Rolf Kailuweit, from ARENAS Partner Heinrich Heine University Düsseldorf, recently delivered a lecture as part of the Anxiety Culture Network (ACP) Lecture Series: Uncertain Times – Their (Re)Presentation in Language, Discourses and Narratives, in Kiel, Germany, on 5 May 2026.
The Anxiety Culture Project focuses on anxiety as a key concept through which to reconsider, describe and analyse contemporary cultures of globalisation, technological development, populism and climate change. Anxiety is a constant companion in many areas of life, including studies, professional contexts and everyday situations. Although fear and stress play a central role in daily life, they are often left unspoken of and remain a taboo topic. Anxiety is a universal experience that transcends linguistic and cultural boundaries. The ACP explores the causes and consequences of anxiety. Rather than viewing fear as a paralysing force, ACP approaches it as a potential stimulus for reflection, self-awareness and personal development.
In relation to his contributions to ARENAS, Rolf Kailuweit examines civil society reactions to Islamist terror in Western Europe within the ACP framework. He gave a talk entitled ‘Der Sprechakt der Versicherheitlichung – Sicherheit als Fiktion’ (‘The speech act of securitisation – security as fiction’) at the event.
Kailuweit’s talk examines the Copenhagen School’s approach to securitisation from a discourse-linguistic perspective. Drawing on speech-act theory, it explores the conditions for the perlocutionary success of securitising moves by leading politicians in Germany, Spain and France in the wake of Islamist attacks. In doing so, it highlights the fictional nature of threat narratives and the symbolic content of proposed (and implemented) measures. Although securitising moves seem to focus on societal vulnerability, one might question whether they instead reveal the vulnerability of power, which, in exceptional situations, no longer (fully) lives up to its claims to leadership.
The talk will be published alongside the others in the lecture series.