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PRODID:-//Columba Systems Ltd//NONSGML CPNG/SpringViewer/ICal Output/3.3-
 M3//EN
VERSION:2.0
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTAMP:20140520T100326Z
DTSTART:20140611T130000Z
DTEND:20140611T140000Z
SUMMARY:Sociology seminar series: Hilary Pilkington ‘Loud and Proud’: You
 th activists in the English Defence League
UID:{http://www.columbasystems.com/customers/uom/gpp/eventid/}lws-hthiqaf
 x-m1zlz4
DESCRIPTION:This paper considers the meanings young members of the ‘new f
 ar right’ English Defence League (EDL) attach to their activism. Based o
 n an ethnographic study (April 2012-Noveber 2013) including interviews w
 ith 35 grassroots activists\, it argues that the movement’s trademark sl
 ogan ‘Not racist\, not violent\, just no longer silent’ denotes more tha
 n a cynical PR strategy. In contrast to a ‘politics’ they reject (unders
 tood as ‘debating’\, ‘listening’ and ‘reading the Sunday Times’)\, parti
 cipation in EDL actions provides young people with a way of ‘getting you
 r point across’\, ‘speaking out’ and ‘standing strong’. This\, it is arg
 ued\, is indicative of the experience of the political sphere by some yo
 ung people as characterised by a ‘politics of silencing’ in which ‘legit
 imate’ political discourse is closed down due to the social distance bet
 ween ‘politicians’ and ‘people like us’ and the legal and cultural circu
 mscriptions on ‘acceptable’ issues for discussion. Drawing on Mouffe’s (
 2005: 6) argument that right wing populism has made inroads in those pla
 ces where traditional democratic parties have lost their appeal to an el
 ectorate no longer able to distinguish between them in the ‘stifling con
 sensus’ that has gripped the political system\, the paper traces the res
 onance of these tropes in the narratives of ‘the political’ among a broa
 der sample of (non-activist) young people in the UK (based on representa
 tive survey and interview data gathered for the FP7 MYPLACE project of w
 hich the EDL ethnography is also a part). The paper asks whether the des
 ire to engage in politics in a ‘loud and proud’ way might confirm Mouffe
 ’s argument that a democracy that ‘works’ for ‘the people’ may not be on
 e based on ‘a universal rational consensus’ managed through institutions
  that ‘reconcile all conflicting interests and values’ but rather one in
  which there is a vibrant public sphere of political contestation (ibid.
  p.3). 
STATUS:TENTATIVE
TRANSP:TRANSPARENT
CLASS:PUBLIC
LOCATION:Room G.019\, Arthur Lewis Building\, Manchester
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