Evil Euphemisms: Folk Devils and the Social Construction of Denial

• In Event: 230 - Theory Section. New Developments in Contemporary Theory

Abstract

This paper revisits Stanley Cohen’s (1972; 2001) classic study of folk devils and moral panics in light of his later work on denial. While most documented cases of folk devils depict relatively harmless social actors as exaggerated threats to society, I present a case where a folk devil (the cowboy figure "los malitos" or little evil guys) becomes a means of euphemizing and refracting real perpetrators of gruesome violence. Drawing on two years of qualitative fieldwork conducted between 2011 and 2013 in urban Mexico, I argue that folk devils may be instrumental not only to the production of a moral panic—as in Cohen’s early work—but also to the social construction of denial and the collective normalization of violence.

Author

• Ana Villarreal, Boston University