E-Mail
Recent attacks by jihadists in Kabul, Dresden, Paris, and Vienna have brought the problem of Islamist terror back into the public eye. The events once again highlight the importance of understanding the role of jihadi media contributions, including videos and their distribution across the Internet and social media platforms. A junior research group at Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz (JGU) has conducted an in-depth analysis of dozens of jihadi videos over the past three years. "What is striking is that the video productions are very much tailored to our own viewing habits, which have been shaped by global cinema and television," explained Dr. Christoph Günther, head of the junior research group. While jihadi videos tend to attract a high level of attention, opposition figures who use their artistic works to combat the concepts disseminated by radical Islamists hardly get noticed by the general public. This aspect and the results of the research group's analyses are discussed in the edited volume "Jihadi Audiovisuality and its Entanglements: Meanings, Aesthetics, Appropriations", published recently by Edinburgh University Press.