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This article discusses 9/11 conspiracy theories with a focus on the United States and Europe. After defining conspiracy theories – and thus distinguishing conspiracy theories about the attacks of September 11, 2001, from the official version, which also revolves around a conspiracy – the article traces the emergence of these theories and their development over the twenty years since the attacks. As I show, 9/11 conspiracy theories emerged quickly after the events. However, for two years they were far more popular in Germany and France where they were fueled by anti-Americanism than in the United States where they only gained traction with the invasion of Iraq in 2003. Their popularity peaked around 2005 with the release of the Loose Change films online, but they never went out of fashion entirely. As is typical of conspiracy theories revolving around specific events, they were over time integrated in larger conspiracist narratives such as that of the “Great Replacement.” People who believe in 9/11 conspiracy theories – just as those who believe in others – should not be dismissed as mentally ill, as their beliefs can be symptoms of real anxieties and grievances.

Covid Conspiracy Theories in Global Perspective examines how conspiracy theories and related forms of misinformation and disinformation about the Covid-19 pandemic have circulated widely around the world.Covid conspiracy theories have attracted considerable attention from researchers, journalists, and politicians, not least because conspiracy beliefs have the potential to negatively affect adherence to public health measures. While most of this focus has been on the United States and Western Europe, this collection provides a unique global perspective on the emergence and development of conspiracy theories through a series of case studies. The chapters have been commissioned by recognized experts on area studies and conspiracy theories.The chapters present case studies on how Covid conspiracism has played out (some focused on a single country, others on regions), using a range of methods from a variety of disciplinary perspectives, including history, politics, sociology, anthropology, and psychology. Collectively, the authors reveal that, although there are many narratives that have spread virally, they have been adapted for different uses and take on different meanings in local contexts.This volume makes an important contribution to the rapidly expanding field of academic conspiracy theory studies, as well as being of interest to those working in the media, regulatory agencies, and civil society organizations, who seek to better understand the problem of how and why conspiracy theories spread.

This article analyzes the first season of Damages (2007) as an early example of the representation of ‘difficult’ women on television. More specifically, I investigate the relationship between the show’s character conception and its complex narration. I argue that all the major male and female characters on the show are ‘difficult’ in the sense that the audience experiences close alignment but troubled allegiance to them. However, the two female protagonists – top-notch lawyer Patty Hewes and her young and initially idealistic associate Ellen Parsons – are also opaque characters about whose thoughts and plans the audience is largely left in the dark. This opacity is mirrored and enhanced by the narration, which constantly teases the audience by withholding information about the plot, suggests inferences that then turn out to be wrong, and generally provides far more insight into the male characters than into the female characters.

Populist movements and parties have been on the rise all over the world. Politicians who have been labelled as populists govern the world’s four largest democracies: Brazil, Indonesia, the USA and India. In Europe, too, populism is no longer restricted to the margins of politics and society. This chapter discusses the characteristics of populism and then the limited number of studies that address the relationship between the two phenomena. The loaded dichotomy between the elites and the people makes populism a particularly moralistic take on politics for which processes of othering are of central importance. The existence of a connection between populism and conspiracy theory is already suggested by the fact that the rich bodies of scholarship on both phenomena often pose and discuss similar questions. Research has highlighted that both ‘populism’ and ‘conspiracy theory’ are problematic derogatory terms that are usually rejected by those thus described.

Part I Definitions and approaches Introduction Todor Hristov, Andrew McKenzie-McHarg and Alejandro Romero Reche 1. Conceptual history and conspiracy theory Andrew McKenzie-McHarg 2. Conspiracy theory in historical, cultural and literary studies Peter Knight and Michael Butter 3. Semiotic Approaches to Conspiracy Theories Massimo Leone, Mari-Liis Madison and Andreas Ventsel 4. Philosophy and conspiracy theories Juha Raikka and Juho Ritola 5. Psychoanalysis, critical theory and conspiracy theory Nebojsa Blanusa and Todor Hristov 6. Conspiracy theory as occult cosmology in anthropology Annika Rabo 7. Sociology, social theory and conspiracy theory Turkay Salim Nefes and Alejandro Romero Reche 8. Conspiracy theories in political science and political theory Julien Giry and Pranvera Tika 9. Social psychology of conspiracy theory Olivier Klein and Kenzo Nera 10. Social network analysis, social big data and conspiracy theories Estrella Gualda Caballero Part II Psychological factors Introduction Jan-Willem van Prooijen, Karen Douglas, Aleksandra Cichocka and Michal Bilewicz 1. Personality traits, cognitive styles and worldviews associated with beliefs in conspiracy theories Anthony Lantian, Michael Wood and Biljana Gjoneska 2. Social-cognitive processes underlying belief in conspiracy theories Jan-Willem van Prooijen, Olivier Klein and Jasna Milosevic Dordevicz 3. Motivations, emotions and belief in conspiracy theories Karen M. Douglas, Aleksandra Cichocka and Robbie M. Sutton 4. Conspiracy theories as psycho-political reactions to perceived power Roland Imhoff and Pia Lamberty 5. How conspiracy theories spread Adrian Bangerter, Pascal Wagner-Egger and Sylvain Delouvee 6. Conspiracy theories and intergroup relations Mikey Biddlestone, Aleksandra Cichocka, Iris Zezelj and Michal Bilewicz 7. Consequences of conspiracy theories Daniel Jolley, Silvia Mari and Karen Douglas 8. Countering conspiracy theories and misinformation Peter Kreko Part III Society and politics Introduction Eirikur Bergmann, Asbjorn Dyrendal, Jaron Harambam and Hulda Thorisdottir 1. Who are the conspiracy theorists? Demographics and conspiracy theories Steven M. Smallpage, Hugo Drochon, Joseph E. Uscinski and Casey Klofstad 2. Conspiracy theory entrepreneurs, movements and individuals Jaron Harambam 3. Conspiracy theories and gender and sexuality Annika Thiem 4. Conspiracy theories, political ideology and political behaviour Hulda Thorisdottir, Silvia Mari and Andre Krouwel 5. Functions and uses of conspiracy theories in authoritarian regimes Julien Giry and Dogan Gurpinar 6. Conspiracy theory and populism Eirikur Bergman and Michael Butter 7. Radicalisation and conspiracy theories Benjamin Lee 8. Antisemitism and conspiracism Kjetil Braut Simonsen 9. Conspiracy theory and religion Asbjorn Dyrendal Part IV Media and transmission Introduction Stef Aupers, Dana Craciun and Andreas OEnnerfors 1. Rumours, urban legends and the verbal transmission of conspiracy theories Anastasiya Astapova 2. Conspiracy theorising and the history of media in the eighteenth century Andrew McKenzie-McHarg and Claus Oberhauser 3. Genres of conspiracy in nineteenth-century British writing Ben Carver 4. Conspiracy in American narrative Timothy Melley 5. Conspiracy theories and visual culture Ute Caumanns and Andreas OEnnerfors 6. Conspiracy theories in film and television shows Michael Butter 7. Decoding mass media / encoding conspiracy theory Stef Aupers 8. The Internet and the spread of conspiracy content Simona Stano 9. Networked disinformation and the lifecycle of online conspiracy theories Hugo Leal 10. Conspiracy theories and fake news Kiril Avramov, Vasily Gatov and Ilya Yablokov Part V Histories and regions Introduction Ilya Yablokov, Pascal Girard, Nebojsa Blanusa and Annika Rabo 1. Conspiracy theories in the Roman empire Victoria Emma Pagan 2. Conspiracy theories in the Middle Ages and the early modern period Cornel Zwierlein 3. Freemasons, Illuminati and Jews: Conspiracy theories and the French Revolution Claus Oberhauser 4. Conspiracy Theories in Europe during the twentieth century Pascal Girard 5. Conspiracy theories in Putin's Russia: the case of the 'New World Order' Ilya Yablokov 6. Conspiracy theories in and about the Balkans Nebojsa Blanusa 7. Conspiracy theories in Turkey Dogan Gurpinar and Turkay Salim Nefes 8. Conspiracy theories in the Middle East Matthew Gray 9. Conspiracy theories in Southeast Asia Viren Swami, Hanoor Syahirah Zahari and David Barron 10. Conspiracy theories in American history Michael Butter 11. Populism and conspiracy theory in Latin America: a case study of Venezuela Rosanne Norris Hooper

This chapter investigates a case of transnational heroization, focusing on the ways in which US president Donald Trump is heroized in both the United States and Europe. Analysing texts, memes, and online videos, it argues that the heroic narratives that are circulated in popular culture on both sides of the Atlantic have increasingly become intertwined with politics and are used to make sense of it. The ‘strongman’ populism that Donald Trump espouses appears to be reassuring to those Americans and Europeans who are concerned about immigration and multiculturalism. Although Trump means different things to different admirers (or fans), they share an international language of Western heroism, and their heroizations of Trump depend on, and are enabled by, a globally circulating popular culture that provides both the templates and tropes for the heroic narratives they create.

This article discusses three strategies that TV shows have increasingly employed in recent years to produce what Jason Mittell, in an essay that marked the beginning of his thoughts on the issue, has called "narrative complexity": unreliable narration, counterfictional scenarios, and ellipses and anachronological narration. It uses the last minutes of "The Wheel," the final episode of the first season of AMC's Mad Men (2007–15), as its primary example. More specifically, this article proposes three different interpretations of the final moments of that episode. These readings have in common that they underline one of Mittell's central claims, namely that serial television shifts comprehension processes toward conscious hypotheses in what he describes as "operational aesthetic." However, the article will also assume a broader perspective throughout and demonstrate that the three interpretations it develops are instances of more widely spread phenomena that merit far more attention than a single article can provide. Thus, the article offers, on the one hand, a close reading of an episode of Mad Men against the background of the early seasons of the show, but, on the other, it also identifies three topics for further fruitful research on television narrative more generally.

How has academic research into conspiracy theories developed over time? This chapter demonstrates that scholarly interest only emerged in the 1930s as part of psychohistorical explorations into the origins of totalitarianism. This line of research continued into the 1950s and influenced public opinion on the subject matter, as it received a lot of media attention. The common denominator of these earliest studies is that they pathologize conspiracy theories and those who believe in them. This tendency is to a certain degree still palpable in the most recent research in social psychology and political science which employs sophisticated quantitative methodologies.

This article starts from the observation that research on conspiracy theories is currently thriving, but that it is also fragmented. In particular there is an increasing divide between disciplines with culturalist and qualitative approaches, such as history, cultural studies and ethnology, and disciplines with quantitative and empirical approaches, such as psychology and political science. The article argues that this ‘great divide’ has to be bridged for research to arrive at a genuine understanding of conspiracy theories. As a first step in such a bridge-building process, the article engages, from the vantage point of (American) cultural studies, with research done on the other side of the divide, namely in psychology and political science. It summarizes the work done in these fields and evaluates it critically, concentrating on methodology; the assumptions about the dysfunctionality of conspiracy beliefs; the circularity of some arguments; the focus on individual rather than social and collective aspects; the lack of engagement with the definition of the phenomenon; and the neglect of cultural and historical difference. The article ends with recommendations for future collaborative research projects.

Konspirationsforscher Michael Butter erklart, welchen gedanklichen Fehler Verschworungstheoretiker begehen – und wie ihre Ideen schon Kriege begunstigt haben.

Was ist aus Martin Luther Kings Vision von einem Amerika der Gleichheit, Gerechtigkeit und Selbstbestimmung geworden? Fünfzig Jahre später haben die USA einerseits ihren ersten afroamerikanischen Präsidenten gewählt, andererseits ist die Alltagserfahrung von Afroamerikaner*innen nach wie vor von Polizei-Brutalität, Ausgrenzung und Rassismus geprägt. Die Beiträger*innen gehen den Spuren nach, welche die Bürgerrechtsbewegung in den USA hinterlassen hat, und fragen, was Rassismus heute bedeutet. Die kultur- und sozialwissenschaftlichen Artikel stellen zudem aktuelle Organisationsformen und Strategien von politischer Partizipation, Protest und Widerstand vor.