ERMeCC Lunch Seminar

Make Europe Christian again: digital media, far-right politics, and religion

Giulia Evolvi

Religion is often used in digital media narratives to support political ideologies and reinforce national identities. The European populist far-right increasingly uses the Internet to refer to the so-called Judeo-Christian roots of Europe, enhancing nativists claims. The talk will address two aspects of far-right parties religious-related online discourses: first, it will analyze online Islamophobia, a strategy often employed to frame Islam as the alleged “other” to European Christian and secular values; second, it will address the so-called anti-gender movements, Catholic-inspired groups that reject LGBTQ+ rights and feminism to support conservative Christian values and protect traditional family values. The talk will present tweets sent by Matteo Salvini, leader of the Italian far-right party Lega Nord, as an example of how Islamophobia and anti-gender movements can be part of a populist strategy to antagonistically designate certain citizens (especially those who are non-white, non-Christian, non-heterosexual and non-cisgender) as scapegoats for social issues. The affordances of social media facilitate the spread of these discourses, often also through the diffusion of disinformation and emotional narratives.

If you or someone you know would like to present their research, or if you have any questions, please feel free to contact Daniel Trottier (trottier@eshcc.eur.nl).

The lunch seminar will also be live streamed via Zoom. Please contact trottier@eshcc.eur.nl for more information.