In this thesis, I have found that while China claims to remain neutral between Ukraine and Russia, China’s news media, "Xinhua News Agency" and "China Daily", seem to present a clear antagonist...Show moreIn this thesis, I have found that while China claims to remain neutral between Ukraine and Russia, China’s news media, "Xinhua News Agency" and "China Daily", seem to present a clear antagonist between the countries, namely the U.S. Through several discursive techniques, the two news organizations present the U.S. as a cunning actor that drags others into a ‘proxy war’.Show less
The thesis deals with the political discourse surrounding the 2016 EU-Turkey Agreement on Migration in the European Parliament (EP). By analysing parliamentary debates, it examines how different...Show moreThe thesis deals with the political discourse surrounding the 2016 EU-Turkey Agreement on Migration in the European Parliament (EP). By analysing parliamentary debates, it examines how different political groups in the EP discuss this topic. Through directed content analysis, the analysis looks into five different factors encompassing security, normative, economic, cultural and diplomatic aspects. The thesis highlights that parties’ discourses on the EU-Turkey deal are shaped along different cleavages, including left-and right, GAL and TAN, pro and against European integration, as well as the geographical dimension.Show less
This thesis uses critical race theory to investigate and explain the ways in which the media discourse of the opioid crisis compared to the crack epidemic. This research combines critical discourse...Show moreThis thesis uses critical race theory to investigate and explain the ways in which the media discourse of the opioid crisis compared to the crack epidemic. This research combines critical discourse analysis and digital methods to analyze the narratives and rhetoric of a range of articles published in the National Review. These findings are compared to published secondary literature that explore trends in media coverage about the crack epidemic to draw conclusions about the shifting media narratives between the 1980s and 2010s. The findings reveal that 1980s media largely constructed crack users as the perpetrators of the crack epidemic. At the same time, the media largely promoted the key components of the War on Drugs campaign, include more regulation and criminalization. Coverage of opioid users contrastingly, were met with greater empathetic concern and their recovery became seen as a priority. By exploring these findings through the lens of critical race theory, this research finds that these narratives reveal significant racial inequities of conservative media coverage.Show less
Executive master thesis | International Relations and Diplomacy (MSc)
open access
With Europe striving towards net zero carbon emissions, green hydrogen is a key priority in EU energy policy due to its significant potential for decarbonizing energy-intensive industries. Germany,...Show moreWith Europe striving towards net zero carbon emissions, green hydrogen is a key priority in EU energy policy due to its significant potential for decarbonizing energy-intensive industries. Germany, Europe’s largest economy and carbon-emitter, significantly shapes EU energy policy with its domestic Energiewende model, and has been among the first member states to pursue an explicit global hydrogen strategy as part of its foreign policy. However, given the country’s energy import-dependence on Russia, the latter’s invasion of Ukraine in February 2022 and resulting breakaway of Russo-German trade relations has invoked a Zeitenwende (‘turning point’) in Germany’s foreign policy: diverging from past narratives on economic interdependence and market-driven politics, geopolitical and national security considerations are becoming more pronounced. This ‘paradigm shift’ thus has important implications for Germany’s hydrogen strategy, a cornerstone in its current foreign policy. Drawing onto critical geopolitics, this paper critically examines Germany’s hydrogen discourse since the onset of the war, and its repercussions for Europe’s and the global energy transition. The critical discourse analysis of official speeches and statements by the government between February 2022 (i.e. shortly after Russia’s invasion of Ukraine) and March 2023 reveals how the German government constructs and rationalizes its identity, interests and spatial beliefs about the international system vis-á-vis Russia in its geopolitical discourse on hydrogen. Contextualizing and discussing the assumptions driving Germany’s hydrogen discourse in the context of EU and international energy governance sheds light on how the government’s narrative (re)produces the geopolitics of hydrogen, and promotes a competitive policy framework that might risk undermining more cooperative and equitable efforts in the global energy transition.Show less
On May 23rd, 2014, Elliot Rodger killed six and injured fourteen near Isla Vista, United States, in his self-declared Day of Retribution. On March 15th, 2019, Brenton Tarrant opened fire in and...Show moreOn May 23rd, 2014, Elliot Rodger killed six and injured fourteen near Isla Vista, United States, in his self-declared Day of Retribution. On March 15th, 2019, Brenton Tarrant opened fire in and around the Al Noor mosque in Christchurch, New Zealand, eventually killing 51. Before their violent acts, both Elliot Rodger and Brenton Tarrant posted manifestos outlining justifications for resorting to violence while incentivising others to do the same. Rodger’s and Tarrant’s manifestos have been highly influential in inspiring other actors to resort to violence and are therefore analysed for the current investigation. However, a lack of analytical attention towards how violent actors with different ideological perspectives utilise gendered narratives in their manifestos necessitates the current investigation to explore how gendered discourses feature in Rodger’s and Tarrant’s manifestos. This thesis takes a gendered approach to violent discourse by applying a Critical Discourse Analysis, which unveils that both Rodger’s and Tarrant’s manifestos contain gendered narratives. However, the results also reveal that the intensities and frequencies of these narratives differ between the two manifestos, as do the ways in which the gendered constructions incite violence. These findings offer valuable insights into how gendered narratives unite ideologically diverse violent actors which can assist future research seeking to better understand the deadly effects of gendered discourse.Show less
The study explores the shift in anti-immigrant discourse of the French far-right party leadership with regard to the Ukrainian refugee crisis. A discourse analysis of the tweets and their...Show moreThe study explores the shift in anti-immigrant discourse of the French far-right party leadership with regard to the Ukrainian refugee crisis. A discourse analysis of the tweets and their accompanying media for Marine Le Pen (RN) and Éric Zemmour (R!) was conducted for the presidential campaign and election period of February to April 2022. The material selected was coded through ATLAS.ti into themes informed by the literature review and the theoretical framework. The findings indeed confirm a shift in emerging discourse, whereby solidarity towards and welcoming of Ukrainian refugees is grounded on the pretense of the traditional Christian spirit of providing asylum as well as their cultural and geographic proximity. Simultaneously, the limits of the Christian spirit towards non-European asylum seekers, refugees and immigrants was justified through discourse relying on neo-racist rhetoric based on ‘cultural differentialism’. These arguments often encompass non-European refugees fleeing from Ukraine.Show less
Interjections such as 'wow', 'mhm' or 'oh boy', can be defined as conventionalized lingui,stic items that typically constitute a non-elliptical utterance of their own and express a speaker’s...Show moreInterjections such as 'wow', 'mhm' or 'oh boy', can be defined as conventionalized lingui,stic items that typically constitute a non-elliptical utterance of their own and express a speaker’s attitude towards a situation. Many studies have debated about topics like the extent of the interjection class, or the semantics of different types of interjections. However, the context of conversation is needed to truly grasp the way interjections are used in spoken language. This study investigates the interjections of Avatime, a Kwa language of Ghana, focusing specifically on how they are used in interactional discourse. I construct an inventory of the interjections used in a collection of Avatime conversations.I then analyze the functions, positions and multimodal properties of these interjections. The great majority of attested interjections are phatic in function (e.g., backchanneling or expressing agreement), while there is relatively little room for interjections expressing emotions. Most interjections occur on their own (as is part of their definition) or turn-initially. Avatime speakers also regularly communicate in sequences that consist of only interjections. Furthermore, conversation is not unimodal, and neither are interjections. A quarter of the Avatime interjections occur with a gesture (with hand, head or other body parts), although facial expressions are rarely involved in producing gestures. Furthermore, there seems to be great areal convergence of interjections in Avatime and surrounding languages, which are all influenced by the regional lingua franca Ewe. To better understand these areal patterns, and to place interjections in a wider typological perspective, more empirical studies like the present one are needed. Only with comparable data from diverse languages can we understand the use of interjections in conversations around the world, which ultimately is fundamental to understanding human interaction.Show less
The Dutch historical narrative on slavery and slave trade is part of a debate in which ignorance tends to be painted as the source of contemporary disputes. This refers to the debate around racial...Show moreThe Dutch historical narrative on slavery and slave trade is part of a debate in which ignorance tends to be painted as the source of contemporary disputes. This refers to the debate around racial inequality that arose in early 2020 in which racism was claimed to be institutionalized. With slavery being an obvious example in history that shows how racism took on a structural and institutionalized form, it is essential to critically analyze how the narrative on the inhumane and degrading treatment of black Africans is told. In this thesis, two senior year havo-level secondary school history textbooks, Feniks and Geschiedeniswerkplaats, will be analyzed using a Critical Discourse Analysis. The storyline on the slavery period will be assessed critically, focusing on the selection of narratives and phrasing. The results show the presence of the Color-blind discourse, in which storylines take on a passive voice, and Racially essentialist discourse, where the selection of black Africans is biologically justified. Both textbooks lack a description on the wider social opinion towards the black community and therefore fail to address these racist attitudes.Show less
This thesis explores how Pim Fortuyn, Geert Wilders and Thierry Baudet manage to be both controversial and successful with their language. It places their rhetoric within contexts of populism,...Show moreThis thesis explores how Pim Fortuyn, Geert Wilders and Thierry Baudet manage to be both controversial and successful with their language. It places their rhetoric within contexts of populism, Orientalism, and Foucault's concept of discourse.Show less
How did racialized ideas about work and rest change in the Dutch East-Indies towards the end of the nineteenth century? In the Dutch colony, the idea that Javanese worker showed a natural tendency...Show moreHow did racialized ideas about work and rest change in the Dutch East-Indies towards the end of the nineteenth century? In the Dutch colony, the idea that Javanese worker showed a natural tendency for laziness and lacked the urge to improve their material condition was highly influential and repeatedly invoked to justify coercive labor practices. Whereas the Dutch used to consider Javanese’s alleged laziness as a stable and in-built feature of their inferior “race”, this study shows that they increasingly started to treat it as a by-product of their deplorable socio-economic circumstances by the turn of the century. Given that the Cultivation System (1830-1870) robbed the Javanese off the fruits of their own labor, the Dutch asserted that the natives had failed to develop the “natural” materialist urges they associated with industrial capitalism. In attempts to cure Javanese agricultural workers of their supposed indolence, the agents of capital therefore endeavored to inculcate work ethic from above via the so-called Ethical Policy of 1901. This study not only documents this discursive change, but also aims to understand and explain it. To this end, it places the historical transformation of the stereotype against the background of the racial capitalist regime change it emerged from: the shift from a system in which natives were excluded from the White economy to one in which they were demanded to assimilate. My findings fill up the empirical lacuna on the circulation of this racial-economic trope in the late nineteenth century and advances the historiography on the topic by thoroughly embedding it within Black Marxist theorizing.Show less
The ratification of the Paris Agreement by the European Union has determined its trajectory and set in motion the green transition of the European economy. Even though the European climate...Show moreThe ratification of the Paris Agreement by the European Union has determined its trajectory and set in motion the green transition of the European economy. Even though the European climate ambitions seem political of nature, the European Central Bank has recently shown its willingness to support the Union’s climate ambitions within its institutional capacity. European policy research organisations put forward new ideas on greening policy instruments, which also touch upon other institutional characteristics of the ECB. However, the monetary authority is de jure independent of exogenous actors in determining its policies and strategy. Recently though, under Lagarde's presidency, the ECB has for the first time opened up to ideas from civil society, think tanks and academia when defining its new long-term "green" strategy. While the new strategy is still on the drawing board, theories from discursive institutionalism assert that ideas resonate the ECB’s communication strategy, through discourse. When juxtaposing and comparing the results from two qualitative research methods, the study concluded that specific, programmatic ideas are not significantly represented in the ECB's discourse. Instead, more a general and normative ideational shift has taken place where a stronger and more decisive change in tone has become visible in the ECB’s discourse on its green strategy that can rather be explained by other exogenous events and factors.Show less
Bachelor thesis | Cultural Anthropology and Development Sociology (BSc)
closed access
Currently, environmental management initiatives influenced by the discourse of sustainable development are often insufficient and unsuccessful. Improvement schemes and conservation initiatives...Show moreCurrently, environmental management initiatives influenced by the discourse of sustainable development are often insufficient and unsuccessful. Improvement schemes and conservation initiatives often have negative environmental and socio-economic consequences, leading to all kinds of resistance. The present study was designed to determine how the influence of international financial institutions such as the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund is affecting (environmental) improvement schemes and shaping indigenous responses. This thesis is an essay in which I have put revised literature into conversation with each other. This study has found that the currently most dominant way of conceptualizing environmental matter – the discourse of sustainable development – is a persuasive slogan that disguises the capitalist end goals and neoliberal aspirations. Neoliberal environmental management, is not everything it promises to be and seems to be the rotten apple, spoiling true sustainability. Such environmental management in the name of development, accompanied by (unwanted) environmental and social impacts, leads to three kinds of responses: adaptation, resistance and protest.Show less
By examining how the works of Snouck Hurgronje and the historiography of the Indonesian independence war have amounted to a contemporary discourse in which Islamophobia arises, It can be concluded...Show moreBy examining how the works of Snouck Hurgronje and the historiography of the Indonesian independence war have amounted to a contemporary discourse in which Islamophobia arises, It can be concluded that both are stooled on false pre-conceptions and a non-existent dichotomy between ‘us’ and ‘them’. This makes the Dutch colonial history in Indonesia as an important factor shaping Islamophobia today.Show less
On the 15th of March 2019, the Linwood Islamic Church centre and the Al-Noor Mosque in Christchurch had been the target of a terrorist attack. The perpetrator of this attack, Brenton Tarrant, had...Show moreOn the 15th of March 2019, the Linwood Islamic Church centre and the Al-Noor Mosque in Christchurch had been the target of a terrorist attack. The perpetrator of this attack, Brenton Tarrant, had released a manifesto in which he cited NATO`s intervention of Kosovo in 1999 as one of the motives behind his attacks. However, this was not the sole instance in which Tarrant referred to the Yugoslav wars, as he was listening to the song ""Karadžić, Lead your Serbs!"" (also known as God is a Serb) prior to his arrival to the Al-Noor Mosque. Additionally, the guns used by Tarrant were brandishing the names of several individuals including those of that the Serbian Prince Lazar Hrebeljanović and Miloš Obilić. These references to Prince Lazar and Milos Obilic are significant, as they are part of the Kosovo Myth and by extension the Heavenly Serbia discourse which are linked to violence within the region, especially towards Muslims. In light of this, the purpose of this paper is to assess to what extent the discourse of the Christchurch shooter is inspired and or connected to the Heavenly Serbia discourse. In order to explore this relationship, this paper applies a critical discourse analysis on The Great Replacement written by Tarrant.Show less
The dissertation argues that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, George Orwell’s 1984, and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale comment on the interdependence between language and identity through...Show moreThe dissertation argues that Aldous Huxley’s Brave New World, George Orwell’s 1984, and Margaret Atwood’s The Handmaid’s Tale comment on the interdependence between language and identity through their respective fictional dystopic regimes’ exploitation of language and the consequential identity development of their nonconformist characters.Show less
