Culture of Fear: A Critical History of Two Streams
Date
2020-07-18
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Abstract
The purpose of this paper is to first track out the original pathways that researchers have taken, including myself, in order to arrive at a conceptual tool like “culture of fear” (as a label) for a much larger phenomenon that had been witnessed. Next, I show how there are at least two streams of thought in how to approach the culture of fear conceptually and theoretically. This mapping of a historical perspective is sorely missing from the literature on culture of fear across the disciplines. It ought to expand the dominant and rather restrictive imaginary of the culture of fear that currently persists. If initiatives that claim we ought to “end the culture of fear” are to be taken seriously, there ought to be a much larger perspective brought to the topic of what is the culture of fear and what ways have we come to understand it in a historical and theoretical sense. Only then, will a critical literacy and larger perspective on the problem of the culture of fear be developed—and, thus, perhaps more effective strategies to “end” or “stop” the culture of fear and its insidious effects will be possible and realistic.
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Ernest Becker, Otto Rank, Ken Wilber, Abraham Maslow, Marianne Williamson, Fiona Mackie, fear, education
Citation
Fisher, R. M. (2020). Culture of Fear: A Critical History of Two Streams. pp. 1-57.