Authors

Discussion

The research presents the results of a project aimed at investigating Russian media content in the context of international legislation regarding public incitements to genocide (Article III of CPPCG, and Article 25 of the Rome Statute). It combines linguistic and legal expertise and introduces a methodology for identifying such incitements in the public sphere, including complex cases that require additional psycholinguistic analysis. The research focused on content disseminated by media actors in Russia from February 24, 2022, to July 31, 2024. The monitoring objects included programs from national TV channels, video hosting platforms YouTube and Rutube, as well as Telegram channels with more than 50,000 subscribers.

The research employed a mixed-methods approach, combining: 1) monitoring; 2) quantitative method — specifically a content analysis program; and 3) qualitative method – psycholinguistic analysis of texts PLAT (Krylov-Grek, 2022), adapted to the research objectives. The first stage of the work (monitoring) aimed at identifying keywords, which were used in the second stage by a computer content analysis program to select relevant statements. In the third stage, the method of psycholinguistic analysis was applied to identify statements containing incitements to genocide.

The specificity of forensic linguistics and psycholinguistics in this study is related to: 

1)    developing clear criteria for qualifying incitement to genocide in forensic linguistic examinations;

2) identifying differences in the philosophical, political, and legal meanings of “genocide”; 

3) interpreting of certain concepts in a legal context, such as "national group" and its correlation with international law regarding incitements to eradicate the “political nation” and “political Ukrainians,” which often appear in the speech patterns of Russian media actors; 

4) identifying complicated cases of incitement to genocide and crimes against humanity that can only be understood within the context of the publication and the surrounding situation, for example the use of euphemisms, metaphors, pictures, etc.

Particular attention was paid to Telegram channels, as their content is not moderated, allowing both the authors of posts and their followers (in comments) to write hateful content and call for crimes against “others” (Ukraine, the EU, the US), including the use of nuclear weapons.

The results of the study showed that hate speech, incitement to genocide and crimes against humanity are constantly present in Russian public communication and is spreading through multiple channels and are amplified by an emotional component.