Racism

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New Gal
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Racism

Post by New Gal »

Non-fiction:

Edward Said, Orientalism.

SYNOPSIS: 20th century scholar Edward Said in his controversial book Orientalism, uses the term to describe a Western tradition, both academic and artistic, of hostile and deprecatory views of the East, shaped by the attitudes of European imperialism in the 18th and 19th centuries. When used in this sense, Orientalism implies essentializing and prejudiced outsider interpretations of Eastern cultures and peoples. Said was critical of this scholarly tradition and also of certain modern scholars, particularly Bernard Lewis.

In contrast, some modern scholars have used the term to refer to writers of the Imperialist era who had pro-Eastern attitudes, as opposed to those who saw nothing of value in non-Western cultures.

Edward Said, Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World.

SYNOPSIS: A penetrating look at the way in which experts, policy-makers and the media have dealt with the crisis in Iran and the Middle East. With examples, Said demonstrates that the government-business establishment has produced a portrait of Islam and Muslims based on ignorance, inaccuracy and prejudice.

Elizabeth Poole and John E Richardson, Muslims in the News Media

SYNOPSIS: Muslims have featured in many of the more significant news stories of the past few years - yet shockingly very few of these stories have been about anything other than the 'war on terror'. This book examines the role and representations of Muslims in the news media, particularly within a climate of threat, fear and misunderstanding. Written by both academic authorities and media practitioners, "Muslims and the News Media" is designed as a comprehensive and critical textbook and is set in both the British and international context. Bringing together a range of insightful perspectives on the subject into a coherent whole, the book clearly establishes the links between context, content, production and audiences, thus reflecting the entire cycle of the communication process. It reveals both the ways in which meaning is produced and reproduced in the news media, and the ways in which audiences themselves, both Muslim and non-Muslim, use or consume this media. Significant too and discussed here is the role of Muslims themselves in the processes of news production. Clarifying the circumstances and politics surrounding the representation of Muslims across a range of journalistic genres, "Muslims and the News Media" provides crucial insights into the representation - and misrepresentation - of Islam and Muslims today.

David Marriott, On Black Men.

SYNOPSIS: Mutilated, dying or dead, black men play a role in the psychic life of culture. From national dreams to media fantasies, from sensual intimacy to outpourings of murderous violence, there is a persistent imagining of what black men must be, a demand that black men perform a script, become interchangeable with the uncanny, deeply unsettling, projections of culture. This powerful and compelling study explores the legacy of that role, particularly its violent effect on how black men have learned to see themselves and one another. David Marriott draws upon a range of examples, from lynching photographs to recent Hollywood films, as well as the ideas of key thinkers including Frantz Fanon, Richard Wright, James Baldwin and John Edgar Wideman, to reveal a vicious pantomime of unvarying reification and compulsive fascination, of whites taking a look at themselves through images of black desolation, and of blacks intimately dispossessed by that self-same looking. On Black Men is a bold and original exploration of what it means to be black and male in contemporary Europe and America.

Fiction, an example of youth culture, uses of derogatory terms within ethnic groups and empowering

Gautam Malkani, Londonstani,

SYNOPSIS: reveals a Britain that has never before been explored in the novel: a country of young Asians and white boys (desis and goras) trying to work out a place for themselves in the shadow of the divergent cultures of their parent's generation. Set close to the Heathrow feed roads of Hounslow, Malkani shows us the lives of a gang of four young men: Hardjit the ring leader, a Sikh, violent, determined his caste stay pure; Ravi, determinedly tactless, a sheep following the herd; Amit, whose brother Arun is struggling to win the approval of his mother for the Hindu girl he has chosen to marry; and Jas who tells us of his journey with these three, desperate to win their approval, desperate too for Samira, a Muslim girl, which in this story can only have bad consequences. Together they cruise the streets in Amit's enhanced Beemer, making a little money changing the electronic fingerprints on stolen mobile phones, a scam that leads them into more dangerous waters. Funny, crude, disturbing, written in the vibrant language of its protagonists - a mix of slang, Bollywood, texting, Hindu and bastardised gangsta rap - "Londonstani" is about many things: tribalism, aggressive masculinity, integration, cross-cultural chirpsing techniques, the urban scene seeping into the mainstream, bling bling economics, 'complicated family-related ****'.


Dignity comes not from control, but from understanding who you are and taking your rightful place in the world.
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WelshStudent
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Re: Racism

Post by WelshStudent »

New Gal wrote:Edward Said, Covering Islam: How the Media and the Experts Determine How We See the Rest of the World.

SYNOPSIS: A penetrating look at the way in which experts, policy-makers and the media have dealt with the crisis in Iran and the Middle East. With examples, Said demonstrates that the government-business establishment has produced a portrait of Islam and Muslims based on ignorance, inaccuracy and prejudice.
That's a fascinating book. :) Quite an eye-opener really.
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