Join co-hosts Malihe and Khali for a talk by Tariq Ali, writer, filmmaker and a long-time political activist. Tariq delivered this presentation on April 23 at the 2004 Conference of the Union for Democratic Communications (UDC) held in Saint Louis, Missouri. The theme for this year’s conference was “The Axis of Empire”. The conference was hosted by the College of Mass Communication and Media Arts at the Southern Illinois University.
Tariq Ali begins his presentation by discussing how the media are globally organized in the age of Washington Consensus following the collapse of Communism. He talks about the control of media in the terms of the language and the images used by them starting with the first Persian Gulf War, and how the media have been used to “whip up the population into war”. At the same time, Tariq points out the power of the public opinion when they see through the deception imposed by the politicians and media barons in. He cites the massive anti-war demonstrations of February 15, 2003 as a manifestation of what he terms a “rebellion against untruth”. Later in his talk, Tariq specifically addresses the reporting by the U.S. media on the occupations of Iraq and Palestine. He goes on to discuss how the resistance in Iraq has affected the media coverage in the U.S, and how this resistance has been an important factor in publication of such titles as Ron Suskind’s The Price of Loyalty, Richard Clarke’s Against All Enemies, and Bob Woodward’s Plan of Attack.
To see a short bio of Tariq Ali, please go to
http://www.versobooks.com/books/ab/a-titles/ali_tariq_bush_babylon.shtml
To obtain more information about the UDC and its
conference, please go to
http://www.udc.org/conf2004/conf2004.html
To contact us at the Middle Eastern and North African
Perspectives (MENAP), you can call 510-848-6767
ext.632 or e-mail [email protected]