RYP – ZERO ANTHROPOLOGY

Innocently Informing State Terrorism: Journalism, Knowledge, and Counterinsurgency

With President Barack Obama sending at least 30,000 additional American troops to knock the Taliban off-balance and a U.S.-led offensive in Helmand province, a better understanding of today’s Taliban is central to the effort to defeat them and to begin withdrawing some American troops from Afghanistan in summer 2011. (McClatchy, 14 March 2010) A very […]

Questions and Allegations about Robert Young Pelton’s Reporting on a Human Terrain Team in Afghanistan

In a previous post titled, “Bumming a Ride with the Occupation Parade: A Look at Human Terrain Teams in Afghanistan,” I wrote about a new piece of “military travel writing,” specifically that of Robert Young Pelton and his article in the Men’s Journal titled, “Afghanistan: The New War for Hearts and Minds” (21 January 2009). […]