Humor and Dissonance in California's Native American Genocide

Datos Bibliográficos

ID3759229
AutoresBrendan C Lindsay (California State University, Sacramento, CA, USA), Brendan Lindsay (California State University, Sacramento, autor de correspondencia)
Año2014
Volumen58
Número1
Páginas97-123
Fecha de publicación2014-01-01
Peer ReviewedSí
Open AccessSí
TipoARTICLE
RevistaAmerican Behavioral Scientist (JOURNAL)
Identificadores de la revistaISSN: 0002-7642 • E-ISSN: 1552-3381
EditorialSAGE Publications Inc (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1177/0002764213495034
OpenAlexW2072692864
IdiomaEN
Citas recibidas2
Referencias citadas36

The originator of cognitive dissonance theory, Leon Festinger, and those who have followed him in revising, expanding, and clarifying his theories over the past five decades provide historians investigating cases of genocide a useful lens for viewing some of the social and psychological forces acting within and upon its perpetrators. This essay takes the contemporary findings of behavioral scientists on dissonance theory and applies their theoretical models to look at the case of genocide in California. Specifically, how did the perpetrators of genocide resolve the cognitive dissonance created by their conflicting attitudes and behaviors? How could one believe that murder was wrong, particularly the murder of defenseless persons such as children or the aged, yet commit the mass murder of Native American populations, or at least allow such to be committed in their communities? Part of the answer appears to be through the dissonance-reducing strategy of trivialization in the form of humor. What the confluence of behavioral theory and historical evidence reveals is that mid-19th-century Euro-Americans-mostly White males from the United States-living in California used forms of humor to trivialize Indian humanity, to achieve a state of psychological consonance even while being the perpetrators of or bystanders to a very visible and brutally effective campaign of genocide

Cognitive dissonance · Commit · Criminology · Genocide · Political science · Self-justification · Self-perception theory · Sociology · Communication in Education and Healthcare · Humor Studies and Applications · Law · Psychology · Rhetoric and Communication Studies · Social Psychology