[ The Conversation asked scholars to explain what they saw –
including ancient Norse images and more recent flags from U.S.
history. Here are five articles from The Conversation’s coverage,
explaining what many of the symbols mean.]
[[link removed]]

COMMITTEE REPORT FOCUS 5 ESSENTIAL READS ON THE SYMBOLS THEY CARRIED
ON JAN. 6  
[[link removed]]


 

Jeff Inglis Freelance Editor, The Conversation US
December 23, 2022
The Conversation
[[link removed]]


*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

_ The Conversation asked scholars to explain what they saw –
including ancient Norse images and more recent flags from U.S.
history. Here are five articles from The Conversation’s coverage,
explaining what many of the symbols mean. _

Pro-Trump supporters storm the U.S. Capitol following a rally with
President Donald Trump on Jan. 6, 2021., Samuel Corum / Getty Images
file

 

As the final report emerges
[[link removed]]
from the congressional committee investigating the insurrection on
Jan. 6, 2021, the focus is on the role of then-President Donald Trump
and those close to him. That’s crucial information, but it leaves
out another important chapter of the story.

There were thousands of people demonstrating on the streets of
Washington, D.C., that day, whose actions are not recounted in detail
in the congressional report. They carried a variety of political and
ideological flags and signs. The Conversation asked scholars to
explain what they saw – including ancient Norse images and more
recent flags from U.S. history.

Here are five articles from The Conversation’s coverage, explaining
what many of the symbols mean.

 
[A man carries the Confederate battle flag in the U.S. Capitol.]
[[link removed]]

 
A man carries the Confederate battle flag in the U.S. Capitol on Jan.
6, between portraits of senators who both opposed and supported
slavery. Saul Loeb/AFP via Getty Images
[[link removed]]

1. The Confederate battle flag

Perhaps the most recognized symbol of white supremacy is the
Confederate battle flag.

“Since its debut during the Civil War
[[link removed]],
the Confederate battle flag has been flown regularly by white
insurrectionists and reactionaries fighting against rising tides of
newly won Black political power,” writes Jordan Brasher
[[link removed]] at
Columbus State University, who has studied how the Confederacy has
been memorialized.

He notes that in one photo from inside the Capitol, the flag’s
history came into sharp relief as the man carrying it was standing
between “the portraits of two Civil War-era U.S. senators – one an
ardent proponent of slavery and the other an abolitionist once beaten
unconscious for his views on the Senate floor.”

[Gadsden flags fly at a Jan. 6, 2021, protest at the Capitol.]
Gadsden flags fly at the Capitol on Jan. 6, 2021. Bill Clark/CQ-Roll
Call, Inc via Getty Images
[[link removed]]

2. The yellow Gadsden flag

Another flag with a racist history is the “Don’t Tread On Me”
flag. A symbol warning of self-defense, it was designed by slave owner
and trader Christopher Gadsden when the American Revolution began, as
Iowa State University graphic design scholar Paul Bruski
[[link removed]] writes.

“Because of its creator’s history
[[link removed]]
and because it is commonly flown alongside ‘Trump 2020’ flags, the
Confederate battle flag and other white-supremacist flags, some may
now see the Gadsden flag as a symbol of intolerance and hate – or
even racism,” he explains.

It has been adopted by the tea party movement and other
Republican-leaning groups, but the flag still carries the legacy, and
the name, of its creator.

[U.S. Capitol storming, gallows, Trump supporters]
A gallows symbolizing the lynching of Jews was among the hate symbols
carried as crowds stormed the U.S. Capitol on Jan. 6. Shay
Horse/NurPhoto via Getty Images
[[link removed]]

3. Powerful antisemitism

Another arm of white supremacy doesn’t target Blacks. Instead, it
demonizes Jewish people. Plenty of antisemitic symbols were on display
during the riot, as Jonathan D. Sarna
[[link removed]]
explains.

Sarna is a Brandeis University scholar of American antisemitism and
describes the ways that “[c]alls to exterminate Jews are common in
far-right and white nationalist circles
[[link removed]].”
That included a gallows erected outside the Capitol, evoking a
disturbing element of a 1978 novel depicting the takeover of
Washington, along with mass lynchings and slaughtering of Jews.

[A man wearing a horned hat and displaying Norse tattoos.]
[[link removed]]

 
A man known as Jake Angeli, now imprisoned for his role in the Capitol
riot, wears a horned hat and tattoos of Norse images. Saul Loeb/AFP
via Getty Images
[[link removed]]

4. Co-opted Norse mythology

Among the most striking images of the January riot were those of a man
wearing a horned hat and no shirt, displaying several large tattoos.
He is known as Jake Angeli, but his full name is Jacob Chansley, and
he is serving a 41-month sentence in prison
[[link removed]]
for his role in the riot.

Tom Birkett, a lecturer in Old English at University College Cork in
Ireland, explains that many of the symbols Chansley wore are from
Norse mythology. However, he explains, “These symbols have also been
co-opted by a growing far-right movement
[[link removed]].”

Birkett traces the modern use of Norse symbols back to the Nazis and
points out that they are a form of code hidden in plain sight: “If
certain symbols are hard for the general public to spot, they are
certainly dog whistles to members of an increasingly global white
supremacist movement who know exactly what they mean.”

[Rioters scale structures while flying flags outside the Capitol.]
[[link removed]]

 
The yellow-and-red-striped flag of the defeated American-backed
Republic of Vietnam flies at the U.S. Capitol insurrection on Jan. 6.
Tayfun Coskun/Anadolu Agency via Getty Images
[[link removed]]

5. An outlier, of sorts

Another flag was prominent at the Capitol riot, one that doesn’t
strictly represent white supremacy: the flag of the former independent
country of South Vietnam.

But Long T. Bui [[link removed]], a global
studies scholar at the University of California, Irvine, explains that
when flown by Vietnamese Americans, many of whom support Trump, the
flag symbolizes militant nationalism.

“[S]ome Vietnamese Americans view their fallen homeland
[[link removed]]
as an extension of the American push for freedom and democracy
worldwide. I have interviewed Vietnamese American soldiers who fear
American freedom is failing,” he explains.

_This story is a roundup of articles from The Conversation’s
archives and is an update of an article previously published
[[link removed]]
on Jan. 15, 2021._

 

* Symbols of the Jan. 6 Capital Riot;
[[link removed]]

*
[[link removed]]
*
[[link removed]]
*
*
[[link removed]]

 

 

 

INTERPRET THE WORLD AND CHANGE IT

 

 

Submit via web
[[link removed]]

Submit via email
Frequently asked questions
[[link removed]]

Manage subscription
[[link removed]]

Visit xxxxxx.org
[[link removed]]

Twitter [[link removed]]

Facebook [[link removed]]

 




[link removed]

To unsubscribe, click the following link:
[link removed]