Re-Visioning Terrorism

Description

Re-Visioning Terrorism: A Humanistic Perspective is an interdisciplinary collection of essays that aims to offer a plurality of visions on terrorism, expanding its meaning across time and space and raising new questions that explore its multifaceted occurrences. The different ideological, philosophical, and cultural perspectives emerging from the essays and the variety of humanistic disciplines involved intend to provide a complex and even contradictory picture that emphasizes the fact that there cannot be a univocal conception and response to terrorism, in either the practical or the intellectual domain. The editors borrow the concept of rack focus response from cinema to create an innovative and flexible interpretative approach to terrorism. Rack focus refers to the change of focus of a lens so that one image can come into focus while another moves out of focus. Though the focal distance changes, the reality has not changed. Both items and events coexist, but given the nature of optics we can only see clearly one or the other. This occurs not just with lenses, but also with human perceptions, be they emotional or intellectual. The rack focus response requires that we try to shift focus from the depth of field that is absolutely clear and familiar to the "other" that is unclear and unfamiliar. This exercise will lead us to reflect on terroristic events in a more nuanced, nondogmatic, and flexible manner. The essays featured in this volume range from philosophical interpretations of terrorism, to historical analysis of terror through the ages, to cinematic, artistic, and narrative representations of terroristic events that are not limited to 9/11.
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

1 Re-Visioning Terrorism: The Rack Focus Response, by Elena Coda and Ben Lawton

PART 1: APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING TERRORISM

2 Deleuze, the Event, and the Problem of Terrorism, by Kenneth E. Noe

3 Symbolic Violence as Subtle Virulence: A Philosophy of Terrorism, by Jonathan Beever

4 The Martyr’s Vision: Why the Suicide Bomber’s Eye Is Cast Not to the Sky—But to the Other, by Hatem N. Akil

PART 2: PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM THROUGH THE AGES

5 Resisting Alexander: Insurgency and Terrorism in Ancient Athens, by Timothy Howe

6 State Counterterrorism in Ancient Rome: Toward a New Basis for the Diachronic Study of Terror, by Ricardo Apostol

7 Terror in the Old French Crusade Cycle: From Splendid Cavalry to Cannibalism, by Sarah-Grace Heller

8 The Invention of Modern State Terrorism During the French Revolution, by Guillaume Ansart

PART 3: AMERICA AND THE WAR ON TERROR

9 Fictions of Counterinsurgency, by Louise Barnett

10 The Cultural Politics of WMD Terrorism in Post-Cold War America, by Harold Williford

11 Historicizing the Present in 9/11 Fiction, by Todd Kuchta

12 Reading 9/11 Through the Holocaust in Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America and Art Spiegelman’s In the Shadow of No Towers, by Stella Setka

PART 4: NARRATIVE, CINEMATIC, AND VISUAL CASE STUDIES

13 Regarding Terror: The German Autumn and Contemporary Art, by Fabian Winkler

14 Forms of (In)visibility in Recent Spanish Films on Basque Terrorism, by Jaume Martí-Olivella

15 Writing Victims: Post-Terrorist Fiction(s) in the Basque Country and Spain, by Roland Vazquez

16 Knights of Justice? Blockbuster Terrorism in Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion, by Aaron Choo and Wilson Koh

CONTRIBUTORS

INDEX

Sujets

• Philosophie
• Éthique et morale
• Philosophie et théologie
• Philosophy
• Evil
• Good

Informations

• Publié par: Purdue University Press
• Date de parution: 15 janvier 2016
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9781612494456
• Langue: English

Extrait

Re-Visioning
TERRORISM
A Humanistic Perspective
Re-Visioning
TERRORISM
A Humanistic Perspective
Edited by Elena Coda and Ben Lawton
Purdue University Press, West Lafayette, Indiana
Copyright 2016 by Purdue University. All rights reserved.
Cataloging-in-Publication data on file at the Library of Congress.
Paperback ISBN: 9781557537331
ePub ISBN: 9781612494456
ePDF ISBN: 9781612494449
Contents
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
1 Re-Visioning Terrorism: The Rack Focus Response
Elena Coda and Ben Lawton
PART 1
APPROACHES TO UNDERSTANDING TERRORISM
2 Deleuze, the Event, and the Problem of Terrorism
Kenneth E. Noe
3 Symbolic Violence as Subtle Virulence: A Philosophy of Terrorism
Jonathan Beever
4 The Martyr’s Vision: Why the Suicide Bomber’s Eye Is Cast Not to the Sky—But to the Other
Hatem N. Akil
PART 2
PERSPECTIVES ON TERRORISM THROUGH THE AGES
5 Resisting Alexander: Insurgency and Terrorism in Ancient Athens
Timothy Howe
6 State Counterterrorism in Ancient Rome: Toward a New Basis for the Diachronic Study of Terror
Ricardo Apostol
7 Terror in the Old French Crusade Cycle: From Splendid Cavalry to Cannibalism
Sarah-Grace Heller
8 The Invention of Modern State Terrorism During the French Revolution
Guillaume Ansart
PART 3
AMERICA AND THE WAR ON TERROR
9 Fictions of Counterinsurgency
Louise Barnett
10 The Cultural Politics of WMD Terrorism in Post-Cold War America
Harold Williford
11 Historicizing the Present in 9/11 Fiction
Todd Kuchta
12 Reading 9/11 Through the Holocaust in Philip Roth’s The Plot Against America and Art Spiegelman’s In the Shadow of No Towers
Stella Setka
PART 4
NARRATIVE, CINEMATIC, AND VISUAL CASE STUDIES
13 Regarding Terror: The German Autumn and Contemporary Art
Fabian Winkler
14 Forms of (In)visibility in Recent Spanish Films on Basque Terrorism
Jaume Martí-Olivella
15 Writing Victims: Post-Terrorist Fiction(s) in the Basque Country and Spain
Roland Vazquez
16 Knights of Justice? Blockbuster Terrorism in Code Geass: Lelouch of the Rebellion
Aaron Choo and Wilson Koh
CONTRIBUTORS
INDEX
Acknowledgments
This book consists of revised and expanded papers originally presented at the Re-Visioning Terrorism conference, held at Purdue University in September 2011 and attended by more than eighty scholars from all over the world. The event was funded by an Enhancing Research in the Humanities and the Arts Grant from the Office of the Vice President for Research and the College of Liberal Arts. We would like to thank Purdue University, the College of Liberal Arts, and the School of Languages and Cultures for their support. We are particularly grateful to Adrian Del Caro, former head of the School of Languages and Cultures, for his encouragement and assistance in the early stages of this work, and to the anonymous referees for their careful reading of the manuscript and their valuable comments and suggestions.
1
Re-Visioning Terrorism: The Rack Focus Response
ELENA CODA AND BEN LAWTON
The attacks against the World Trade Center (WTC) Twin Towers and the Pentagon on September 11, 2001, were tragic for their victims and traumatic for our nation. We Americans were sound asleep, comforted by the illusion that we were protected by two unsurmountable oceans when, suddenly, we were awakened by nightmarish visions of airplanes crashing into the Twin Towers over and over again, and then, again and again we watched these symbols of American might seemingly melt and collapse amidst billowing clouds of dust. We watched in horror as people leaped to their deaths; slack-jawed we admired the seemingly suicidal courage of the firefighters and other first responders; and we shared the shock, anguish, and confusion of the people at ground zero. Later we saw the images of the massive breach in the Pentagon and we heard about United Flight 93 and we wondered when and where the next attack would come. It all seemed like an inconceivable nightmare. How could this be happening? Who was attacking us and why? Who was responsible for killing 2,996 people and injuring some 6,000 more? 1 Who was responsible for this incalculable economic disaster, the first major attack against the United States since Pearl Harbor in 1941 and the first attack against the continental United States since the War of 1812?
It quickly became clear that these were terrorist attacks, but that confused us even more. Until that time, terrorism had been something that happened elsewhere, to other people. Now, suddenly, we, the United States, were no longer safe. And so, as the tenth anniversary of what has come to be known as 9/11 drew near, 2 like so many others, we began to reflect on those events, on the nature of terrorism, and on our individual and national response to the phenomenon.
What is terrorism? 3 To paraphrase Supreme Court Justice Potter Stewart on pornography in his opinion in Jacobellis v. Ohio (1964), “We can’t define what terrorism is, but we know it when we see it.” 4 After 9/11 we all knew what terrorism was. And we all knew what terrorists looked like. Or at least we thought we did. For a decade we watched the footage of the airplanes crashing into New York’s Twin Towers and the pictures of Osama bin Laden and his Al Qaeda followers on countless TV shows and in newspapers and magazines. Terrorists, we came to understand, were dark-skinned, bearded “rag-heads,” Islamic fundamentalists: irrational, fanatical, cowardly madmen who slaughtered innocent American civilians for absolutely no good reason. 5
In the days immediately following 9/11, those were the images and concepts that were burned into our mind’s eye. And the world seemed to share our feelings. We received messages of solidarity from around the world. The country came almost unanimously together in support of President George W. Bush’s “crusade” and his Global War on Terror (GWOT). 6 At first we followed the American campaign against Al Qaeda and the Taliban in Afghanistan with feelings that approached jubilation. We read about and saw photographs of bearded United States Army Special Forces soldiers and Air Force Combat Controllers on horseback calling in air strikes in support of our Afghani allies. 7 The local population seemed to welcome enthusiastically its liberation from the almost inconceivably brutal and repressive Taliban regime. Our intervention, we were told, was not just motivated by a search for justice and retribution—we were liberating Afghan women from a condition of oppression unique, perhaps, in the modern world. 8
All too soon, however, doubts began to surface. Were the attacks truly unexplainable? 9 Were the terrorists really irrational, cowardly madmen? 10 Did 9/11 really justify a war on terror that knew no geographical boundaries? 11 Did it lead us to reject the international laws and conventions that had been laboriously constructed over time to bring order and humanity to the chaotic and inhuman nature of war? 12 Did 9/11 really justify jettisoning our civil liberties in the name of security? 13 Those very liberties which we had been told were the motivation for the 9/11 attacks in the first place? 14
Individuals who expressed reservations openly or who challenged the dominant narratives were pilloried and ostracized. 15 But with the passing of time the stories that trickled out of Afghanistan told of “collateral damage,” of innocent civilians killed and maimed “accidentally” in myriad different ways—stray bombs, wrong targets, bad intelligence. 16 And we began to see images that were more reminiscent of Vietnam than of the allegedly good war, World War II, when we were, we are told, welcomed as liberators. The callous brutalization of prisoners—the hoodings, the stress positions, the yelling and striking (perhaps the best known case is that of Dilawar of Yakubi) 17 —was so clearly pandemic that it seemed to be not an aberration, but the result of deliberate policy. 18 The hooding, and the sensory deprivation it implied, appeared to be a form of torture, even without the 1997 conclusion of the United Nations Committee against Torture, reconfirmed in 2004. 19
And then came the invasion of Iraq, predicated on an ever-evolving set of narratives (find and remove Iraq’s weapons of mass destruction, cut Saddam Hussein’s links to Al Qaeda, end the regime of Saddam Hussein, deliver humanitarian support to Iraqi civilians, secure the oil fields, help Iraqis establish a representative government) that became increasingly ludicrous as they were debunked, one after the other. And we began to ask ourselves, why were we in Iraq? 20 Some even began to wonder why we had invaded Afghanistan in the first place. We had, we were assured, sent our armed forces into Afghanistan to eliminate Al Qaeda and kill or capture its putative leader, Osama bin Laden. But then, when he managed to slip away from us as a result of the Tora Bora debacle, we were told that he was no longer an important target. 21
And from Iraq the horror stories multiplied. The images from Abu Ghraib shocked the world, and us, 22 and the so-called collateral damage reached incomprehensible numbers: 100 thousand Iraqi dead? Or perhaps 200 thousand? And hundreds of thousands more maimed or dispersed. 23
After ten years of the Global War on Terror, what had we accomplished? Osama bin Laden had vanished. Al Qaeda presumably no longer exists as a terrorist organization, but it has metastasized into a worldwide terrorist rhizome. The Weapons of Mass Destruction (WMD) that had so threatened our nation as to justify the preventive invasion of Iraq were nowhere to be found. In fact, arguably, all we accomplished in Iraq was the deposition and execution of Saddam Hussein and the removal of his Ba’ath Party from power; and, of course, the killing of Osama bin Laden on May 2, 2011, an event which is rapidly joining the demolition of the World Trade Center (WTC) in the rank of the most popular conspiracy theories. 24
By the