Anti-Americanism and Anti-American Sentiments in Runet Discourse

Abstract

This article analyzes the phenomenon of unfriendly attitudes towards the United States — attitudes which are today defi ned as “anti-Americanism.” The immediate object of the study is numerous issue-related discussions in the Russian Internet space in which the participants express this or that understanding of American actions towards Russia and present and explain their subjective assessments of these actions. The article draws attention to the narrowing of the subject fi eld of anti- Americanism; it is noted that the latter today focuses on crisis-level international processes and events related to the interests of the two countries and the contradictions of these interests in the fi eld of bilateral relations in their most important areas: the confrontation in Syria and NATO’s approach to Russian borders, economic and political sanctions, the dramatic events in Ukraine and others. The “reactive” nature of anti-Americanism can be easily traced through a large amount of empirical material fr om the discussions in the Runet space, wh ere outbursts, both transitory and substantial, are associated with specifi c international events that have received wide publicity in the media. In the context of information warfare, the online community, one way or another, reproduces the maxims drawn directly from the media or from other posts that ultimately go back to the same media sources, and very rarely off ers any individual reasoning indicating the presence of a personal message by the authors. The article analyzes the rational and emotional constituent elements of the issue-related posts and identifi es their radical components.

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