The Political Aesthetics of ISIS and Italian Futurism

The Political Aesthetics of ISIS and Italian Futurism cover

The Political Aesthetics of ISIS and Italian Futurism

Out of stock
$129.60 RRP $162.00 Website price saving $32.40 (20%)
Notify me by email when this item is available

For information on how we process your data, read our Privacy Policy

Description

Through empirical analysis and theoretical reflection, this book shows that the aesthetics and politics of the Islamic State is “futurist.” ISIS overcomes postmodern pessimism and joins the modern, techno-oriented, and optimistic attitude propagated by Italian Futurism in the early twentieth century. The Islamic State does not only excel through the extensive use of high-tech weapons, social media, commercial bot, and automated text systems. By putting forward the presence of speeding cars and tanks, mobile phones, and computers, ISIS presents jihad life as connected to modern urban culture. Futurism praised violence as a means of leaving behind imitations of the past in order to project itself most efficiently into the future. A profound sense of crisis produces in both Futurism and jihadism a nihilistic attitude toward the present state of society that will be overcome through an exaltation of technology. Futurists were opposed to parliamentary democracy and sympathized with nationalism and colonialism. ISIS jihadism suggests a similarly curious combination of modernism and conservative values. The most obvious modern characteristic of this new image of fundamentalism is the highly aestheticized recruiting material.

Table of Contents

Introduction: Islamic Futurism? A Study in Political Aesthetics

Chapter 1: ISIS and Futurism: An Impossible Comparison?

Chapter 2: The Futurist Aesthetics of ISIS

Chapter 3: From Cyberpunk back to Futurism: The Trajectory of ISIS

Chapter 4: Fascism, ISIS, and Futurism

Chapter 5: Islam

Chapter 6: Terrorism and Cyberpunk

Chapter 7: The Real Machine vs. the Virtual Machine

Conclusion: Artificial Optimism Then and Today

Epilogue

Product details

Published 17 Dec 2018
Format Ebook (Epub & Mobi)
Edition 1st
Extent 228
ISBN 9781498564373
Imprint Lexington Books
Illustrations 11 b/w photos;
Publisher Bloomsbury Publishing

About the contributors

ONLINE RESOURCES

Bloomsbury Collections

This book is available on Bloomsbury Collections where your library has access.

Related Titles

Get 30% off in the May sale - for one week only

Environment: Staging