BEGIN:VCALENDAR VERSION:2.0 PRODID:-//Sabre//Sabre VObject 4.6.1//EN CALSCALE:GREGORIAN BEGIN:VTIMEZONE TZID:Europe/Zurich X-LIC-LOCATION:Europe/Zurich TZURL:http://tzurl.org/zoneinfo/Europe/Zurich BEGIN:DAYLIGHT TZOFFSETFROM:+0100 TZOFFSETTO:+0200 TZNAME:CEST DTSTART:19810329T020000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=3;BYDAY=-1SU END:DAYLIGHT BEGIN:STANDARD TZOFFSETFROM:+0200 TZOFFSETTO:+0100 TZNAME:CET DTSTART:19961027T030000 RRULE:FREQ=YEARLY;BYMONTH=10;BYDAY=-1SU END:STANDARD END:VTIMEZONE BEGIN:VEVENT UID:news1963@dslw.philhist.unibas.ch DTSTAMP;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20261103T171434 DTSTART;TZID=Europe/Zurich:20261202T141500 SUMMARY:"Colonization from Within: Antisemitic Conspiracies in Mike Stone ’s «A New America. The First Novel of the Alt-Right!» (2017)" DESCRIPTION:Postcolonial discourse\, it seems\, has in recent years been ap propriated by the transnational far right. Be it through Russian claims of decolonizing Ukraine or the white supremacist conspiracy theory of the ‘Great Replacement’ of Europeans through migration\, the far right has cherrypicked from anti-colonial theories to advocate for neo-colonial pol itics\, combining emancipatory rhetoric and racist essentialism with consp iratorial modes of thinking. This talk explores this curious combination i n Mike Stone’s A New America\, a satirical novel that reimagines electio n day 2016 and Donald Trump’s rise to power as part of a spiritual battl e between good and evil. Peppered with mid-2010s Alt-Right ‘edgy’ humo r and racial slurs\, the short text intertwines the age-old Jewish conspir acy theory with fears about the extinction of white US Americans. This tal k argues that A New America presents a narrative of what David Higgins has termed ‘reverse colonization\,’ where the historical beneficiaries of colonialism and imperialism – in this case white Christian Americans – are allowed to imagine themselves as the outnumbered underdog in an ep ic struggle against an oppressive force. In entangling Christian nationali st narratives of Trump’s first election as divine intervention with anti semitic conspiracy theories\, racism\, and American exceptionalism\, Stone ’s novel constructs white American identity as characterized by victimho od\, and\, consequentially\, its bearers as entitled to righteous retribut ion. Inadvertently\, though\, the novel reveals colonial anxieties about t he loss of white Christian hegemony and the United States’ status as the foremost global power\, mirroring the rhetoric of the transnational far r ight\, which has increasingly become grievance-based.\\r\\n\\r\\nSof Sabbi oni is a postdoc researcher based at the University of Basel. After comple ting their PhD thesis on contemporary Russian and US American far-right fi ction and authorial authority\, they are now part of the SNSF-funded resea rch project “Reading Right: Literature\, Education\, and Far-Right Activ ism” (2027-2031). Their research interests include far-right studies\, l iterary sociology\, postcolonialism\, and contemporary US American literat ure and culture.  X-ALT-DESC:

Postcolonial discourse\, it seems\, has in recent years been appropriated by the transnational far right. Be it through Russian claims of decolonizing Ukraine or the white supremacist conspiracy theory of the ‘Great Replacement’ of Europeans through migration\, the far right has cherrypicked from anti-colonial theories to advocate for neo-colonial pol itics\, combining emancipatory rhetoric and racist essentialism with consp iratorial modes of thinking. This talk explores this curious combination i n Mike Stone’s A New America\, a satirical novel that reimagines election day 2016 and Donald Trump’s rise to power as part of a spiritua l battle between good and evil. Peppered with mid-2010s Alt-Right ‘edgy ’ humor and racial slurs\, the short text intertwines the age-old Jewish conspiracy theory with fears about the extinction of white US Americans. This talk argues that A New America presents a narrative of what Da vid Higgins has termed ‘reverse colonization\,’ where the historical b eneficiaries of colonialism and imperialism – in this case white Christi an Americans – are allowed to imagine themselves as the outnumbered unde rdog in an epic struggle against an oppressive force. In entangling Christ ian nationalist narratives of Trump’s first election as divine intervent ion with antisemitic conspiracy theories\, racism\, and American exception alism\, Stone’s novel constructs white American identity as characterize d by victimhood\, and\, consequentially\, its bearers as entitled to right eous retribution. Inadvertently\, though\, the novel reveals colonial anxi eties about the loss of white Christian hegemony and the United States’ status as the foremost global power\, mirroring the rhetoric of the transn ational far right\, which has increasingly become grievance-based.

\n\n

Sof Sabbioni is a postdoc researcher based at the University of Basel. After completing their PhD thesis on contemporary Russian and US American far-right fiction and authorial authority\, they are now part of the SNSF- funded research project “Reading Right: Literature\, Education\, and Far -Right Activism” (2027-2031). Their research interests include far-right studies\, literary sociology\, postcolonialism\, and contemporary US Amer ican literature and culture. \;

END:VEVENT END:VCALENDAR