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8 - The Importance of Context in Analysing the Incitement of Violence

A Case Study of an Online Community

from III - The Dark Side of Persuasion

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  10 June 2025

By
David Wright
Edited by
Sofia Rüdiger  and
Daria Dayter
Sofia Rüdiger
Affiliation:
Universität Bayreuth, Germany
Daria Dayter
Affiliation:
Tampere University, Finland
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Summary

This study explores the importance of a full(er) understanding of ‘context’ when analysing and interpreting the indirect incitement of violence, a speech act closely related to that of persuasion. Using descriptions of context from Systemic Functional Linguistics (Bowcher, 2014; Hasan, 2014, 2020), the chapter qualitatively examines a small number of selected extracts from a very particular online community – a pick-up artist (PUA) forum. The main argument here is that the contextual configuration of the discourse, in terms of the nature the community and the participants in it, is such that posts which on the face of it appear to be giving advice or expressing opinions could be potentially inciteful in this context. Incitement has typically received relatively little linguistic attention, and indirect incitement poses a specific challenge for linguistics and law alike. This chapter goes some way to providing a new perspective from which the elusive discursive action of incitement can be analysed and interpreted.

Keywords

contextdiscussion boardsforensic linguisticsincitementmanosphereonline forumspick-up artistssituation typeSystemic Functional Linguisticsviolence
Type
Chapter
Information
Manipulation, Influence and Deception
The Changing Landscape of Persuasive Language
 , pp. 157 - 176
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2025

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