Spencer Sunshine
Spencer Sunshine | |
|---|---|
| Citizenship | United States |
| Academic background | |
| Education | PhD (City University of New York) |
| Academic work | |
| Notable works | Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism |
| Website | spencersunshine |
Spencer Sunshine is an American independent scholar and political analyst,[1][2] primarily known for his writings on right-wing extremism.[3] He was an associate fellow at Political Research Associates from 2013 to 2019.[4] [5] In 2024 he published an academic book on the history and reception of the neo-Nazi book Siege, which was positively reviewed.
Life and work
[edit]Sunshine grew up in rural Georgia in the 1970s and 1980s, where he was threatened for having a Jewish father.[3] In the late 1980s he began participating in the punk rock scene, where he became involved in anarchist politics.[6] He earned a doctorate in Sociology from the City University of New York, writing his dissertation on post-1960s American anarchism.[3][7][8] He describes himself as a libertarian socialist[9] and anti-fascist activist.[10] Sunshine has received death threats and does not publicly disclose where he lives.[3] He co-organized a YIVO conference on Yiddish Anarchism in 2019.[11] After the January 6 United States Capitol attack he was the subject of a right-wing conspiracy theory tying him to the QAnon Shaman.[12]
Research on Siege
[edit]Sunshine's book Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism: The Origins and Afterlife of James Mason's Siege was published by Routledge in 2024.[10] He describes it as written from "an antifascist perspective". It was researched using Mason's archival letters and periodicals from a collection at the University of Kansas.[13] It discusses the origins and reception of Mason's book Siege, which has inspired several terrorist groups and attacks.[14][13]
The book is divided into two parts: a history of American neo-Nazism in the 1960s and 1970s, followed by an exploration of Mason's countercultural music and publishing connections (centered on Adam Parfrey, Boyd Rice, and Michael C. Moynihan), which Sunshine calls the "Abraxas Clique".[10][13] There is also an appendix that discusses the individuals who were influenced by the book.[13] It was well-reviewed.[13] John P. Hendry praised it as meticulously researched and said there was "no finer resource for scholars of the contemporary neo-Nazi movement". He noted its structure as unusual and said it felt like three books in one; Hendry wrote that this could feel disconcerting but was minimized by the chapters being effectively self-contained.[13] Writing in the Los Angeles Review of Books, Jordan S. Carroll called it "a brilliant account of the contemporary Far Right’s evolution".[14]
Selected bibliography
[edit]- Co-editor with Pam Chamberlain, Matthew. Lyons, Abby Scher Spencer Sunshine, Exposing the Right and Fighting for Democracy: Celebrating Chip Berlet as Journalist and Scholar, eds. Routledge, 2022.
- Unorthodox Fascism (2019)
- —— (2024). Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism: The Origins and Afterlife of James Mason's Siege. Routledge Studies in Fascism and the Far Right. New York: Routledge. ISBN 978-0-429-57601-0.
References
[edit]- ^ Burley, Shane (June 25, 2019). "Far-Right Group Patriot Prayer Is Declining. Thank Anti-Fascists". Truthout. Retrieved April 29, 2025.
- ^ Smith, Naomi (May 14, 2024). "Neo-Nazi terrorism and countercultural fascism". Birkbeck Institute for the Study of Antisemitism. Retrieved April 29, 2025.
- ^ a b c d Pine, Dan. "'Very fine people': Neo-Nazis are still a menace to America's future". The Jewish News of Northern California. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- ^ https://politicalresearch.org/bios/spencer-sunshine.
- ^ Strickland, Patrick. "'Nazis in your neighbourhood': Site maps US fascists". Al Jazeera. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- ^ Sunshine, Spencer. "Fair Trade Music". Souciant. 10 July 2013.
- ^ "Post-1960 U.S. anarchism and social theory". WorldCat. Retrieved April 26, 2025.
- ^ Pickens, Miriam (August 27, 2018). "An Anarchism of the Working-Class: A Review of Whither Anarchism?, by Kristian Williams (To the Point/AK Press, 2018), Reviewed by Miriam Pickens". The Institute for Anarchist Studies. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- ^ Grudo, Gideon. "A forgotten chapter: When Jewish America spoke Yiddish -- and was anarchist". The Times of Israel. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- ^ a b c Cusack, Carole M. (2024). "Spencer Sunshine, Neo-Nazi Terrorism and Countercultural Fascism: The Origins and Afterlife of James Mason's Siege". Alternative Spirituality and Religion Review. 15 (2): 258–260. doi:10.5840/asrr2024152119. ISSN 1946-0538.
- ^ Silow-Carroll, Andrew. "A YIVO conference finds a new audience for Yiddish anarchism". The Times of Israel. Retrieved October 19, 2024.
- ^ I’m the Victim of a Far Right Conspiracy Theory | Super Users Vice.
- ^ a b c d e f Hendry, John P. (April 25, 2025). "Neo-nazi terrorism and countercultural fascism: the origins and afterlife of James Mason's siege". Dynamics of Asymmetric Conflict. 0: 1–3. doi:10.1080/17467586.2025.2490519. ISSN 1746-7586.
- ^ a b Carroll, Jordan S. (October 9, 2024). "The Definitive History of Neo-Nazi Edgelords". Los Angeles Review of Books. Retrieved October 19, 2024.