Who’s afraid of barbarians? Interrogating the Trope of ‘Barbarian Invasions’ in Western Public Rhetoric from 1989 to the Present.

Abstract

Since 1989 and particularly since the attacks on September 11, 2001, talk of barbarians and civilization is common practice in public and political rhetoric in Europe and the US. This rhetoric often mobilizes the trope of the ‘barbarian invasions,’ constructing analogies between present realities and the historical narrative of Rome and its barbarians. Revisiting this narrative as it was popularized by Enlightenment historiography and especially Edward Gibbon, this article critically probes contemporary evocations of the trope of barbarian invasions and the framing they produce for understanding contemporary realities. To that end, it charts the political climate that motivated the rekindling of the barbarian as a pivotal figure in Western rhetoric from 1989 to the present.