Yesterday’s Guardian carries video and comment regarding the demolition of a Bedouin village in the Negev region of Israel. Neve Gordon provocatively refers to the razing of this village as ‘ethnic cleansing’, arguing that it is evidence of the state of Israel’s desire to ‘Judaise’ the Negev. The description of the demolition of residential structures and the uprooting of trees certainly indicates an attempt to prevent the Bedouin establishing a claim to territory that Israel regards as its own (and thus, following the logic of Zionism, as Jewish). Building is a primary way in which identity and territory can be linked since dwelling establishes a durable relationship between individuals and the place they reside in. Given that ethnic cleansing is defined by its assumed linkage of identity and territory one can understand how Gordon comes to his conclusion. However striking this claim might be, however, to my mind it obscures the deeper politics of administrative demolition in Israel.
Click on the book cover on the right to see contents and read an extract
Urbicide is the first book length discussion of the deliberate destruction of cities. I examine the ‘killing of cities’ in cases such as the 1992-95 Bosnian war, the Russian Chechen Campaigns, and the Israel-Palestine conflict. I outline a theoretical understanding of what is achieved in such destruction.
Last week I took part in an extremely interesting workshop at the British Library. Citizenship Without Community was hosted by the Open University in collaboration with the BISA poststructural politics working group. The workshop examined ideas concering citizenship, begining with thoughts from Engin Isin (The Open University) and closing with a paper by Étienne Balibar (University of California, Irvine. In between there were a number of thoughful contributions on the nature of contemrpoary citizenship from Vicki Squire (Open University), Angharad Closs Stephens (Durham University), Joe Painter (Durham University), Jonna Pettersson (Lund University), Andrew Schapp (Exeter University), Cindy Weber (Lancaster University), Rutvica Andrijasevic (Open University), Claudia Aradau (Open University), Umut Erel (Open University), and Jef Huysmans (Open University).
For those who weren’t able to be at the workshop podcasts of all of the day’s contributions are now online along with photos of the event. You can find them here.
The ongoing disruption caused by volcanic ash has demonstrated some of the ways in which contemporary urban life is constituted by its infrastructures. Similar in many ways to Don DeLillo’s Airborne Toxic Event, the cloud from Eyjafjallajökull has reinforced the manner in which our sense of self is tied up in the things and circuits that keep us mobile and fed. Continue reading Ash and infrastructure»
NB: This video has graphic images of killing. Viewers should exercise discretion. You Tube recommends that the video is not viewed by anyone under the age of 18.
I’ve been away for a couple of weeks and so have not been able to respond to the wikileaks ‘Collateral murder‘ video.1 Like many others I was initially struck by the way the video exemplifies the contemporary intersection of video-gaming, spectacle and warfare. Indeed, the uncanny resonance of the footage with the ‘Death from above’ mission in Call of Duty 4: Modern Warfare seem to invite the viewer to draw uncomfortable parallels. Continue reading Observations on ‘Collateral Murder’»
Thanks to Nate Wright for alerting me to this video ↩
The Facebook half-billion: interconnection, infrastructure, anthropocentrism
July 30th, 2010I find last week’s news that facebook has reached the milestone of 500 million subscribers interesting for several reasons. Continue reading The Facebook half-billion: interconnection, infrastructure, anthropocentrism»
Tags: anthropocentrism, cyborgs, facebook, infrastructure, networks, social media, technology
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