Counterhegemonic knowledge production in hybrid media environments

This paper theorizes affective counterhegemonic knowledge production in the contemporary hybrid media systems. Drawing on Laclau and Mouffe, Gramsci and Althusser, in particular, it demonstrates how epistemic authority is achieved through new mechanisms operationalised by the wider movement. These do not claim to contest science but reproduce the parameters of science. The affective dimension emerges from the claims of counter-knowledge or alter-science. On the other hand, social media platforms offer a novel site where counterhegemonic mobilisation can take place. It particularly draws attention to the audiovisual content in the building of identifications. While in the previous generations of the ‘alt-right’ message boards have been providing a tool for communicating ideas, and visual memes have become a key to conveying the perspective – the video platforms enhance the embodied-affective experience of sharing spaces and novel forms of knowledge. The paper draws particularly on the ‘alt-right’ mobilisation and generation of new knowledge and organic intellectuals, who reproduce a populist logic of affective-antagonistic us building. Finally, despite the Derridian-Lacanian origins associated with post-Marxism, having outlined and considering the dynamics of social media, the paper asks whether we can conceptualise hegemony in the hybrid media era without recourse to Deleuze.