This discussion’s been going on for a while. Make sure to check out the reader comments on the THES site.

Times Higher Education Supplement

READING LISTS INSPECTED FOR CAPACITY TO INCITE VIOLENCE

by Melanie Newman | 25 July 09

The reading lists of lecturers at the University of Nottingham’s School of Politics and International Relations are being scrutinised for material that is illegal or could incite violence.

The institution has set up a “module review committee”, made up of teaching-group heads, to advise on academics’ teaching material.

A document about the process explains that the reviews’ purpose is to provide feedback to staff on a range of issues, including the topics covered, the assessment methods used and “whether any material on reading lists could be illegal or might be deemed to incite people to use violence”.

The review process has already begun, with reading lists used in the current academic year being checked retrospectively.

The committee was set up after an MA student in Nottingham’s politics department, Rizwaan Sabir, and a clerical assistant, Hicham Yezza, were arrested under anti-terrorism laws last year. Staff called the police after they discovered a copy of the Al-Qaeda Training Manual on Mr Yezza’s computer.

Mr Sabir, who was studying Islamic terrorism for his dissertation, had downloaded the manual from the internet and sent it to his friend, Mr Yezza, for printing. Both men were released without charge, although Mr Yezza was subsequently jailed for immigration offences.

The arrests provoked outrage from scholars, who claimed that they amounted to an attack on academic freedom, a claim that was strongly denied by Nottingham.

David Miller, professor of sociology at the University of Strathclyde and the convenor of Teaching About Terrorism, a study group that has members drawn from 30 universities, said Nottingham’s review policy represented a “fundamental attack on academic freedom”.

“The module review committee is a censorship committee: it can’t operate as anything else,” he said. “The university is acting as the police, one step removed.”

Senior academics at Nottingham have stressed that the committee acts only in an advisory capacity and that its operation was agreed by staff.

Steve Fielding, professor of political history at Nottingham, said: “The policy was agreed in principle at a full meeting of staff, and a working group whose membership was open to all interested staff was set up to refine the details.

“We collectively agreed the policy at a further full meeting of staff. The policy is there to protect staff from the accusation of promoting illegal acts: it is not an attempt to undermine academic freedom.”

A Nottingham spokesman said: “In total, the school teaches almost 100 modules, with reading lists comprising thousands of books and other materials. All of them have been reviewed under the process and not one has caused concern.”

Professor Miller said he was not aware of any other university that was reviewing reading lists.

Alia Brahimi, a research associate at the University of Oxford’s department of politics, specialises in al-Qaeda ideology and strategy and teaches a course on Islam in international relations, both of which require her to consult jihadi tracts.

“As far as I am aware, neither the university nor my department has seriously considered auditing or interfering with the recommended reading on my syllabus,” she said.

Priceless:

GUWAHATI, India–Security forces are planning to mix one of the world’s hottest chili powders in hand grenades to control riots and during insurgency operations in the remote northeast, a defence official said yesterday.

India’s defence scientists say they will replace explosives in small hand grenades with a certain variety of red chili to immobilize a person without killing him.

H/t Tom Ricks.

 

Greg Smith at Serial Consign has a great review – “Open World, Locked City” – of a video game entitled Prototype:

I had the opportunity to spend a few hours playing the game earlier this week and the experience left me a combination of numb and puzzled. The plot revolves around Alex Mercer, a young amnesiac infected with a weapons-grade genetic enhancements that ties him to the outbreak of a related lethal virus. The tone is dire and the game is set in a faithful reproduction of Manhattan, albeit post-quarantine, overrun with mutants and military contractors and rendered in a style that speaks to the cinematography of Children of Men and 28 Days Later. As is the case with most open world games, while the plot is not worth speaking of, the level design and gameplay are.

Greg asks”Does Prototype bring anything novel to the table in terms of playable urban space?” His answer: “Yes, there are some wild opportunities for movement and battle within this game.”

Go read the full article.

Only if your politicians are less intelligent than South Park characters, that is. Thanks to Tom Ricks for pointing out the silliness for what it really is. On Tom’s condescension? I’m reminded of this little episode Canadians are fond of mentioning any time the issue of northern timidity comes up.

I’ve been giving some more thought recently to framing and the problem of militant sanctuary. It’s the end of a long day right now, so I’ll save the longer version for another time. The short version: the angle I want to pursue is that political views of sanctuary may have been, in part, symptomatic of an evangelical trend in foreign policy and military conduct. Recent coverage of intelligence reports embossed with biblical quotes, proselytizing at Baghram air base, troops dressing up their actions in crusader-rap symbolism  all suggest as much. So does this book. As it turns out, some of what Harper’s covered in its last issue was reported way back in the dark ages of 2005. It’s an angle I hadn’t previously considered, except insofar as it may have shaped the sort of narrow worldview we’ve come to associate with the Rumsfeld/Wolfowitz era. But the language of sanctuary, I would think, might have a particular resonance for those whose inclinations tend toward this sort of thing. Something to think about; at least, it’s part of the story yet to be told.