Fitna, the video battle: how YouTube enables the young to perform their religious and public identities

2008年3月，荷兰极右翼激进分子Geert Wilders发布了一部16分钟的反伊斯兰电影，名为Fitna。威尔德斯很难找到愿意播放这部电影的广播公司或互联网提供商，因为他的想法引起了巨大的全球争议，导致死亡待遇，暴力抗议，外交事件和激烈的公众辩论。其中一种反应是来自世界各地的年轻人有组织和无组织的视频抗议，他们将自己的反应上传到YouTube或LiveLeak等网站。这些视频构成了本研究项目的材料，并使年轻女性和男性使用的视觉资源的描述，以履行他们的宗教和公共身份，他们的动机和信仰与他们特定的视觉风格的清晰度，并探讨类型的参数，视觉文化允许在宗教和公共辩论。这项研究将在三个方面为青年和宗教的学术工作做出贡献：首先，它将提供更多关于青年宗教自我的调解和公开表现的见解，这些过程通常不太公开可见，并限于当地和宗教背景。第二，大多数关于年轻人和宗教的研究都是在心理学学科中进行的，主要集中在基督教宗教上。虽然所有宗教和非宗教背景的年轻人都发布了他们的Fitna视频，但这项研究的重点是伊斯兰教以及围绕它的政治和文化斗争，从而为青年和宗教的研究提供了一个相对特殊的入口。第三，菲特纳战役既是一场宗教斗争，也是一场政治和社会斗争。这种结合使本研究进入了公共领域研究和理论的更广阔领域，传统上假设公众是有文化的、知情的和理性的。宗教和视觉文化在公众中的重要性日益增加，这对这些假设提出了挑战，并需要考虑是否以及如何将它们纳入公共辩论。该研究将在解释性研究设计中进行，其中视频，背景资料，电子邮件采访和对比在线书面文本将形成材料的主体，通过数据收集的定性方法，以及数据分析的话语和符号学方法进行处理。该研究团队由一名负责人和一名共同研究者以及一名博士后研究助理组成，他们将共同撰写七篇期刊文章，为报纸撰写专栏文章，并建立一个专门的网站，其中包括精选的典型视频和研究成果。

In March 2008, Dutch extreme-right parliamentarian Geert Wilders released a 16 minute anti-Islam movie called Fitna. Wilders had a hard time finding a broadcaster or internet provider willing to air the film, because his mere idea caused an immense global controversy, leading to death treats, violent protest, diplomatic incidents and fierce public debate. One of the reactions consisted of organised and unorganised video protest by young people from all over the world, who uploaded their reactions to websites such as YouTube or LiveLeak. These videos form the material for this research project and enable the description of the visual resources young women and men use to perform their religious and public identities, the articulation of their motives and beliefs with their particular visual styles, and the exploration of the type of arguments that visual culture allows for in religious and public debate. The research will contribute to academic work on youth and religion in three ways: first it will provide more insight into the mediation and public performance of the young religious self, processes which are usually less publicly visible and restrictred to situated local and religious contexts. Second, most studies about young people and religion have been carried out in the Psychology discipline focusing mainly on Christian religions. While young people of all religious and non-religous backgrounds posted their Fitna-videos, the focus of this study is on Islam, and the political and cultural battle surrounding it, therewith providing a relatively exceptional entry to the study of youth and religion. Third, the Fitna-battle was as much a political and social struggle as a religious one. This combination takes this study into the wider field of public sphere studies amd theories, which assumes traditionally a literate, informed and rational public. The increasing public importance of both religion and visual culture has challenged these assumptions and necessitated the question of whether and how they can be incorporated in public debate. The research will be carried out in an interpretative research design, in which videos, background information, email interviews and contrasting online written texts will form the body of material, approached through qualitative methods of data gathering, and discursive and semiotic methods of data analysis. The research team consists of a principal and a co-investigator, and a postdoctoral research assistant, who together will produce seven journal articles, op-ed contributions to newspapers, and a dedicated website with a selection of typical videos and research output.