ABSTRACT
This chapter explores the gender, class, and race politics of white nationalism in the Trump era. First, I detail the resurfacing of white nationalism within specific cultural- and political-economic contexts. Second, I analyze gender politics in the alt-right, with a particular focus on the interpretive processes of white nationalists as they confront political challenges and seek to consolidate and expand their movement. I explore three central precepts in alt-right gender ideology: a new biologism; a politics of degradation targeted at liberals, feminists, transgender people, and weak men; and a class politics that promises to restore economic prosperity to those who respect patriarchal gender norms and racial hierarchies. Ultimately, I argue that gender is more than just a site of inequality in alt-right thought and action. It is a part of a worldview that imagines gender equality and gender nonconformity as existential threats to the white race. This chapter ends with a critical discussion of ethnographic engagement with white nationalist groups, asking the question: what are the ethics of studying a group that must be condemned as sexist, racist, anti-trans, and authoritarian? Further, what ethical dilemmas do we face in crafting a scholarly response organized around the alt-right’s political defeat?
