Interdiscursive intersections: Social class, citizenship and migration in YouTube comments

Abstract

YouTube’s comment feature provides the affordance of persistent interdiscursivity, as commenters can build on and intensify public debates with utterances that remain visible over time. Responding to an episode of Benefits Street, a British documentary about welfare recipients, commenters draw on and reinforce well-established discourses of social class, welfare, citizenship, and migration to invoke two opposing characters: ‘the demotivated British citizen on welfare’ and ‘the ambitious migrant’. These polarised and polarising stereotypes help to shape and reinforce neoliberal, post-welfare ideologies by painting welfare as stultifying and precarious mobility as motivational. Analysing the ways these tropes and categories intersect in the comments provides insight into processes of social media polarisation. When sketching two opposing characters, certain conflations are effected; for example, ‘welfare as privilege’ and ‘migration as rebranding’. As the perception of social cohesion is integral for supporting the welfare state, these polarising stereotypes can bring material consequences.