American Social “Reminders” of Citizenship after September 11, 2001: Nativisms and the Retractability of American Identity

My discussion considers how crisis dramatically changes social relationships and interaction patterns within a multicultural context. Specifically, I note the inherent social asymmetry of multicultural configurations, thus rendering it vulnerable for the dominant ethnic/racial group, the ethnocracy, to exact symbolically and materialistically punitive measures against minorities during periods of national crisis. I situate my discussion of dramatically changed social interactions in the post- September 11, 2001 period, when the attacks on the World Trade Center towers triggered nativism against Arab Americans, or any group phenotypically similar to the construction of “Arab.” I note how this nativism is not new but is a historical and consistent articulation of the ethnocratic stratum that retracts the American identity and notions of citizenship away from minorities during times of national crisis. The discussion concludes with how American multiculturalism is still full of unresolved ethnic and racial symbolisms that hark back to nineteenth century attempts by the White power structure to idealize, culturally and phenotypically, the constitution of an “ideal” American.

Incredible but Very Real: 3D Cinema and Trauma in the Wake of WWII and 9/11

<p>This thesis investigates Hollywood and global Hollywood 3D cinema at the height of its box office success, the early fifties, and from 2009-2014. Discourse surrounding 3D cinema in both periods is governed largely by technological and economic arguments. While this discourse holds some merit, it overlooks the cultural and historical background against which 3D cinema rose to prominence. Shifting research focus from the technological and economic to the cultural, this project uncovers the presence of trauma in 3D cinema of the fifties and D3D of the new millennium, and argues 3D cinema to be a privileged form to engage with traumatic themes. As trauma is uncovered in 3D cinema, connections are drawn between the narratives and poetics of the films discussed and post-traumatic themes prevalent in the US post WWII, and post September 11 respectively. Focusing on questions of representation, embodiment and temporality, which hold a central role both in 3D cinema and trauma theory, this project finds that 3D cinema narratives and poetics of each period resonated with the cultural trauma that preceded it.</p>

Incredible but Very Real: 3D Cinema and Trauma in the Wake of WWII and 9/11

<p>This thesis investigates Hollywood and global Hollywood 3D cinema at the height of its box office success, the early fifties, and from 2009-2014. Discourse surrounding 3D cinema in both periods is governed largely by technological and economic arguments. While this discourse holds some merit, it overlooks the cultural and historical background against which 3D cinema rose to prominence. Shifting research focus from the technological and economic to the cultural, this project uncovers the presence of trauma in 3D cinema of the fifties and D3D of the new millennium, and argues 3D cinema to be a privileged form to engage with traumatic themes. As trauma is uncovered in 3D cinema, connections are drawn between the narratives and poetics of the films discussed and post-traumatic themes prevalent in the US post WWII, and post September 11 respectively. Focusing on questions of representation, embodiment and temporality, which hold a central role both in 3D cinema and trauma theory, this project finds that 3D cinema narratives and poetics of each period resonated with the cultural trauma that preceded it.</p>

Mark Bingham

In this article, the author recounts some of the events that occurred on September 11, 2001, when four doomed airlines crashed after being hijacked by 19 Al-Qaeda terrorists, resulting in the deaths of 2,977 people in New York, New York, at the Pentagon in Arlington, Virginia, and on an empty field in Shanksville, Pennsylvania. It is at this latter location, where United Flight 93 crashed killing everyone onboard, including 31-year-old Mark Bingham, an openly gay businessman and member of a small group of people who, it is believed, wrested control from the hijackers and brought the plane down. In the years post-September 11, Bingham has become known as a modern-day hero by the various queer communities, while also garnering a high level of notoriety among many mainstream people as well. The author maintains, however, that Bingham’s hero status simultaneously contributes to the dismissal and erasure of countless other queer people, primarily Black, Brown, and transgender, who have also performed heroic acts throughout modern U.S. history. Without diminishing the actions Bingham and the others took on board United Flight 93, the author questions why this particular gay man is remembered, while countless other queer/trans people of color remain largely unknown.

Biometrics: constructing 'ideal' subjects and 'aliens' at the Canada-U.S. border

Employing critical social research in combination with critical discourse analysis, this paper examines the use of biometrics technology in the citizenship and immigration context with particular emphasis on its application at the Canada-U.S. border. The central argument of thls paper is that through the use of biometrics technology at the Canada-U.S crossing, the border has become a social filter that separates welcome from unwelcome migrants depending on strategic objectives to include and exclude population groups, which makes them part of a social an economic strategy in the post-September 11 securitized environment. Moreover, the paper takes the position that through the use of biometrics technology at the Canada-U.S. border, the notion of citizenship is being reconstructed whereby racialized migrants and vulnerable populations will be tremendously affected: most notably, poor migrants from the South as well as refugees and asylum seekers from elsewhere.

Biometrics: constructing 'ideal' subjects and 'aliens' at the Canada-U.S. border

Employing critical social research in combination with critical discourse analysis, this paper examines the use of biometrics technology in the citizenship and immigration context with particular emphasis on its application at the Canada-U.S. border. The central argument of thls paper is that through the use of biometrics technology at the Canada-U.S crossing, the border has become a social filter that separates welcome from unwelcome migrants depending on strategic objectives to include and exclude population groups, which makes them part of a social an economic strategy in the post-September 11 securitized environment. Moreover, the paper takes the position that through the use of biometrics technology at the Canada-U.S. border, the notion of citizenship is being reconstructed whereby racialized migrants and vulnerable populations will be tremendously affected: most notably, poor migrants from the South as well as refugees and asylum seekers from elsewhere.