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Language, ethnicity, race, and racism

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Incels and Ideologies

Part of the book series: Palgrave Studies in Language, Gender and Sexuality ((PSLGS))

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Abstract

This chapter explores how ideas of race and ethnicity are discussed within the incel community. I start by discussing the use of *cel and highlight how some terms for social actors are food for (ethnic) characteristic metonymies. I also explore what adjectives are used to describe incels, noting that incels often have conflicting ideologies about sexual market value and race/ethnicity. This chapter also touches upon how name for characteristic metonymies are used in relation to one male social actor. This leads to a discussion about adjectives about race/ethnicity for the nouns man and woman, before I discuss the representation of interracial relationships. The last section of analysis in this chapter then turns to explore dehumanising metaphors as they relate to race/ethnicity. I then discuss the findings and reiterate the need to consider race/ethnicity when exploring the construction of gender.

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Notes

  1. 1.

    Many authors write conceptual ‘domains’ in the singular. I have pluralised these examples for the sake of readability.

  2. 2.

    Note, I have used ‘ethnic’ here to stand for culture, rather than including ‘race’ in this instance.

  3. 3.

    Although used in the data, this is a term I refuse to reproduce in print. This term has a rich history of racist associations—and despite being reclaimed by several Black people, it is still frequently used as a racial slur. As someone who does not identify as Black, it is not my place to reproduce nor reclaim the term.

  4. 4.

    As with the above footnote, I refuse to reproduce a slur towards Jewish people. Although this slur is typically used in the context of the USA, I realise that it can still be distressing for readers from multiple geographic locations.

  5. 5.

    I want to preface this section by explaining that while interracial unions may be seen to act as a symbol of racial impurity for ‘race purists’ (and eugenicists), I do not take this stance whatsoever. However, the fact that this does pose a problem for such people means it is worth exploring how such a concept is constructed.

  6. 6.

    While this book uses some anecdotal data gathered through netnographic research, this evidence has been documented and triangulated with other forms of data analysis (which is more easily evidenced).

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  1. Department of Languages, Information, and Communications, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK

    Frazer Heritage

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Heritage, F. (2023). Language, ethnicity, race, and racism. In: Incels and Ideologies. Palgrave Studies in Language, Gender and Sexuality. Palgrave Macmillan, Cham. https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40184-8_5

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/978-3-031-40184-8_5

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