This article examines images of The Satanic Bible and clips from a 1969
shockumentary titled, Satanis: The Devil’s Mass, tracing the
gradual transformation of their imagery into what is termed, variously,
‘iconic topoi ’ or ‘visual
abbreviations’. Mapping the visual abbreviations of Satanic imagery
demonstrates how the mass media enable the invention of rumor-panics from a limited
number of ‘texts’. Once divorced from their actual content in
media programs, the imagistic forms of the book and film collectively served as
ready-made topoi for the invention of a clandestine and criminal Satanic
‘underground’ in the late 1980s and early 1990s. This article
also argues that the fragmentation of the book and film into stock footage reflects
the conditions of their production, helping to highlight the cultural logics typical
of late capitalism.
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