bb (not King, but the dude from Lesley) scrobe:
>I realize this is a gruesome topic -- but has anyone done activity
>theoretical
>studies concerning terrorism?
>
>Is there some theoretical understanding of how this arises as a form of
>human
>action?
it has certainly been a major component of civilizations that arose around
the mediterannean for a long time -
>
>
>Where would we begin? Would Bateson's stick be replaced with a rifle?
>Would
>the animal in Leont'ev's hunt become Bin Laden? Would we substitute
>Mohamed
>Atta for Huckleberry Finn?
this last go-around was so fascinating because the men - were they angry?
coldly rational? self-assured? etc. - employed the very tools of the
system, and transformed them into weapons - a remarkable hybrid. even
more fascinating are the effects of the bombing/hijacking/murder which are
being played out in airline travel, crop-dusting, restaurants, ESL
schools, hotel usage, and what seems to me to be a confrontation with a
kind of reality that the national security council never had the tools to
previously look at.
and what about all of the acts of terrorism (supposedly from anarchists)
at the turn of the last century - McKinley, Czar Alexander, Empress
Elizabeth, Archduke of Austria and Sophia - all of these acts and more
against heads of state in order to destabilize - to bring down - timothy
mcveigh's bombing in oaklahoma was closer to the world trade center /
pentagon in scope - (could he really have believed this would institute a
revolution?) Theodore Kozinsky.
yet i wonder what separates these acts from Jeffrey Dahlmer? there were
certainly acts seeking to attain specific kinds of control - control
through violence. like the two young boys at Columbine.
i guess that all of these acts of violence as well are played out in the
most hum-drum of domestic activities - the scale and scope and rationale
seem to differ - but they all utilize violence as a tool for control -
for inacting agency.
just some stuff off the top of my head, bill.
phillip
>
* * * * * * * *
* *
The English noun "identity" comes, ultimately, from the
Latin adverb "identidem", which means "repeatedly."
The Latin has exactly the same rhythm as the English,
buh-BUM-buh-BUM - a simple iamb, repeated; and
"identidem" is, in fact, nothing more than a
reduplication of the word "idem", "the same":
"idem(et)idem". "Same(and) same". The same,
repeated. It is a word that does exactly what
it means.
from "The Elusive Embrace" by Daniel
Mendelsohn.
phillip white
doctoral student http://ceo.cudenver.edu/~hacms_lab/index.html
scrambling a dissertation
denver, colorado
phillip_white@ceo.cudenver.edu
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