Knocking on Europe’s door: How narratives of fear, insecurity and nostalgia shape collective perceptions of immigration

This chapter starts by reviewing historical and cultural imagery of the ‘ideal’ Europe before discussing literary examples - The Camp of the Saints (Raspail 1973), Submission (Houellebecq 2015), in the belief that literature provides us with the most useful insights into the cultural underpinnings of the complex political phenomena of our time. It then highlights how the narratives of fear, insecurity and nostalgia typical of the dystopian prefigurations mentioned above have found new vigour online and, in particular, in the visual propaganda of the Brexit Leave campaign. Particular attention will be paid to the rhetorics of the narratives of fear in their articulation across various media before concluding by examining alternative narratives to the dominant ones, as exposed in art works produced in response to the migration tragedy.