“Cleansing the Earth of the Stench of Shirk”

The Islamic State’s Violence as Acts of Purification

Bibliographic Data

ID22340232
AuthorsPieter Nanninga (0000-0003-2070-5588, University of Groningen, corresponding author)
Year2019
Volume7
Issue2
Pages128-157
Publication date2019-01-01
Peer ReviewedYes
Open AccessNo
TypeARTICLE
VenueJournal of Religion and Violence (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 2159-6808 • E-ISSN: 2159-6808
PublisherPhilosophy Documentation Center (PUBLISHER • US)
DOI10.5840/jrv2019112266
OpenAlexW2991280794
LanguageEN
Citations received7
References cited17

Current research on jihadism is dominated by the policy and security perspectives that characterize terrorism studies, leaving jihadist culture underexplored. As a result, jihadist violence is typically studied as instrumental actions related to the organizers’ strategic objectives. This paper, however, argues the violence should also be studied as a cultural practice, focusing on its symbolic aspects and cultural meanings for the actors involved. For this purpose, the paper focuses on the case of the Islamic State and, particularly, on the theme of purification in relation to the group’s violence. The relationship between violence and conceptions of purity/pollution is a longstanding theme in research on fundamentalism and mass violence, but these studies have hardly been integrated in the study of jihadism. This paper does so by relating insights from these fields to the case of the Islamic State. Drawing from the author’s extensive archive of Islamic State media releases, it identifies three types of violence to which conceptions of purity/pollution are central: the destruction of cultural heritage, the targeting of non-Muslim minorities, and the punishment of alleged sinners and spies. These acts of violence, the paper argues, are deemed to purify space, society, and the Muslim community, respectively. Perceiving the Islamic State’s violence from this perspective, provides insights into the cultural meanings of the Islamic State’s violence for the perpetrators and their supporters, and thus for grasping the appeal of the group that has become infamous for its bloodshed

Appeal · Criminology · Fundamentalism · Ideology · Islam · Jihadism · Political science · Politics · Sociology · Terrorism · History · Law · Political Conflict and Governance · Politics and Conflicts in Afghanistan, Pakistan, and Middle East · Psychology · Social Psychology · Terrorism, Counterterrorism, and Political Violence