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The Subcultural Narratives of Incels: From Shared Grievances to Subcultural Violence
Linnaeus University, Faculty of Social Sciences, Department of Criminology and Police Work.
2025 (English)Independent thesis Basic level (degree of Bachelor), 20 credits / 30 HE creditsStudent thesis
Abstract [en]

This thesis examines how the incel subculture constructs its collective identities and belief systems, and how these two components, when combined, foster a community that legitimises violence against women. The data was collected from two primary sources, the online forum incels.is and the encyclopaedia incels.wiki, applying cultural and narrative criminological frameworks to analyse thematic patterns, symbolic boundary work, and performative storytelling within subcultural narratives. The findings demonstrate that incels build their collective identities through narratives of victimhood and resistance to mainstream norms rooted in deterministic worldviews like the Scientific Blackpill. Through subcultural narrative formulas, incels normalise violence using dehumanising language, pseudoscientific rationalisations, and a strong sense of group cohesion, thereby justifying misogyny and aggression. The incel narratives, inherently criminogenic, underscore the role that online subcultures have in promoting deviant ideologies and highlight the need for nuanced approaches to address the harmful potentials of digital subcultures. 

Place, publisher, year, edition, pages
2025. , p. 37
Keywords [en]
incels, cultural criminology, narrative criminology, subcultural theory, symbolic boundaries, collective identities, the Scientific Blackpill, Manosphere, storytelling, online subculture, deviant ideologies, digital subculture, violence
National Category
Criminology
Identifiers
URN: urn:nbn:se:lnu:diva-136118OAI: oai:DiVA.org:lnu-136118DiVA, id: diva2:1936156
Subject / course
Kriminologi
Supervisors
Examiners
Available from: 2025-02-10 Created: 2025-02-10 Last updated: 2025-02-10Bibliographically approved

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Department of Criminology and Police Work
Criminology

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CiteExportLink to record
Permanent link

Direct link
Cite
Citation style
  • apa
  • ieee
  • modern-language-association-8th-edition
  • vancouver
  • Other style
More styles
Language
  • de-DE
  • en-GB
  • en-US
  • fi-FI
  • nn-NO
  • nn-NB
  • sv-SE
  • Other locale
More languages
Output format
  • html
  • text
  • asciidoc
  • rtf