Remaking/Unmaking: Abu Ghraib and Poetry

PMLA ◽  
2008 ◽  
Vol 123 (5) ◽  
pp. 1596-1610 ◽  
Author(s):  
Philip Metres
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The Body ◽  
Abu Ghraib ◽  
Visual Images ◽  
Long Poem ◽  
Literary Responses ◽  
Susan Sontag ◽  
American Poets ◽  
Abu Ghraib Prison

So now the pictures will continue to “assault” us—as many Americans are bound to feel. Will people get used to them? Some Americans are already saying that they have seen “enough.”—Susan Sontag, “Regarding the Torture of Others”… a state anterior to language, to the sounds and cries a human being makes before language is learned.—Elaine Scarry, The Body in PainWhen The ABU Ghraib Prison torture scandal began to circulate throughout The MASS media in Spring 2004, most pundits and commentators neglected to note how those images hauntingly paralleled the 9/11 attacks, insofar as each event's widespread publicity—replayed and reposted images of physical and psychological destruction—participated in the very unmaking that the perpetrators intended. In other words, just as the terrorist act on the Twin Towers was an act of both material and symbolic destruction that required media representation of the planes hitting the towers, mass media's recirculation of visual images of naked and dominated Iraqi men completed the act that Charles Graner and other United States military police had begun. Though the disturbing video representation of the 9/11 attacks rapidly disappeared from television, the Abu Ghraib photos persisted far longer (see York). The rapid disappearance of video of the planes striking the buildings suggests its traumatic power for Americans. But why would the Abu Ghraib photos be less disturbing than those of the attacks of September 11, 2001—given what they say about United States conduct in the war? In this essay, I consider the Abu Ghraib effect in the wider context of imperial imaging of the other. Second, I analyze artistic and literary responses (including Fernando Botero's Abu Ghraib paintings, Daniel Heyman's etchings, and an anthology of poems on torture) that attempt to re-present Abu Ghraib and make visible the invisible of that torture. Third, I sketch out how Arab American poets have played (and can continue to play) a critical role in the conversation about the effects of United States policies in the Middle East. Finally, I share my own poetic project, a long poem called “–u –r—” that attempts to make audible the muted voices of the tortured Iraqis at Abu Ghraib.

Eroticism and the Politics of Representing the Abused Body

2021 ◽  
pp. 500-516
Author(s):  
Lisa Fitzpatrick
Keyword(s):  
Sexual Violence ◽  
Judith Butler ◽  
Georges Bataille ◽  
The Body ◽  
Abu Ghraib ◽  
The Gaze ◽  
Susan Sontag ◽  
The Spectator ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Abu Ghraib Prison

This chapter discusses the photographic and dramatic representation of sexual violence in conflict and the potential for such visual spectacle to be received as erotic or titillating. The chapter begins with a brief consideration of the human fascination with horror, then draws upon the work of Judith Butler on vulnerability, and Susan Sontag and Georges Bataille on suffering to analyze the relationship between pornographic imagery and the images of Abu Ghraib prison. Taking an example of a dramatic representation of wartime rape, Colleen Wagner’s The Monument, the author’s decision not to display the body is explored as one strategy to avoid the exposure of the body to the gaze of the spectator.

Diaghilev and British Writing

2009 ◽  
Vol 27 (1) ◽  
pp. 65-92
Author(s):  
Susan Jones
Keyword(s):  
Visual Arts ◽  
The Body ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Literary Responses ◽  
Literary Aesthetics ◽  
Ballets Russes ◽  
The Arts ◽  
The Subject ◽  
And Gender ◽  
Opening Up

This article explores the diversity of British literary responses to Diaghilev's project, emphasising the way in which the subject matter and methodologies of Diaghilev's modernism were sometimes unexpectedly echoed in expressions of contemporary British writing. These discussions emerge both in writing about Diaghilev's work, and, more discretely, when references to the Russian Ballet find their way into the creative writing of the period, serving to anchor the texts in a particular cultural milieu or to suggest contemporary aesthetic problems in the domain of literary aesthetics developing in the period. Figures from disparate fields, including literature, music and the visual arts, brought to their criticism of the Ballets Russes their individual perspectives on its aesthetics, helping to consolidate the sense of its importance in contributing to the inter-disciplinary flavour of modernism across the arts. In the field of literature, not only did British writers evaluate the Ballets Russes in terms of their own poetics, their relationship to experimentation in the novel and in drama, they developed an increasing sense of the company's place in dance history, its choreographic innovations offering material for wider discussions, opening up the potential for literary modernism's interest in impersonality and in the ‘unsayable’, discussions of the body, primitivism and gender.

A Good Sentencing Precedent is Hard to Find

2020 ◽  
Vol 32 (3) ◽  
pp. 138-144
Author(s):  
Brian A. Jacobs
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Significant Role ◽  
College Admissions ◽  
The Body ◽  
Federal Law ◽  
Criminal Cases ◽  
Federal Sentencing

In federal criminal cases, federal law requires that judges consider the sentences other courts have imposed in factually similar matters. Courts and parties, however, face significant challenges in finding applicable sentencing precedents because judges do not typically issue written sentencing opinions, and transcripts of sentencings are not readily available in advanced searchable databases. At the same time, particularly since the Supreme Court’s 2005 decision in United States v. Booker, sentencing precedent has come to play a significant role in federal sentencing proceedings. By way of example, this article discusses recent cases involving defendants with gambling addictions, and recent cases involving college admissions or testing fraud. The article explores the ways the parties in those cases have used sentencing precedent in their advocacy, as well as the ways the courts involved have used sentencing precedent to justify their decisions. Given the important role of sentencing precedent in federal criminal cases, the article finally looks at ways in which the body of sentencing law could be made more readily available to parties and courts alike.

Updating long-held assumptions about fat stigma: For women, body shape plays a critical role

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jaimie Krems ◽  
Steven L. Neuberg
Keyword(s):  
Body Shape ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The Body ◽  
Theoretical Assumption ◽  
Obesity Stigma ◽  
Obese Female ◽  
Three Samples ◽  
Female Bodies ◽  
Different Parts ◽  
Fat Stigma

Heavier bodies—particularly female bodies—are stigmatized. Such fat stigma is pervasive, painful to experience, and may even facilitate weight gain, thereby perpetuating the obesity-stigma cycle. Leveraging research on functionally distinct forms of fat (deposited on different parts of the body), we propose that body shape plays an important but largely underappreciated role in fat stigma, above and beyond fat amount. Across three samples varying in participant ethnicity (White and Black Americans) and nation (U.S., India), patterns of fat stigma reveal that, as hypothesized, participants differently stigmatized equally-overweight or -obese female targets as a function of target shape, sometimes even more strongly stigmatizing targets with less rather than more body mass. Such findings suggest value in updating our understanding of fat stigma to include body shape and in querying a predominating, but often implicit, theoretical assumption that people simply view all fat as bad (and more fat as worse).

Building America

2019 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jean H. Baker
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Early Republic ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Water System ◽  
The United States ◽  
Primary Sources ◽  
Early American ◽  
Transatlantic Exchange ◽  
The Us ◽  
Private Homes

Building America: The Life of Benjamin Henry Latrobe is a biography of America’s first professionally trained architect and engineer. Born in 1764, Latrobe was raised in Moravian communities in England and Germany. His parents expected him to follow his father and brother into the ministry, but he rebelled against the church. Moved to London, he studied architecture and engineering. In 1795 he emigrated to the United States and became part of the period’s Transatlantic Exchange. Latrobe soon was famous for his neoclassical architecture, designing important buildings, including the US Capitol and Baltimore Basilica as well as private homes. Carpenters and millwrights who built structures more cheaply and less permanently than Latrobe challenged his efforts to establish architecture as a profession. Rarely during his twenty-five years in the United States was he financially secure, and when he was, he speculated on risky ventures that lost money. He declared bankruptcy in 1817 and moved to New Orleans, the sixth American city that he lived in, hoping to recoup his finances by installing a municipal water system. He died there of yellow fever in 1820. The themes that emerge in this biography are the critical role Latrobe played in the culture of the early republic through his buildings and his genius in neoclassical design. Like the nation’s political founders, Latrobe was committed to creating an exceptional nation, expressed in his case by buildings and internal improvements. Additionally, given the extensive primary sources available for this biography, an examination of his life reveals early American attitudes toward class, family, and religion.

scholarly journals PPARs as Metabolic Sensors and Therapeutic Targets in Liver Diseases

2021 ◽  
Vol 22 (15) ◽  
pp. 8298
Author(s):  
Hugo Christian Monroy-Ramirez ◽  
Marina Galicia-Moreno ◽  
Ana Sandoval-Rodriguez ◽  
Alejandra Meza-Rios ◽  
Arturo Santos ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Liver Diseases ◽  
Metabolic Regulation ◽  
Structural Changes ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The Body ◽  
Molecular Characteristics ◽  
Signal Pathways ◽  
Virus Infections ◽  
Physiological Processes ◽  
Hepatic Level

Carbohydrates and lipids are two components of the diet that provide the necessary energy to carry out various physiological processes to help maintain homeostasis in the body. However, when the metabolism of both biomolecules is altered, development of various liver diseases takes place; such as metabolic-associated fatty liver diseases (MAFLD), hepatitis B and C virus infections, alcoholic liver disease (ALD), and in more severe cases, hepatocelular carcinoma (HCC). On the other hand, PPARs are a family of ligand-dependent transcription factors with an important role in the regulation of metabolic processes to hepatic level as well as in other organs. After interaction with specific ligands, PPARs are translocated to the nucleus, undergoing structural changes to regulate gene transcription involved in lipid metabolism, adipogenesis, inflammation and metabolic homeostasis. This review aims to provide updated data about PPARs’ critical role in liver metabolic regulation, and their involvement triggering the genesis of several liver diseases. Information is provided about their molecular characteristics, cell signal pathways, and the main pharmacological therapies that modulate their function, currently engaged in the clinic scenario, or in pharmacological development.

Confronting Soviet Power: U.S. Policy during the Early Cold War

2012 ◽  
Vol 36 (4) ◽  
pp. 151-188 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul C. Avey
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
Cold War ◽  
Soviet Union ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Balance Of Power ◽  
The United States ◽  
Soviet Power ◽  
The Soviet Union ◽  
Foreign Policies ◽  
Distribution Of Power

Many self-identified realist, liberal, and constructivist scholars contend that ideology played a critical role in generating and shaping the United States' decision to confront the Soviet Union in the early Cold War. A close look at the history reveals that these ideological arguments fail to explain key aspects of U.S. policy. Contrary to ideological explanations, the United States initially sought to cooperate with the Soviet Union, did not initially pressure communist groups outside the Soviet orbit, and later sought to engage communist groups that promised to undermine Soviet power. The U.S. decision to confront the Soviets stemmed instead from the distribution of power. U.S. policy shifted toward a confrontational approach as the balance of power in Eurasia tilted in favor of the Soviet Union. In addition, U.S. leaders tended to think and act in a manner consistent with balance of power logic. The primacy of power over ideology in U.S. policymaking—given the strong liberal tradition in the United States and the large differences between U.S. and Soviet ideology—suggests that relative power concerns are the most important factors in generating and shaping confrontational foreign policies.

Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document