The meaning of resistance: Hezbollah’s media strategies and the articulation of a people

Since its emergence in the 1980’s, the Lebanese Shiite movement Hezbollah has played a leading role in the military struggle against Israeli occupation in Lebanon. With the liberation of Southern Lebanon in May 2000 and the 2006 war with Israel, Hezbollah emerged as a regional resistance movement and its leader, Hassan Nasrallah, as a transnational figure. During this decades-long conflict, the movement was active not only militarily, but also politically, socially, and in the media. This book offers a closer look at Hezbollah’s media strategies, exploring their development and transformation within a shifting political context, by tracing the emergence of Hezbollah in the framework of post-colonial liberation movements and in relation to the failure of the Arab nationalist experience of Gamal Abdel Nasser. In this context, Hezbollah’s media strategies reveal a desire to acquire a voice and the ability to define oneself. Contesting the discursive space, on screen and in the streets, allows Hezbollah to articulate new meanings of resistance within the religious community, the nation, and the region as a whole. This study suggests an analysis of four of Hezbollah’s most widespread media forms: speeches, military videos, music videos, and scenes from everyday life. It draws on discourse theory and notions of hegemony and political identification in order to better understand the military role of these media productions and the way in which the movement articulates a versatile popular identity in Lebanon and the Arab world.