ISSN 2562-9948
First, my thanks to Erik Davis (colleague, long time friend of this blog) for directing my attention to this brilliant piece by Matt Taibbi at Rolling Stone: Lara Logan, You Suck, from which I will quote extensively in the extracts that follow. This is a “notes and quotes” feature of this blog, apart from this […]
Read More…The latest media coverage of the U.S. Army’s Human Terrain System (HTS) comes from Kyle Crawford at War News Radio: The Human Terrain. Those interviewed on the program include recently deposed HTS program manager, Steve Fondacaro; Catherine Lutz, Brown University anthropology professor and member of the Network of Concerned Anthropologists; Keith Brown, a colleague of […]
Read More…“Propaganda is at its most effective when the audience does not know it is being manipulated and one of the best, glitziest examples of that is when propaganda is delivered on the big screen in the guise of a Hollywood blockbuster.”–The Listening Post, 12 June 2010 Al Jazeera’s The Listening Post had an excellent review […]
Read More…In terms of American mainstream media propaganda at the service of U.S. wars of occupation, and particularly favourable to the U.S. Army’s Human Terrain System, my vote for the most generous treatments, in descending order, are first the piece in the San Francisco Chronicle, second this prize in The Atlantic, third this recommendation to Obama […]
Read More……CONTINUED FROM PART 1 We continue the discussion of the American Anthropological Association’s Commission on the Engagement of Anthropology with the U.S. Security and Intelligence Communities (CEAUSSIC) which released its “Final Report on the Army’s Human Terrain System Proof of Concept Program,” in early December of 2009. Though not a comprehensive summary, nor a thorough […]
Read More…When the American Anthropological Association’s Commission on the Engagement of Anthropology with the U.S. Security and Intelligence Communities (CEAUSSIC) released its “Final Report on the Army’s Human Terrain System Proof of Concept Program,” in early December of 2009, there was a fair bit of media coverage that zeroed in on one paragraph in particular: When […]
Read More…Two previous articles on this site (Innocently Informing State Terrorism: Journalism, Knowledge, and Counterinsurgency, and Human Terrain System Under Investigation: HTS Link to JIEDDO & US Death Squads) dealt with the figure of Michael Furlong and what some claim was a “rogue” program of extrajudicial execution. Here, Ishtar Enana, an Iraqi writer (blog: غار عشتار, […]
Read More…Over 470 reports have been published online concerning the relationships between anthropology, other parts of academia, and the military and intelligence agencies since 2001. The items covered here consist of online publications of the mainstream and alternative media, documents online referred to by journalists, statements and reports from professional associations, and journal publications by some […]
Read More…Among the many American “news” sources that offer barely veiled propaganda, the Associated Press is one of the most outstanding for its unfaltering repetition of the official line from Washington, and its careful nurturing of Islamophobia. With partners like Yahoo!, which almost exclusively favours AP in its listing of top news on its default front […]
Read More…What For? Two days ago, on Saturday, 21 December, 2008, when I chose to participate in and do video documentation of a protest in Montréal organized by Block the Empire/Bloquez l’empire, like anyone else taking part, and those against it who did not take part, I had to ask myself “What for?” That the temperatures […]
Read More…An Italian news crew, at times offering the kind of principled and socially engaged commentary I applauded earlier, produced a unique document of riots in Osaka, Japan, and they noted that no other journalists were present. The context was the G-8 meeting held there in June, and while we were made barely aware on this […]
Read More…Why do I say suspect media? We know by now that The New York Times published completely false accounts that legitimized claims that Iraq had weapons of mass destruction leading up to the 2003 invasion. We see how CNN anchors, even now, continue to provide moments of careless speech when rushing out the words, “Iran’s […]
Read More…“The aide said that guys like me were ‘in what we call the reality-based community,’ which he defined as people who ‘believe that solutions emerge from your judicious study of discernible reality.’ … ‘That’s not the way the world really works anymore,’ he continued. ‘We’re an empire now, and when we act, we create our […]
Read More…I found my captor and tormentor! I found my captor and tormentor who subjected me to an afternoon of torture, appearing in noisy, nauseating technicolour dreams for long afterwards, until I learned to love him and all those like him. I am referring not only to the supreme Amitabh Bachchan (see this biography as well), […]
Read More…“The choice to rely … on cultural anthropologists in the rebuilding of a defeated enemy has particular resonance now as the United States struggles to rebuild a stable and viable Iraq. … As the occupation of Iraq appears more complex by the day, where are the new Ruth Benedicts, authoritative voices who will carry weight […]
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ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY 