ABSTRACT
This chapter addresses the role of disinformation within immigration discourses and argues that disinformation is central to current migration discourses and indeed necessary to maintain the consistently negative view of (far)right views on mobility. The ways in which disinformation appears are considered under two main sections. The first section, naming, discusses how nonsensical names (e.g. “bogus asylum seekers”) gained traction and how accurate and legitimating (e.g. “refugees”) names are avoided in public discourses. The second, narratives, discusses the myths that are closely associated with contemporary migration discourses. This includes those which have been consistently disproved by social statistics and those which can be disproved by linguistic and historical research (e.g. the myth of the UK as a historically welcoming country). In both cases, it draws attention to the role of absence of contextual or salient information in maintaining to disinformation.
