TITAN PROJECT
The TITAN (Terrorism Insight Through the Analysis of Narratives) Project is an initiative developed by the Program on Extremism at George Washington University to expand knowledge of essential aspects of jihadist communication strategy and ideology. TITAN’s goal is to advance the understanding of jihadist narratives and their evolution over time through analyses derived from the compilation and subsequent contextualized exploitation of an electronic, monolingual, diachronic, balanced, and representative corpus of the propaganda discourse of the two main global jihadist organizations: Al-Qaeda and the Islamic State.
Main Features
The TITAN Project draws contextual conclusions from corpus exploitation and delivers empirical results.
Contextualized corpus analysis combines quantitative and qualitative methods, enabling data triangulation to validate findings.
The TITAN Project analyzes narratives emanating from primary source Arabic materials.
The TITAN Project is ongoing, delivering up-to-date insights based on a constantly updated database.
The TITAN Project drives innovative research by enabling creative exploration of a corpus that supports a wide range of inquiries.
The systematization of narrative analysis yields compelling data that supports more effective counter-narrative strategies.
Project Lead
How Does It Work?
The TITAN corpus can be described as a dual-purpose corpus, serving as a unified body for the broad study of jihadist discourse, while also allowing for division into two distinct corpora—one for al-Qaeda publications and another for those of the Islamic State—enabling focused analysis of each organization individually and facilitating comparative studies. Additionally, once the official publications from the central media offices of both organizations have been covered, the project aims to continue expanding by compiling subcorpora from the publications of various regional branches of both jihadist groups.
Recent Publications