Academic Scientific JournalsFeminevil: The Chechen Black Widows’ Symbolic Terrorism
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.26881/jpgs.2022.4.01Keywords:
Black Widows, Chechnya, feminevil, gender, groups, Russia, suicide bombings, Symbolic Convergence Theory, symbols, terrorismAbstract
This paper examines the Chechen Black Widows and how they carry symbolic terrorist attacks against Russian targets – the authors’ newly created concept of feminevil. By and large, feminevil is a growing phenomenon of girl-militancy in human violence. The theory used in this paper is Symbolic Convergence Theory (SCT). Developed by Bormann (1972), SCT posits that a group can unite to form a collective culture so as to achieve ambitious objectives. Whether it is a word, phrase, narrative, or physical symbol, each tenet – (a) fantasy theme, (b) symbolic cue, (c) fantasy type, and (d) saga – merges with all the others to recognize anything that helps generate, increase, and sustain a rhetorical society’s awareness.
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