Threat perception in online anti-migrant speech: A slovene case study

Abstract

The aim of this article is to describe the perception of refugees as a threat in Slovene online discourse, based on a critical analysis of commenters' responses to popular media posts at the height of the European migrant crisis. The proposition of the study is that the perception of migration as a threat is at the core of socially unacceptable discourse (SUD), portraying refugees and migrants as an undesirable and potentially dangerous presence. Within the framework of a comprehensive project examining public responses to media coverage of the arrival of migrants to Slovenia, online comments classified as SUD targeting refugees were extracted and annotated to reveal the recurring themes of threat perception. The analysis focused on describing the main categories of threat, as well as the various discursive features and strategies employed. Although the approach to observing this subject is essentially qualitative, a general case-specific overview of the frequency and distribution of identifiable categories is also given.