Sixth International Conference on Communication & Media Studies

Abstract

This paper investigates the role guilt plays in Australia’s construction of its outsiders by focusing on contemporary migrant experience. I build off Sarah Ahmed’s work on the politics of emotion by reading migrant interviews in relation to media: films, political speeches, and other discursive structures that facilitate social organization in Australia. In the first part of this paper, I argue that a “multicultural narrative” positions the nation as a “happy home,” and examine how this can displace feelings of guilt and shame in the migrant by rendering possible social transgressions positive steps toward attaining a greater social good. In the second section of this paper, I discuss Australia’s “hatred narratives.” I do not define hatred as a necessarily aggressive emotion, but instead, demonstrate the way particular words can be affectively charged because of the histories they invoke, and show how this affect can be mobilized to create outsiders who are not welcome in the national imaginary and Australian society. These narratives however, are not fixed: political parties can appeal to tropes that have accumulated in affective value – such as the “home” – in order to achieve different political goals, and to organize social groups by aligning individuals with or against affectively charged objects. Similarly, these narratives remain available to subjects as possible identifications that can shape how we feel about ourselves, how we imagine our past actions and our futures, and who we align ourselves with.