A nation reborn: right to law and right to life in The Purge franchise

Armstrong, Megan A. (2019) A nation reborn: right to law and right to life in The Purge franchise. Journal of Intervention and Statebuilding, 13 (3). pp. 377-392. ISSN 1750-2977

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Abstract

Popular culture matters for helping make sense of our political lives. This article addresses the value of dystopian horror films in challenging narratives about the state. It is situated within broader understandings of popular culture and politics, and specifically within narrative understandings of the state as a performative body. It presents The Purge film franchise as an example of such a challenge to state narratives, and argues that through its distortion of dominant state narratives, the franchise reveals and challenges the intersections of economic and racial inequality in the neoliberal United States. It examines in particular the emergency broadcast featured in all four films, which positions citizens in a relationship with law and life where the right to law conflates the right to life, and argues that the films present an understanding of vulnerability and abandonment that are in some ways already present in the state. It concludes by questioning what, if any, the capacities are for resistance.

Item Type:	Article
Additional Information:	© 2019 Informa UK Limited
Divisions:	Gender Studies
Subjects:	N Fine Arts > N Visual arts (General) For photography, see TR H Social Sciences > HN Social history and conditions. Social problems. Social reform H Social Sciences > HC Economic History and Conditions
Date Deposited:	29 Mar 2019 14:51
Last Modified:	08 Jan 2024 05:06
URI:	http://eprints.lse.ac.uk/id/eprint/100384

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