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Subjects Archives: Media

Media, Communications, and Literature

The “Cosmopolitan Century”: European Re-Membering

  Natan Sznaider.  Gedächtnisraum Europa: Die Visionen des europäischen Kosmopolitismus; eine jüdische Perspektive.   Bielefeld: transcript Verlag, 2008.  153 pp.  EUR 16.90 (paper), ISBN 978-3-89942-692-2. As Europe moves into the twenty-first century, its search for a shared identity continues to occupy academic journals, the feuilleton pages, and Eurocrats eager to underwrite a by-and-large successful administrative […]

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My Home of the Last Seven Millennia

  “As we joke about this accident, I feel refreshed to be back in Tehran.  Things are always going wrong here, but, at the same time, there is a network of people ready to volunteer to help.” — Sabereh Kashi Sabereh Kashi started her career as a journalist and film critic in Iran.  She made […]

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Elections in Afghanistan

  “Light!  Camera!  Action!“ Gervasio Umpiérrez is a cartoonist based in Montevideo, Uruguay.  This cartoon was featured on the home page of Rebelión on 22 August 2009.  Translation by Yoshie Furuhashi (@yoshiefuruhashi | yoshie.furuhashi [at] gmail.com).

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Night

شب / Night Majid Naficy was born in Esfahan, Iran in 1952.  His first wife Ezzat Tabaian and his brother Sa’id were executed after the revolution.  He fled Iran in 1983, eventually settling in Los Angeles with his son Azad.  This video was brought online by the Translation Project on 17 July 2007.  This poem — […]

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Dear Shahid,

I am writing to you from your far-off country. Far even from us who live here. Where you no longer are. Everyone carries his address in his pocket so that at least his body will reach home. Rumors break on their way to us in the city. But word still reaches us from border towns: […]

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A Simple Question about Israel

  On 2 August 2009, after cordoning off part of the Arab neighborhood of Sheikh Jarrah in east Jerusalem, Israeli police evicted two Palestinian families (more than 50 people) from their homes; Jewish settlers immediately moved into the emptied houses.  Although Israeli police cited a ruling by the country’s supreme court, the evicted Arab families […]

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No American Money for Israeli Settlements

  For many years, various American governments have called on Israel to stop the expansion of settlements, but Israel has consistently ignored this demand.  The Obama administration has been the most vocal administration so far in articulation of this demand.  Yet unfortunately a number of American individuals and institutions have provided large quantities of material […]

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I Did What My Heart Told Me to Do

  This is not the first time that I stand trial for my beliefs.  But it is the first time that they will probably be able to stop me. I always knew that many people silently supported me, and that if I ever got into trouble they would stand behind me.  This moment has come. […]

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I Confess

  اعتراف می کنم Mana Neyestani, born in Tehran in 1973, is an Iranian cartoonist.  He is Azeri himself, but his 12 May 2006 cartoon depicting a cockroach that appeared to speak in Azeri led to riots of Azeris in Iran, which in turn got him arrested.  A collection of his cartoons commenting on the […]

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Higher Education Today: Theory and Practice

  In the Beginning I am a child of the cold war.  I was born in 1940, was an adolescent in the 1950s, and devoid of political consciousness when President Eisenhower warned of the “unwarranted influence, whether sought or unsought, by the military-industrial complex” in 1960.   I was modestly inspired by the young President Kennedy’s […]

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Media Capitalism, the State, and 21st Century Media Democracy Struggles: An Interview with Robert McChesney

  The Media, the Left, and Power Tanner Mirrlees: Why do you think it is important for progressives to understand the media and participate in media democracy struggles? Robert McChesney: The media is one of the key areas in society where power is exercised, reinforced, and contested.  It is hard to imagine a successful left […]

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Contrary to Its Hard Line, EU Bends to Iran

  Despite its criticism of Tehran’s handling of protesters, the EU shies away from a serious diplomatic conflict with Iran.  Both the Swedish EU Council Presidency and individual EU member states will participate in the inauguration of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad. However, German Chancellor Angela Merkel announced that, “given the circumstances surrounding the controversial reelection” of […]

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Education and Its Cold War Discontents

  Andrew Hartman.  Education and the Cold War: The Battle for the American School.  New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2008.  x + 251 pp.  $74.95 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-230-60010-2. Although world affairs are inherently distant from the local activity of running a school, international events can often heighten a sense of threat from abroad and a related […]

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¡En Honduras No Pasarán!

  En Clave Roja / No Pasarán Pan y Rosas Brought online by TV PTS (Partido de los Trabajadores Socialistas) of Argentina on 27 July 2009, for the march today against the coup in Honduras.  En Clave Roja, <www.enclaveroja.org.ar>; No Pasarán <www.np.org.ar>; and Pan y Rosas <www.pyr.org.ar>.

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Feeling the Hate in Tel Aviv

  “What do you have to say to the Iranian people?” “The Iranians are fucking assholes.  I hate them all.  They can go fuck themselves.” “What do you have to say to the Iranian people?” “I hate them.  I don’t like them.” “What do you think about Obama?” “Obama is a cooshi.” “What?” “He’s a […]

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U.S. Continues to Train Honduran Soldiers

  A controversial facility at Ft. Benning, Ga. — formerly known as the U.S. Army’s School of the Americas — is still training Honduran officers despite claims by the Obama administration that it cut military ties to Honduras after its president was overthrown June 28, NCR has learned. A day after an SOA-trained army general […]

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Recapturing the Middle Ground: “Reasonable Belief” in the European Enlightenment

  David Jan Sorkin.  The Religious Enlightenment: Protestants, Jews, and Catholics from London to Vienna.  Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2008.  xv + 339 pp.  $35.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-0-691-13502-1. On January 14, 1791, the Comte de Mirabeau delivered a speech to the National Assembly in defense of the Civil Constitution of the Clergy, the controversial project […]

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Iran, O House of Hope

  ایران ای سرای امید On 17 June 2009, Mehr News reported that Mohammad Reza Shajarian wrote a letter to Islamic Republic of Iran Broadcasting Managing Director Ezzatollah Zarghami, objecting to the airing of his works on Iranian state TV and radio: “As you know, IRIB repeatedly airs my epic songs particularly ‘O Iran, O […]

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