Breaking down the language of racism: a computerised linguistic analysis of racist groups’ self-defining online statements

The Internet represents a powerful tool for racist groups to achieve their collective goals – i.e., disseminating racist ideologies, increasing their support base, and enhancing their transnational influence. Their online presence is carefully and strategically crafted as it often constitutes their first point of contact with potential supporters. To identify linguistic markers or racist (online) communication and key presentational strategies of racist groups, we examine the language they use when describing their self-defining beliefs on their websites. A dataset of group online statements of racist self-defining beliefs (N = 102) was analysed using a computerised linguistic analysis software; we compared this dataset with a baseline of neutral texts (N = 12,173). We found that online self-defining statements of racist groups were characterised by greater use of divisive language and a stronger focus on collective identity. We identified an increased use of religion and anger words, and reduced use of sadness and cognitive complexity words. We conclude by discussing implications of these findings for designing policies aiming to counteract the harmful societal effects of racist groups.