“The Real War”

This is one of the most interesting cartoon i’ve found, which shows two different faces of Islam. One, which is evil and one which is not evil. And the terror is done by the one thats evil, which concludes that there are terror groups who has taken the name of Islam as to give a reason to their mission for why they committed such deeds.  I will use this cartoon to make the connection on even thought there are terrorist groups linked to Islam not everyone can be consider terrorist by the Westerns or seen as a terrorist…

“Them Islamics all look the same to me” by Goddard, Clive

This cartoon here clearly shows how the Americans think that Islam is linked to terror and that clearly illustrates most Americans think alike when it comes down to terrorism. This cartoon is powerful at showing how minds of the Americas are united in one way or one particularly direction…

Annotated Bibliographies

Little, Allan. (2001). Analysis: Who is a terrorist? Retrieved March 15, 2008, from http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/americas/1693876.stm.

“In the 1980s, the United States armed and funded the Afghan mujahideen when it was fighting the Soviet forces who had invaded the country in 1979.The mujahideen (of which Osama Bin Laden was a part) used acts of terror then against civilian targets – blowing up schools and torturing and murdering captured Russian soldiers they had captured. Was Osama Bin Laden a terrorist at that time? Or a freedom fighter? The danger in this is clear. If the war against terrorism is to be genuinely global – if it is to unite the world – it must surely be credible to the world outside the North Atlantic bubble of the United States and Western Europe. For if it appears to be a war against a certain kind of terrorism only – the kind that attacks America and its friends – then it will look less and less like a war against terrorism and more and more like a war for American self-defence. Now that is no less legitimate a war, for manifestly the United States was attacked and has the right to self-defence, but it is not the same thing as a war against terrorism. And we must not be surprised if much of the world – particularly parts of it that have experience of terror inflicted by America’s friends – view it with suspicion and resentment.”

This paragraph provides examples on what Americans call terrorism. And when 9/11 occurred U.S. also had to self-defense and the way U.S. declared war on Iraq this can also be called terrorism act in some extend. Its already hard to label someone a terrorist these days where terrorism acts occur on daily bases around the world whether its Iraq or any other country. 

 

The Elusive Definition of Terrorism. Retrieved March 14, 2008, from http://uk.oneworld.net/guides/terrorism

“Simultaneous bomb attacks on the US embassies in Kenya and Tanzania in 1998 followed by the 9/11 tragedy in 2001 marked the advent of a branch of terrorism whose grievance will find no refuge in political negotiation. Both attacks were traced to the group headed by Osama bin Laden known as al-Qaeda. Its ideology is shaped by the belief that Islam is being degraded and humiliated by “western” values, with particular disgust reserved for those Arab countries, such as Saudi Arabia and Egypt, which are close allies of the US. The plight of the Palestinians symbolises the al-Qaeda perspective. The central goal of al-Qaeda therefore is to expel Americans from Muslim lands and dismantle pro-US Middle Eastern governments. To this end all US citizens and their sympathisers are to be killed, regardless of whether or not they are Muslim.”

I think this is really important to acknowledge why certain groups like al-Qaeda, which is controlled by Bin Laden does what they did. As this paragraph explains the humiliation by western is one reason why terrorist groups do such activities. It’s more of a political matter that makes these terrorist groups to act the way they do. Political matter like U.S. troops going in Afghanistan and then creating Taliban’s to control Afghan’s through force. Political decisions gives terrorist groups their intend to take actions in certain ways. 

Research Hypothesis For Unit 2

 

1.   Please describe the inquiry question you began this research project with and the inquiry question that is now guiding your research and your thinking.  Why has your inquiry questions changed or not changed?

When I started this second unit I thought my primary research would be very limited to the philosophy of Edward Said, which wasn’t really true. The reason why was because as I did my research and tried to find questions like why the perceptions of Westerns so limited? I came across many other issues in relation to terrorism. And many other questions came to my mind like who is a terrorist? And what makes a terrorist? As my research showed me many of my inquiry questions has changed due to the information I’ve found. The reason why they changed was because as I did my research I kept on raising questions such as how the western minds think about war on terror and how they see terrorism in their perceptive, I believe that as you do your research to a great dept you tend to question things that you find from your research, which leads you on to find more about the particular topic.

2.   What you now know about your topic that you did not know before?  How has this new knowledge shaped your understanding of your topic of inquiry?  What research has provided you with this new knowledge?

After I did my research from various places such as Crisis Group I found more on the “War on Terrorism” and about terrorists. Some of the things I would want to mention that I learned while doing my research is that if we are fighting a war on terror we certainly don’t know as much as we should know about our enemy. As far as this war is concerned we do not know where our enemy can be found. When it comes to knowing who are terrorists its really hard to answer this question not because they are always hidden but terrorists could be organizations or individuals who could get technical advices they need from the internet such as bomb making materials and etc. One other fact I found was that education, training and the role of religious mentors play a significant role in causing terrorist behavior one way or another, however there are more than only these few factors. One answer I found to the most important question, which was what turns young Indonesians into suicide bombers? The answer to this question is not poverty nor is it desperations. But rather its JI most suicide bombers haven’t been JI’s, which is Jemaah Islamiyah. Their own ideology has come from salafi jihadism, which calls for a war against the U.S. and its allies. They wanted avenge of Muslims deaths in Afghanistan, Iraq. This new knowledge about understanding the behavior and terrorism has narrowed my topic at some point. Now I have planned to focus my inquire on the word terrorism and terrorist. And try to go behind to learn the meaning behind these two words and how they have worked in today’s world. Some of the research that provided me with this new information is from Crisis Group reports and speeches.

3.   What do I want to know more about?  Be specific here.  Why is this information that you want to find out important?  What kind of research do you plan to conduct to locate this new information?  What sources will you consult?

I want to find more information on what does the American people think about the word terrorism and terrorist. Is there is specific group of people they think when they think about the word terrorists. I want to know what comes to their mind then they think about terrorism. I would also like to know what American citizens think about the war on terror. Do they think its efficient or its not going anywhere? I would also want to find more information on terrorism act. What leads to terrorism behavior and is there anyway we can prevent it from happening. First of all this information is very important for my paper and second this information will build upon my ideas. It will be part of my primary research because I plan to ask views of the people through a survey. And students of Syracuse University will answer this survey and so it will be easier to conduct my primary research.

4.   What specific gaps are you noticing in your research, which could potentially create space for an original idea to emerge?   For instance, are there incongruities in what secondary sources are saying about your topic?  Are there connections missing in other sources analyses of your topic?  Is there a disconnect between what you believe to be true or what your primary research subjects believe to be true and what the media or other sources are saying about your topic?  Is there a gap in certainty about the answers to your question of inquiry that you could fill in with a plausible explanation?  Etc.

The gaps come into my research when media is involved because we don’t realize that media and press are two different things. Media involves opinions and their own ideas as well as bias toward certain things where as press is something that does not really involve opinions but are based on more factual things. Rather than this I haven’t found any other disconnection between what I believe to be true or primary research.

5.   What original ideas are brewing in your head at this point?  If you had to make an argument about your topic of inquiry today, what would it be????  What are your justifications for this working hypothesis?  Please, explain…… 

If I had to make an argument about my topic I would make an argument that most terrorist attacks are after all made by Islamic activists and the activities are done under influences. Influences in the name of religion, which is committed within this ideology of a lens. And that lens contains several factors because most of the suicide bombers who committed these horrible attacks had a purpose to take revenge of many Muslims what was killed through Taliban, which was also created by America. This situation of terrorist and terrorism comes long back from the past and the answer to the question what motivates them is very complicated but politics play a key position in creating more Islamic activists to become terrorists.

Constructing Primary Research & Methods

a. What do I want to discover? I want to discover who are the terrorists? What motivates terrorists? What causes terrorist behavior? The war on terror how effective has it been? What can we do to prevent terrorism? I also want to investigate the terrorism acts of the people in 9/11 and in the past their backgrounds and try to find information on what led them to commit what they committed. Other information I want to discover is to see what people think about terrorism. Whether it’s more political matter or more religious since people commit these acts recalling on religious beliefs.

 

b. How do I plan on discovering it? (This is called your research methods or methodology)? The way I am trying to discover these answers to these questions are by conducting both primary and secondary research. I am going to be conducting surveys and do research online. One of the interesting sites I found was the International Crisis Group which has reports and speeches on my topic from several of people. That will be my primary source and my secondary sources will come from several different databases and websites, which is quite easy to locate. The survey, which I will conduct, will be a primary source so I can ask people about their views on terror and the word terrorist. As well as whom do they think terrorist are whether it’s a group of people or an individual?

 

c. Who am I going to talk to/observe/survey? (These people are called your subjects or participants) I will be designing a survey, which will mainly focus on Syracuse Students it does not has to be a particular race as long as they are serious as they answer the questions. I will try to ask one facility member to do the survey as well. Just to see what facility member think about this topic on terrorism. My research will mainly focus on the word terrorist and who people think are terrorists because after all we are fighting a “War on Terror.” I am thinking of conducting at least 10 surveys. Along with that I will give as much time as they need to finish the survey. I am thinking of sending e-mails but I also think face to face is better or I can try both. I’ll make some variation to it. I will be making questions easier rather than getting all complex because people wont wait to complete a long survey so I am only going to focus it’s attention on main points. I will have open ended questions along with one or two close ended questions..

 

d. How am I going to be able gain access to these groups or individuals? I will be able to gain access to these groups through my classes as well as friends and there are many facility members that I know of so that’ll be easier.

 

e. What are my biases about this topic? I am pretty much neutral on this topic, which means my ideology is that terrorists is not just one group or just one person but it’s all over the world. That’s the main reason why it’s hard to target terrorism.   

f. How can I make sure my biases are not reflected in my research methods? My biases is pretty much neutral and they wont reflect in my research methods because I will be creating fair questions, which wont favor over one side or another.

 

g. What do I expect to discover? I expect to discover more about the linkage behind the word “terrorist.” More over this war, which we are fighting on terrorism how effective has it been in the past years. Are we succeeding along with what leads to terrorism and how we can target it? Questions like Can we target terrorism? Can we eliminate it? How can we prevent it? All these questions will be answered in my research and my paper.

    

More Research

Rushing, Josh, “FreeThoughtManifesto.” [Spin: The Art of Selling War.] Blogger. 26 December. 2007. (http://freethoughtmanifesto.blogspot.com/2007/12/spin-art-of-selling-war.html) 1 March. 2008.

Spin: The Art of Selling War

-        “Less about the truth more about sales formula.”

The idea of this quote is that politics is all about advertising and propaganda they want to make sure that people buy their ideas and agree with them. The sale formula is the key source if you can sell what you want then everything is possible you can buy people into your ideology. This quote surely raises a question, which is are our leaders more of an advertising figure where they try to convince us on different political events. This quote here does relate to my topic, which is changing perceptions and leading in wars. If it’s less about the truth and more about the sales formula then wars will always occur no matter what because all you need is reasons.

-       Same Phrases coming from Presidents like “Protecting U.S. Citizens”

Over the years Presidents have claimed and have used phrases like “Protecting U.S. Citizens” to lead Americans to Wars whether it was Vietnam War or Iraq war. Reasons are enough to lead to war. Such as “We Fight humanely” and saying we avoid killing civilians where are when bombs were thrown in Baghdad there were more civilians dead. Reasons are the key factors in leading to wars and changing the perceptions one other effective quote used by American government is “If we don’t fight them there, we’ll have to fight them here.” This was mostly used after 9/11 when Iraq was attacked. If we don’t act fast they will attack us just like Pearl Harbor. Selling War is easy thing to do but takes a lot of reasoning to buy someone into it just like Bush Administration did by buying to American public into the war in Iraq as revenge to 9/11 

-       Selling War is demonizing the enemy comparing Saddam with Hitler.Another way of selling war and changing perceptions of the people is to demonize the enemy such as comparing Hitler to Saddam to generate support for the war in Iraq. I believe that this idea works and it is true. Because when you try to demonize your enemy you try to create an image of that person into something totally different and when for example American public sees it they see what the government is trying to show them rather than seeing them through a clear lens. Demonizing your enemy has worked in the past and has worked in war with Iraq.                         

“Thinking politically about Islamism and terrorism”

Dr. Hugh Roberts was one of the inspiring speaker’s I ever heard. He made a lot of remarks regarding the U.S. government and argued about some British political system as well. But mostly his presentation was on Islamism. One of the interesting argument he made was political problem should be a political approach. In relation to U.S. he made an argument that the U.S. government has not approached a political action in relation to 9/11. And that he totally made a disconnection with War in Iraq and 9/11. As he explained further that there could be no war on terror. Then why does the government referring the war in Iraq to the war on terror. The so-called war on terror by the government has made the problem much more massive. The problem is now bigger than it was in the past. The U.S. government has not made political choices but rather made fatal choices in making the matter worst. The government has made some of the worst policies in relation to Middle East. Then he goes into media the biggest problem in today’s world for example the words moderate and radical. Media has tried to use words that are bad but also good in the political system to make one group better off than the other one. And in terms of Islam they use words while talking about politics to make Islam as if they want power and control over something. Again as of “War on Terror” it’s not something you can do. But people don’t realize even the soldiers who are fighting for their own country not realizing why they are fight the war. Is it on terror? As far as I think it isn’t terrorism the government has targeted. The U.S. government has fought the wrong wars. He relates the terror groups with Sunni’s and they all relate to Sunni’s rather than Shia. Which I quiet didn’t understand why he made that claim. But one of the important arguments he made was Westerns stepping the Islamic values that Islamic have an evil ideology. And then made the claim that Westerns don’t really cared about issues that go on and the fact they still go into those conflicts to make them worse. He also mentioned a little bit about Palestine and that the problem wont be fixed until the people realize what they are doing and realize what they are doing is wrong. Until then there isn’t any policy that could fix matters like that. But I planned to look into more of his work on http://www.crisisgroup.org, which has his report and other information that I can read to analyze more on my topic.

            

Freewrite on Kantz’s article…

            Margaret Kantz makes some really interesting points regarding your ability to read and analyzing a text. At the time trying to interpret it as the audiences of the paper rather than a narrative. In order for you to be a good reader and writer as I think is to practice but Kantz explains many various ways in which you can increase your skills such as using rhetoric strategies in your paper. Using these strategies not only gives your paper an appeal but adds favor to it. Other strategies Kantz talked about was using transitions the reason why is because it makes your paper flow. Whether it’s a transition in between sentences or paragraphs it’s always a good idea to keep your reader wanting to read more as your paper flows. In addition writing your paper for an audience will provide your paper with a tone and will make it stronger. Tracing back on these points a strong sustained research argument is the key to your paper and Kantz claims some points like not to believe everything your source provide you with. Trying to argue points that will allow you to say more would be the way to go because as you develop your points you will have more arguments on built upon what you said. An example of this is Edward Said as he talked about his points on Orientalism he tried to build upon his ideas and tried to raise question according to this arguments. Creating strong sustained arguments requires analyzing your text and seeing if you agree or disagree with what you have read. Also Kantz discusses rhetorical gaps where she discusses about discovering these gaps as a writer. In order for you to discover these gaps you need to think as if you are teaching someone or solving a problem for someone or trying to answer questions as Kantz explains it. Becoming a good reader and writing is when you start to think about all dimensions to your topics to your arguments as well as the goals in writing your paper.   

 

One other and most important thing Kantz explains is using sources in your paper. Quoting and paraphrasing which many students do in their papers. Quoting is much easier than paraphrase because quoting doesn’t require for you to simply transform it into your own words where as paraphrase is hard to do without your comments conflicting with the author’s ideas. But paraphrase is important for you to practice because it shows you can write without having your ideas or narrative conflicting with what the author is trying to explain. As I mentioned a bit about Edward Said and how he is a role model for what Kantz referred to because he tried to create his inquires as he made his arguments. He not only used examples from the history but also tired to trigger the problem and how we can fix it as he was making his claims about the westerns.    

           

In my sustained research essay I will be trying to focus more on my arguments as well as the tone of my paper. I will take in consideration that I am trying to write my paper for my audiences. To persuade them with my arguments. With my quotes and with my rhetoric strategies. I will be requiring quotes from many different sources for instance like databases, blogs, interviews and try to target the problem matter of fact I will try to answer my own question as Edward Said did in the video. Some of the sources I have searched are YouTube to see if there is anything I can find. Also I’ve planned to attend the “Thinking politically about Islamism and terrorism” lecture so that’ll be interesting. One obstacle I came across was finding the reliable sources. Sources are hard to find with the information you need but I am still looking into a lot of WebPages and writing down what I need…

   

Freewrite Assignment #1 – Research Proposal

1. What specific topic and accompanying questions you intend to research?

The topic I am currently looking into is Orientalism. This topic, in general fits the theme of war because Orientalism is an ideology where everything is framed in perspectives, writings, visions, and ideological biases in the minds of the westerns, which creates misperceptions. It creates racial injustice toward the Arabs and other cultures. In this broad topic I plan to argue misperceptions toward Middle Eastern people. The cartoon I was working on in Unit 1 leaded me to Orientalism thoughts of a great scholar Eward Said. I plan to focus more on his work and find more how Orientalism plays a role in fighting wars. I want to illustrate the main purpose, which leads to these misperceptions by focusing on massive media and the government as well as politics. This will not limit the time period for this topic because Orientalism comes from the past misperceptions about people of Middle Eastern countries, which is viewed till now in the western countries. As of that I will not limit my inquires just on how westerns view other but the matter of religions and culture differences. Some of questions I would want to inquire for this research is in which ways has Orientalism created misperceptions that led to wars? In the past and the present. How has government and media change the way western see other people such as Middle Eastern? How can we live together and view each other the same? Is religion one of the main reasons why there are misconceptions? Is it cultural differences?

1. Why you intend to research that topic and those questions?

I intend to research this topic because I believe misperceptions leads to war. For instance after 9/11 many citizens wanted revenge of what happened and those misperceptions lead to war in Iraq, which had nothing to do with what happened on 9/11. In addition to this I want to learn more about the culture differences in Western countries and Middle East. Educational system becomes critical when it comes to how much you know about others outside of U.S. Do we need a better educational system? Some of the things I am concerned about are whether the culture here is so different that you do not get the time to think about things on your own. That people are more depended on mass media, government, expertise to tell them the answers rather than thinking and judging based on what you think and your inner self. One important question comes to me is that if you can’t trust government, expertise, mass media then who would you trust? 

3.  How you intend to research that topic and those questions?

 

I have done research online and some of the other sources I’ve planned to explore are books from the library and maybe get in contact with some expert on Orientalism or on the question on who do we trust. I have Peter Levine in mind who is a Rhodes Scholar who has written on subjects like democratic society and came here in Syracuse on a panel. And I am probably going to look more on this topic through electronic sources like databases and newspapers.

 

4.  What purpose your work serves?

 

The research I will do on this topic will be draw attention of many people who have viewed Middle Eastern as if they were all the same. This is quite an interesting topic because it acknowledges how we can as a society and as a nation make this world a better place. In creating peace instead of wars. And I believe many scholars have tried to answer the question of how we can eliminate differences? Or who should we trust? So its quite interesting finding these answers rhetorically, which many scholars are working on.

Hey

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