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September 10, 2011

Global citizenship through the study of war

Filed under: Social and cultural anthropology — Tags: 9/11, anthropology, Crawford, Eisenhower Research Project, Lutz, Nordstrom, war — Laura Fulton @ 4:51 pm

As much media attention is currently focused on the 10^th anniversary of 9/11, I turn my attention to the financial, social and human costs of war. To start with, this interview with anthropologist Catherine Lutz and political scientist Neta Crawford, just posted by PBS, is worth watching. The two scholars direct the Eisenhower Research Project at Brown University. The interview focuses on the war in Afghanistan, the U.S. involvement in Pakistan and the costs of these conflicts that will keep surfacing for at least 40 years.

If you wish to dive more deeply into studies of war with your students, check out Breaking Ranks (2010) in which Lutz (and Gutmann) explore the lives of six Iraqi veterans who openly opposed the war. Carolyn Nordstrom is also well known for her insightful war ethnography, A Different Kind of War Story and Shadows of War are both on my bookshelf.

February 27, 2011

“war”: words in politics and the media

Filed under: TOK meets global citizenship — Tags: argument, counter-argument, Environment, images, Language, persuasion, war — Eileen Dombrowski @ 10:56 pm

Public space can sound so violent and threatening in the language of some politics and some media! It’s possible to declare war on anything you want to contest — and to declare that others are making war on you if they are arguing a position that restricts you in any way. In a course where we hope to encourage an openness to alternative views – and an inclination to use calm, analytical dialogue rather than bullets — we might well want to defuse the verbal bombs. A quick, light touch in class, with laughter rather than indignation, could serve to give students some distance from the impact of persuasive language.

Today Canadian environmentalist David Suzuki provides a short, easily accessible article on the way that opinions and arguments have been recast, verbally, in violent terms. It is appropriately entitled “If there is a war on cars, which side is winning?” and treats the way in which peaceful environmental arguments for shifting from private cars to public transit have been recast by opponents in terms of war. It also links to an article by George Monbiot entitled “The Imaginary War”, in which he asks, “Where is this famous war on the motorist? Can anyone point me to the battlefields, the graves of the war dead, the statues commemorating the unknown driver? Who has been waging it and when was it fought?”

July 6, 2010

Human Terrain Overshadowing Other War Studies?

Filed under: Social and cultural anthropology — Tags: anthropology, Carolyn Nordstrom, conflict, globalization, Human Terrian, Lubkeman, war, ZeroAnthropology — Laura Fulton @ 12:26 am

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‘Embedded anthropologists’ in Iraq and Afghanistan have been the subject of ongoing controversy for about five years now. These professionals make at least $200 000 USD a year aiding the American military by providing cultural knowledge and advice. Time magazine has been the latest to publish an article on this topic. Zero Anthropology has had the most extensive ongoing discussion on this topic. Both Zero Anthropology and the American Anthropological Association have condemned the actions of anthropologists engaged in current human terrain work. Criticisms have reduced the number of anthropologists engaging in this type of work – other social scientists are now taking up posts as human terrain professionals.

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