I’m late for the neocon bus! Last week the Washington Post ran an Op-Ed by a Harvard Law student calling for an investigation of the National Endowment for the Humanities for its funding of Arabic instruction materials. The student, who is taking Arabic at Harvard, chiefly objects to the tone of the materials as “an indoctrination into misery.” Though of course Joel B. Pollak, clearly a landsman (that’s Yiddish for my coreligionist) also objected to having to see Nasser praised in a film. “To study Arabic in America today is to be inducted into a world of longing, abandonment and regret.” The piece has a condescending, all-knowing tone. For instance, Pollak says we only know about the 12th century Islamic philosopher Averroes because Jews translated his work. OK, let’s just have Israelis teach Arabic. They’re good at it.
Orientalism in the media, it feels so yesterday. Why is the Post making room for this stuff?
Another Harvard student promptly defenestrated two of Pollak’s claims, in a letter to the Post. “Mr. Pollak claimed that the maps in ‘Al-Kitaab’ do not include Israel. There are three maps in the book: On Page 13, Israel is represented without the West Bank and Gaza. On Page 389, two historical maps (from the Ottoman era to World War I) predate Israel’s existence.”
Related posts:
- Fight Over Arabic and Hebrew Instruction Makes Me Pine for… Fairness
- ‘If an Israeli woman had lost five daughters in a Palestinian attack, would Washington Post balance that image?’
- Washington Post reporter Tom Ricks describes paper’s unreconstructed neocon op-ed page as ‘insane’
- Cheney on Bernard Lewis
- ‘The Washington Post’ is pro-neocon, says Robert Parry
{ 11 comments }
It was good to see Pollack thoroughly pummelled by the commentors. But why did the Washington Post even consider printing such a silly article? Are they really pretending they don't know what's behind this submission from the president of the Harvard Law Alliance for Israel? All their readers seem to know.
More on this Joel Pollak character (among other things, a lackey of Alan Dershowitz) here:
http://www.kabobfest.com/2008/07/joel-pollak-takes-on-arabic-textbook.html
"To study Arabic in America today is to be inducted into a world of longing…….."
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
"NEXT YEAR IN JERUSALEM"
I was struck by the Averroes "complaint" too, Phil.
"The third movie, "Destiny," told the story of the great medieval Islamic philosopher Averroes and his struggles against Islamic religious fundamentalism. It was a bit more nuanced than the first two. But the film omitted the fact that it was only through the Hebrew transcription of Averroes's writings by Jewish scholars in Egypt that his works were preserved for posterity."
So he could only consider it "balanced" and scholarly if the "Hebrew translators" were mentioned? Is this relevant concerning a short video on his life?
It somehow reminded me of a debate on Daniel Pipes blog, were I dared to mention that without Arabic translations we wouldn't have many of the classic Greek texts, and was heavily attacked as a nitwit, by a nitwit.
This is a standard in classic studies over here and does shows on Wikipedia, no trace of it on the English Wiki entries.
I have to admit, that by now I have an almost instinctive disgust reaction to these hypersensibilies.
I should add: as a translator your ultimate goal is to get the original voice over as closely as possible. You win, when it rises from the paper as recognizably the same as in the original.
You are a servant to this voice and not a master.
so much for the young jews.
another single loyalist – to israel.
speaking of singularity
william kristol to make amends for being a traitor will become an airborne ranger typist.
revoltn bonzo "whitey" bolton will become a navy walrus – the elite of the elite: one walrus equals 12 barking seals.
richard prince of darkness perle will change his moniker to princess of happy hour and service the troops in iraq. no greater sacrifice can a "man" make.
wolfowitz, feith, and wurmser will join the pentagon's paint ball squads and learn to grunt.
cant anymore accuse any traitoring jewcon of not serving america.
"To study Arabic in America today is to be inducted into a world of longing…….."
_ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _ _
"NEXT YEAR THE RAPTURE WILL FINALLY COME."
I like your scenario, concerning Bolton, you have to read the latest blog entry of one of my favorite teachers on US politics.
http://www.ips.org/blog/jimlobe/?p=168
"another single loyalist – to israel."
This made me stop and ponder. I am still not madly in love with the dual loyalty or single loyalty line of thought. But neither do I have a better coinage. It's a complex phenomenon.
I think Joel B. Pollak's article is in support of our dear Philman's achievements line of thought, the problem is that we are hesitant to take his maybe partly justified critique, since it feels tremendously biased. It's a very personal take, were an objective report would be needed.
Hilarious posting on this:
http://elijahzarwan.net/blog/?p=653
Interesting article. I'm also a fan of:
http://joshxiong.com/?p=43
Who writes an article an Bernard, that is prolly worth checking out
Interesting article. I'm also a fan of:
http://joshxiong.com/?p=43
Who writes an article an Bernard, that is prolly worth checking out
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