Anti-modernity: domestic terrorism in the United States and the TV series "Manhunt: Unabomber"

• Grant number: 19/21042-0
• Support Opportunities: Scholarships in Brazil - Master
• Start date: April 01, 2020
• End date: February 28, 2023
• Field of knowledge: Humanities - History - History of America
• Principal Investigator: Mary Anne Junqueira
• Grantee: Rodolpho Hockmuller Menezes
• Host Institution: Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH). Universidade de São Paulo (USP). São Paulo , SP, Brazil
• Associated scholarship(s): 21/09901-7 - Manhunt: Unabomber: domestic terrorism and the making of a north-American television series, BE.EP.MS

Abstract

Our project proposes a study of the television series "Manhunt: Unabomber", originally aired in 2017 in the United States. The series portrays the investigation of the American domestic terrorist Theodore Kaczynski, from the point of view of the FBI agent James Fitzgerald. The terrorist came to be known as Unabomber because of acting alone. It took more than 17 years for him to be identified and arrested. The terrorist is captured by the linguistic analysis of his manifest, "The Industrial Society and its future", which criticizes modern and technological society. "Manhunt" narrates the final stage of the investigation at the same time that portrays the reasons and events that led Kaczynski to his violent actions. The series will be seen in the context of US-created cultural products that focus on terrorism, particularly terrorism following the September 11 attacks. The Unabomber case and the series address one of the American traditions that criticize modernity. Such perspective sees in nature and the contact of man with the environment an alternative to the modernity that created not integral humans but automatons. The idea of American wilderness and pastoral are references to this tradition. (AU)

Academic Publications

(References retrieved automatically from State of São Paulo Research Institutions)

MENEZES, Rodolpho Hockmuller. Against-modernity: domestic terrorism in the United States and the TV series \Manhunt: Unabomber\ (2017). 2023. Master's Dissertation - Universidade de São Paulo (USP). Faculdade de Filosofia, Letras e Ciências Humanas (FFLCH/SBD) São Paulo.