and cartoons are frequently combined with fragments of text to express hate speech in ever-new ways. But despite the centrality of these ‘multimodal’ forms of expression within online discourse today, academic studies of the role of visual imagery in hate speech tend to take a historical perspective. When hate ideologies are examined within today’s digital communication spaces, the focus is usually on non-visual forms of communication alone. As such, research into contemporary visual and multimodal expressions of hate in digital communication is urgently needed in order to understand and vigorously counter the phenomenon and its underlying dynamics.
A new anthology compiled by the Decoding Antisemitism project seeks to tackle this question head on. Provisionally entitled “Imagery of Hate Online”, the volume will include contributions from experts exploring the visual and multimodal communication of hate ideologies from a range of disciplinary and methodological perspectives. The anthology will provide invaluable insights into cutting-edge theories and practices of multimodality research today, as well as setting out the challenges posed by a perpetually shifting research object.
By presenting an overview of current research, both qualitative and quantitative, that addresses the structure and spread of different visual and multimodal forms of hate ideology online, this anthology will – for the first time – lay out a coherent picture of their nature and extent. By providing precise answers to the question of how to deal with the current challenge of visual and multimodal hate, the anthology will make a significant contribution to an issue that is crucial for the future of social cohesion.

Publication planned for Summer 2024!