Sexist Hate Speech as Subjectivation: Challenges in Media Education

Abstract

This chapter is dedicated to exploring the practice of sexism—in the sense of sexist hate speech—in digital media and its discursive relationship to theories of subjectivation and education. While I do not approach the issue via the concept of discourse in a formal analytical sense, I reference a Foucauldian view of language drawing on theories of discourse and identifying language and speaking as instruments of power and knowledge. After surveying the current state of digitisation and media education, I will use examples of sexist hate speech to examine the relevance of the gendered orders in force in media and beyond and illuminate a gap in theories of media education in terms of their neglect of the analysis of power relations.