The Technological Operation of the Swastika
A Media Ecology Approach
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.46391/ALCEU.v22.ed46.2022.284Keywords:
Antisemitism, Swastika, Jews, University, United States, Media Ecology, Technology, HateAbstract
Continuing the work of Aronis and Aoki (2021), this essay focuses on contemporary installations of swastikas on U.S. campuses and uses a media ecology theoretical approach to expand on the technological operation of the swastika in the service of antisemitism. The author examines the matter and medium of the swastika, along with its doing, in order to deconstruct its violent, harassing, and threatening nature—for the U.S. university Jewish community, as well as for other potentially affected minoritized and racialized communities. Through five lenses of technological, material, and communicative exploration - assembling, dual act of marking, space/time bias, (re)mediation, and prescription - the author explains how installed swastikas create a traumatizing effect for Jewish university members. This may assist scholars and practitioners regarding education on the topic and
treatment.
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