American Fracture, Digital Rage: Evaluating the Influence of Conspiratorial Rhetoric on the U.S. Catholic Community

American Fracture, Digital Rage: Evaluating the Influence of Conspiratorial Rhetoric on the U.S. Catholic Community

Presenter(s)

Dominic Sanfilippo

Comments

Presentation: 10:00-10:20 a.m., Kennedy Union 211

Description

It has been well documented that religious individuals and groups continue to play roles in both the complex global web of polarization, extremism, and terroristic violence and in the reciprocal forces of peacebuilding, justice work, and public reconciliation. My graduate thesis research examines the historical antecedents and current characteristics of digital spaces like #CatholicTwitter (and, in particular, the degree to which both conspiratorial and extremist rhetoric flow throughout them) to assess how such social media spaces both mediate the American Catholic experience and affect the civic health of the United States at large. This thesis speaks to all those interested in understanding, assessing, and combatting civic fragmentation, polarization, and extremism; enters into a growing scholarly conversation exploring the various ways Catholic individuals and institutions both affect and are affected by conspiratorial discourse, misinformation, and disinformation; and point toward potential reconciliatory paths forward. As a Catholic and Marianist institution, the University of Dayton "encourages its members to judge for themselves how institutions are performing their purposes (and) to expose deficiencies in their structures and operations..." through inquiry, dialogue, and praxis. In that spirit, I write in hopes of helping advance our campus community's communal mission to function as a university for the common good.

Publication Date

4-19-2023

Project Designation

Graduate Research

Primary Advisor

William Trollinger, Vincent Miller, Nicholas Rademacher

Primary Advisor's Department

History

Keywords

Stander Symposium, College of Arts and Sciences

Institutional Learning Goals

Critical Evaluation of Our Times; Scholarship; Faith

American Fracture, Digital Rage: Evaluating the Influence of Conspiratorial Rhetoric on the U.S. Catholic Community

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