Westfield Athenaeum Library
Meet the Author
The Westfield Athenaeum Presents Westfield State College Assistant Professor Nessim Watson Nessim Watson, an Assistant Professor of Communications at Westfield State College, will present the final lecture in the Westfield Athenaeum's Spring Lecture Series on Wednesday, June 14 at 7:00 p.m.
Mr. Watson's lecture is entitled From Silly to Sinister: A History of the Image of the Arab in U.S. Popular Culture & Foreign Policy.
Mr. Watson teaches about the economics and politics of the American mass media, especially as it interacts with our democracy, culture, and the representation of race. He will be making a multimedia presentation based in part on his recently completed dissertation. Focusing on the history of how Arabs and Muslims have been seen by Americans in both American popular culture & U.S. foreign policy, Mr. Watson will present research from his book-in-progress, Action Movie Arabs and the American Call to Endless War.
Taking from Edward Said's concept of Orientalism, Mr. Watson attempts to trace out a specifically American form of Orientalism, as distinct from the European variety studied by Said. He will show not only the changes in how the Middle East is portrayed and understood by Americans, but also that the representations in the two separate spheres (pop culture and foreign policy) have been steadily converging toward the same message. The conclusion is that this progression greatly assisted the Bush administration in gathering public support for the War in Iraq. According to Mr. Watson, as more than half the American public now feels that starting this war was a mistake, it is time to begin looking at how and why we are all so quickly persuaded to war, so that we can mount a critical defense against such destructive policies in our future.
The lecture is free and open to the public. For more information, please call the Westfield Athenaeum at 413-568-7833.
