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The write stuff: U.S. serial print culture from conservatives out to neo-Nazis
Library Trends, Wntr, 2008 by Chip Berlet
Dobratz & Shanks-Meile scanned white supremacist serials to detect an ideological shift in framing toward the concept of "White Separatism" (1997). Hamm (1994) devotes special attention to what he calls the use of small circulation "Zincs" as a recruiting tool for racist skinheads. Levitas (2002) reviewed serials from both the extreme right and the Patriot movement. Barkun (2003), Goldberg (2001), and Mintz (1985), reviewed serials with conspiracist and antisemitic themes. At the end of Inside Organized Racism: Women in the Hate Movement (2002), Blee includes a list of fifty-one white supremacist serials she examined (pp. 247-248). Ferber (1998, pp. 173-177) includes as an appendix a detailed discussion of the major right-wing serials she read in depth in multiyear runs: Instauration, The National Alliance Bulletin, National Vanguard, The New Order, NS Bulletin (National Socialist), White Power, NSV Report (National Socialist Vanguard), The Thunderbolt, The Torch, and White Patriot; as well as nine other serials she was able to locate in broken collections.
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Across the sectors of the political right, various authors have also used primary serial resources in writing chapters in edited collections, and the same is true with journal articles (see, for example, Marshall, 1998). The problem is that unlike information on serials on the left, there are no equivalent library resources for finding serials on the right or articles in those serials.
CONCLUSION: SERIALS, NOT SURREALS
It is a relatively recent idea that political right movement activists could publish serious and substantial serials that were not surrealistic escapes from sensible rational thought. As a progressive movement activist, journalist, and researcher (and sometimes autodidactic scholar), why do I care about right-wing serials? Why would I help create the entry "Alternative press (U.S. political right)" on Wikipedia? (11) Why even write this article?
The obvious answer for me is that content analysis of right-wing publications, especially serials, can assist opposition research. Such efforts are sometimes predictive. At Political Research Associates we watch for trends in the development stage as they are refined in movement serials on the political right. An example was when the neoconservative Weekly Standard ran its covers in 2001 and 2002 building up support for military strikes in the Middle East.
There is a bigger issue, however. While familiarity may breed contempt, it can also help build collections. The right-wing oppositional press played an important role in framing issues that in today's political debates are considered mainstream. The collection of right-wing serials can be "fraught with danger" for librarians, but it should be considered (Danky & Hennessy 1985, p. 6). Without access to oppositional serials of the political right and political left, library users will have their understanding of the history and current political struggles of the United States severely narrowed. That's not good for libraries, and it's not good for the type of vigorous and freewheeling debate that real democracy demands of an informed citizenry.
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