A Case of Cosmopolitan Memory? The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and the Global Media - Jérôme Bourdon (Tel Aviv University, IL)
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The document explores the concept of cosmopolitan memory in relation to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, challenging traditional notions of collective memory bound by national contexts. It discusses the role of media, local witnesses, and transnational audiences in shaping perceptions of the conflict while highlighting the complexities of framing these narratives. Ultimately, it argues for a rethinking of memory as a multifaceted process that intersects global and local experiences.
A Case of Cosmopolitan Memory? The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict and the Global Media - Jérôme Bourdon (Tel Aviv University, IL)
- 1. A case of cosmopolitan memory? The media and the Israeli-Palestinian conflict Jér ôme Bourdon Tel Aviv University, Israel Center for the Sociology of Innovation, Ecole des Mines, Paris EU SCREEN CONFERENCE, STOCKHOLM, SEPTEMBER 15, 2011
- 2. Cosmopolitan memory as oxymoron Halbwachs denied the possibility of universal/transnational collective memory « History could be considered as the universal memory of the human race. But there is no universal memory. Collective memory of any kind must be related to a given group located in space and time » (La mémoire collective, 1949). Even the nation was not central to his theoretical outlook The growing field of media/memory studies: distant ‘memory making’ (Neiger et al., 2011)
- 3. Cosmopolitanism as political utopia/experience/methodology Cosmopolitanism: a set of normative principles (« an ornament of the elite ») Cosmopolitanism as often experienced, often unconsciously, as latent (conflictual) historical process Cosmopolitanism as methodological choice: releasing major concepts, including memory, « from the fetters of the nation »
- 4. Food for memory: Israel-Palestine, the main foreign story Israel-Palestine as the main « global media conflict » (but Israel-Palestine fatigue?) Jerusalem as « default » foreign news Justifications (the 3 religions/petrol/holocaust/ diasporas) which feed themselves … .and feed culture beyond news: Israel Palestine as cultural artifacts: documentaries, films, memoirs, comics, detective stories
- 5. Joe Sacco. Palestine. 1993
- 6. Suad Amiry. Sharon and my mother in law. 2006
- 7. Beyond journalists: Local Witnesses as Agents of Memories The local actors of the conflict have long been used to narrating their experience to international audiences … . And to taking to witness the media and the political pilgrims and tourists … Instant/distant witnessing on the Internet Machsomwatch: http://www.machsomwatch.org/en/videos B’Tselem: http://www.btselem.org Shovrim Shtika: www.breakingthesilence.org.il
- 8. Archiving for the Future « And the place of Breaking the Silence is now to create a bank, a museum of the Second Intifada, so that when Israeli society inscribes its national narrative about what happened here during these years, it will not be able to ignore the thousands of hours of sound and video of soldiers testimonies » (Yehuda Shaul, Initiator of Breaking the Silence…. for who ?)
- 9. Appropriations by audiences: media,identity and collective memories Transnational diasporic audiences: Jews, Arabs and Muslims, the radical left The Europe/US divide? Different relations to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict However, beware of national/continental reification: « multi-layered, transnational spaces and cultures of memory » (Ulrich Beck)
- 10. Framing the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Some examples From the left: the occupation as a universal good fight (less so after 9/11 and the rise of radical islam) Distant suffering (Boltanski): a politics of compassion (« Christian » framing) The Israeli-Palestinian conflict as global risk for world peace (the case of the nov. 2003, European Commission sponsored opinion poll)
- 11. Framing through metaphors Israel as historical miracle, socialist experiment (kibbutz) The watershed of 1967: occupation, colonization The rise of the Palestinians in public space: new lexicon (Intifada, Nakba), new metaphors (Palestinians as David/Jews) A rising metaphor: the apartheid
- 12. Cosmopolitanism as challenge for the media Cosmopolitan memory is not an oxymoron, but a complex process: “issues of global concerns are becoming part of the everyday local experience and the moral life worlds of the people” (Ulrich Beck) The mainstream media still functioning in the old national frame of neutrality/objectivity Talking to journalists, backstage: cracks in « professionalism »