Bethany's recent presentation on the terrorist stereotype throughout literature brought me back to Hayan Charara's visit to our class and his reading the same night in Rodman, both of which were extremely thought provoking. His words and readings tied in extremely well with the overall goal of the class. I found the most interesting aspect of Charara's work to be his decision to focus on his personal aspect of the post 9/11 world. Being an Arab American, Charara has had to experience a completely different aspect of the attacks on 9/11 than most Americans would have to experience. Because he is of similar ethnicity as the terrorists on 9/11, Charara has gone through a number of different trying times associated with the hatred and racism towards the Middle Eastern community.
After hearing his readings I was struck by his decision to focus on the perceived "attackers" rather than most of the other material that we have read which focused on the victims of 9/11. In one of my classes this semester we read and discussed Truman Capote's In Cold Blood in which Capote focuses the majority of the story on the two murderers of the Clutter family.
I was curious as to what impact this has on a reader? Is there a major difference between focusing on the victims or focusing on the guilty party? Do you think that one is better than the other? Or if this raised any other points of interest or questions.
After hearing his readings I was struck by his decision to focus on the perceived "attackers" rather than most of the other material that we have read which focused on the victims of 9/11. In one of my classes this semester we read and discussed Truman Capote's In Cold Blood in which Capote focuses the majority of the story on the two murderers of the Clutter family.
I was curious as to what impact this has on a reader? Is there a major difference between focusing on the victims or focusing on the guilty party? Do you think that one is better than the other? Or if this raised any other points of interest or questions.
Will raises an interesting point. I think we can relate the focus of attacker and victim to Lidless. I think the play did a nice job of showing the victim and the attacker. The dialogue focuses on Bashir and how he suffered as a detainee. However, the whole play did not focus on Bashir as a victim. It showed how everyone related to Guantanamo was a victim. Alice was a victim to her own behavior while Rhiannon and Lukas fell victim to the aftermath of trying to cover it up.
ReplyDeleteThere is a different motivation when a piece of literature focuses on the attacker. The motivation may be to sympathize with the attacker- take a walk in their shoes and try to understand them. In the case of Lidless, I don’t think there was sufficient time dedicated to trying to understand Alice’s tactics as an interrogator. The most the audience learned was that she got a high from hurting the bird and was brutal in her techniques because she was allowed to be. The author may also try to show the lack of validity and sanity in an attacker’s actions. This is closer to the understanding the audience has for Alice. The scene where she describes defeathering the bird in the middle of the night shows that she has issues with power and force.
When a story focuses on the victim, it can be a story of healing, sadness, mourning, or growth. Bashir’s story focused on mourning the life he lost, but I think the play ended with a growth on his part. Once he was able to have the surgery and be reconnected with his daughter there was a difference in his demeanor. Alice became more of a victim at the end of the play because Rhiannon died. People tend to connect more with stories about victims because it is easier to empathize with the characters.