Studying Stigmatised Knowledge: Researching Esotericism and the Far Right

Date 17 October 2023

The challenge researchers face of accessing sources which are not only obscure, but in certain instances, actively oppressed by governments or online platforms.

Billy Mann, PhD Candidate

When I decided to write a PhD thesis on the topic of American neo-fascism and conspiracy theories, I understood that, aside from raising a few eyebrows, this would present several challenges. I had to delve deep into tucked away corners of some mysterious intellectual landscapes to understand the underground cultures which influenced neo-fascist conspiracy belief. This included a surprisingly broad variety of ideas, including UFO religions, satanism, neo-paganism, holocaust denial, ancient aliens, Atlantis, hollow earth theory, spiritualism, Hitler worship and more familiar conspiracy theories, such as those surrounding the assassination of President Kennedy, to name just a few. For the sake of this recounting, I will place all of these under the broad category of stigmatised knowledge. This is not to say that these varied beliefs are similar to each other, though they are united by their status as alternatives to more mainstream understandings of science, history, or current events.

This presents researchers with the challenge of accessing sources which are not only obscure, but in certain instances, actively oppressed by governments or online platforms. Though these actions certainly seem sensible from a policy or business perspective, they have the unintended consequence of impeding research, and therefore understandings, of how these unusual and often dangerous ideas form and spread. Ironically, this runs the risk of means that policies made to help control the spreading of these ideas are less informed by academic understandings. However, there are numerous methods of conducting research in this area.

The most prominent theatre for these ideas in the modern age is the internet. The early years of the internet represented something of a wild west for online communities. Content was often unregulated, meaning obscure and dangerous ideas could be posted with less risk of moderation. However, as the internet became more accessible, greater moderation has been necessary. Though this moderation is certainly welcome, it has resulted in some historically valuable sources being made inaccessible to historians. There are, however, still ways to access these in certain instances. The waybackmachine, for example, is an online archive connected with archive.org, which takes ‘snapshots’ of certain webpages and stores them online. This website has proved invaluable to me, as it has allowed me to find sources that have not only been removed by online moderators, but also sources which the author of the source themselves would rather disappear. This includes politicians or business people who have unfortunate pasts in which they propagated this stigmatised knowledge. Even sources which are still available online however cannot be taken for granted, with many historically significant online sources disappearing during the course of my research without being archived by the waybackmachine. Therefore, it is good practice for researchers of this kind to download copies of all the material they are referencing to keep on an external hard drive. This can then be donated to an archive, such as the Searchlight archive, so other historians have the same research opportunities you did. This also means your work can be more accurately peer reviewed, as colleagues can check your sources for themselves.

Less recent outlets for stigmatised knowledge were not online of course, but in print. Often, historical texts can be found on archive.org, which has been the source of some great historical gems in my research, such as FBI files investigating my subjects. With a bit of sleuthing, PDFs of many stigmatised texts can be found, often being shared on forums or message boards discussing relevant topics. Sometimes, however, the only way to access this stigmatised knowledge is to buy the books themselves. This raises a certain number of ethical considerations, as the money we spend on these may end up in the pockets of extremists or fund the spread of misinformation. Fortunately, some of these ethical considerations can be mitigated by purchasing books from second hand sources, such as eBay, though it is still wise to research the seller’s account for problematic themes. It is also important to consider whether the potential profits provided to extremists, which are often small on printed material, are worth the potential benefit to researchers. If donated to an archive after a research project, purchased material can, in theory, benefit researchers trying to understand extremists for generations to come. Fortunately, these are ethical questions which I have not yet had to ponder in the course of my research, though it is important for all researchers in this field to be mindful of the ethical implications of their work.

Picture of Billy Mann who is the Enrolment Manager at the University of Northampton
Billy Mann, PhD Candidate

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