This paper examines how, why, and with what consequences Hindu nationalists have made nari shakti (women’s empowerment) central to their political agenda. I make four arguments, each of which I develop in a separate section of this paper. The first section argues that both secular feminists and Hindu nationalists supported secular civil rights on questions concerning the family historically. Neither one appropriated the other. As I argue in the second part of this paper, both secular feminists and Hindu nationalists have drawn on religious idioms to mobilize women. Feminism appropriated elements of nationalism, which led Hindu nationalists to appropriate feminism. More significant are the consequences: this appropriation benefitted Hindu nationalists at the expense of feminists. The third part of the paper describes state supported nari shakti programs which are the most important instance of Hindu nationalist appropriation and redefinition of women’s empowerment. In section four, I describe a form of women’s activism which resists appropriation and contests ethnic majoritarianism and religious nationalism.

As the LGBTQ+ community has become an increasingly salient political constituency, questions of their belonging and their rights have become highly contested in the American mainstream. This paper examines the nexus between this relatively new battlefield and one that predates the American republic—racial exclusion—by examining the rhetoric of a contemporary far-right group espousing Neo-Confederate and Lost Cause values. Identity Dixie (ID) fits this bill—a loose collection of bloggers that championed Southern nationalism and the preservation of a white supremacy that they felt was under siege. Five years of ID’s blog posts show that this segment of the far-right perceives sexual minorities’ march for progress as an existential threat to their racial and sexual hierarchy. Such groups rely on claims of victimhood status. Society’s increased acceptance of LGBTQ+ people has, they have claimed, undermined their traditionally understood rights. This paper contends that these groups are responding to their perceived victimhood by attempting to re-racialize “pink” as the latest non-white threat to their traditional dominance, linking racism explicitly with restrictive notions of gender and sexuality. And, critically, their perception of lost rights has transcended the American South; they feel besieged in modern America by the direction of the nation as a whole.

This essay explores how right-wing Hindu organizations have coopted American political discourses and institutional structures to advance a nationalist agenda. Specifically, they claim civil rights in a multicultural society and employ the language of equity and inclusion to further their aims through public institutions: school boards, city councils, state legislatures, student organizations, and courts. The essay is about discursive choices, yet these cannot be separated from organizational structures, goals, and strategies. For example, I show how two prominent advocacy organizations, the Hindu American Foundation and the Coalition of Hindus of North America, pursue a nationalist agenda by leveraging progressive causes. I then examine student organizations that have opened up new arenas for Hindu nationalism on university campuses, appropriating the rhetoric of “safe spaces” as part of a targeted effort to build support among second- and third-generation Hindu Americans. Finally, I analyze three nationalist projects involving history textbooks, anticaste discrimination and India Day parades to illustrate different modes of discursive and institutional cooptation, including those of other right wing organizations. Contrary to civil rights ideals, the Hindu right wing is actively advancing a politics that is deeply exclusionary, privileging the rights of Hindus while marginalizing other communities.

This article examines how Hindu nationalist (Hindutva) political actors in India have strategically co-opted the language of decolonization to advance a majoritarian ethno-religious agenda—one that, paradoxically, reproduces the exclusionary dynamics that postcolonial theory was originally developed to critique. The article identifies three core rhetorical vectors: a “double colonialism” thesis that frames Muslim rule as equivalent to British colonialism; curriculum reform that erases Muslim contributions to Indian history while privileging a mythologized Hindu past; and the reframing of caste discrimination as itself a colonial invention, undermining the legitimacy of affirmative action. Beyond rhetoric, the article traces how decolonization has been operationalized as state policy—through legal reform, changes in the military, urban renaming, and education reforms—to systematically Hinduize public institutions. This article further argues that this recent semantic appropriation of decolonial vocabulary is deployed to legitimize the implementation of old Hindu nationalist ideas.

Our article aims to show how right-wing women in positions of power like Italian Prime Minister Giorgia Meloni are able to manipulate feminism to their political advantage. Stemming from our previous study on Meloni’s particular brand of conservative feminism, we analyze the disorienting ability of the right to appropriate and manipulate the traditional language of the left. We are interested in this creation of confusion through rhetorical somersaults on the Italian political stage, specifically how the right appropriates feminist language and themes to further neoliberal economics, neoconservative morals, and a nationalist agenda that is hostile to women, nonwhite people, migrants, and LGBTQIA+ communities. As a case study, we offer an analysis of the ideas of one of Italy’s most prominent gender-critical feminists, Marina Terragni, who challenges assumptions about feminism’s ties to the left. Promoting a strictly binary vision, Terragni highlights the fault lines in the relationship between traditional and progressive feminism.

This article examines far-right nature by showing how contemporary movements weave ecological and public-health discourses into forms of political storytelling with broad public appeal. Focusing on cases from Europe and the United States, it traces how Rassemblement National’s eco-populism, the agrarian ultranationalism of Călin Georgescu, and Robert F. Kennedy Jr.’s “Make America Healthy Again” coalition channels public concern over climate and health crises into exclusionary narratives. The rhetoric of far-right nature can be difficult to identify and critique, in part because its ostensible concern with well-being and the environment often distances it from culturally dominant images of classical fascism. Nevertheless, the article demonstrates resonances between contemporary far-right nature and the biopolitical and organicist imaginaries of interwar fascist movements. Combining approaches from the environmental humanities with scholarship on fascism and the far right, the article argues that a public-facing environmental humanities must attend not only to imagination and storytelling but also to the political work environmental narratives perform within reactionary and exclusionary projects.

This article explores the paradoxical phenomenon of far-right “philosemitism,” in which political movements historically steeped in antisemitism present themselves as defenders of Jews and allies of Israel. Drawing on contemporary examples—such as the French National Rally’s claim to be a “shield for Jews,” and the American evangelical alliances with Israel—the study situates these gestures within a longer trajectory of far-right ambivalence toward Jews. While often dismissed by pundits and scholars as simply opportunistic weaponization of antisemitism, these pro-Jewish stances also reveal deeper discursive and ideological functions: self-legitimation, moral licensing, and the repositioning of Jews as symbolic allies against other outgroups. This article identifies such ambivalence in early 20th-century European thought, highlighting case studies from the German Empire where figures such as Börries von Münchhausen, Wilhelm Schwaner, and Max Hildebert Boehm articulated versions of philosemitism that combined admiration with exclusionary imperatives. Across contexts, a recurring logic emerges: a dualistic “Good Jew/Bad Jew” distinction, whereby “authentic” Jews—biblical, assimilated, or nationalist—are praised, while “inauthentic” Jews—cosmopolitan, liberal, or diasporic—are condemned. By historicizing far-right “philosemitism,” its function, and significance, this article is an attempt to combat its harmful normalizing effects.

Democracy is anchored by communication, grounded in a commitment to factual truth. This is an ideal historically captured by the ancient Athenian concept of parrhesia (frankness) and, in contemporary deliberative theory, by sincerity. This essay argues that the US far right has hijacked this democratic ideal, weaponizing it to create a post-truth environment and fuel a form of demagogic propaganda. The essay traces the historical evolution of the truth-telling ideal, noting how sincerity can morph into an antirhetorical style of “hyper-sincerity,” which performs shamelessness for a citizenry sidelined by massive economic inequality and corporate power. Drawing on Jason Stanley’s work, the essay then argues that this rhetorical style has become a form of fascist demagoguery, a rhetorical style that poses a threat to the very possibility of democratic politics. The final section explores the possibilities for irony as an antidote to hyper-sincerity. It reveals that the far right has also hijacked irony to create a mode of “fascist irony.” The paper concludes by calling for a “civic irony” rooted in a commitment to democratic values.