"War Resistance and Counter-Resistance in the U.S.A. and France"
organized by Professor Francis McCollum Feeley
Director of research at CEIMSA (The University of California)
and
member of CREA (Université Paris X at Nanterre)
Friday, 11 April 2008
10 AM to 7 P.M
Amphi S2 on the Nanterre campus
10h : Welcome by Pierre Guerlain (Director of research at CREA) and Francis Feeley.
10h 30: Francis Feeley (Professor of American Studies at Stendhal University-Grenoble3 and director of the Center for the Advanced Study of American Institutions and Social Movements [CEIMSA], the web site of which is temporarily located on The University of California-San Diego server : http://dimension.ucsd.edu/CEIMSA-IN-EXILE/. Francis Feeley has taught European and U.S. History for over 30 years at institutions of higher education in the United States, France, and the in Former Soviet Union, where he taught as a Fulbright Scholar in 1993-94. He has published eight books and more than a dozen articles on European and American social history. He is a member of the Association Française d’Etudes Américaines, and the Société des Anglicistes de l’Enseignement Supérieur, and is presently affiliated with the research laboratory, Centre de recherches anglophones (CREA) at the Université de Paris X (Nanterre), where he is directing the theses of eight Ph.D. students. Professor Feeley also serves on the Board of Directors of the International Endowment for Democracy [http://www.iefd.org] in New York City.) :
"The Political Economy of 'Homeland Security' in the USA"
Abstract: Stephen Lendman wrote in his February 2008 review of Jonathan Cook's book, Israel And The Clash Of Civilizations that, "Israeli technology firms pioneered the homeland security industry, still dominate it, and it's made the country the most tech-dependent in the world and its fourth largest arms exporter after the US (far and away the biggest), Russia and France. The US Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is one of its biggest customers for high-tech fences, unmanned drones, biometric IDs, video and audio surveillance gear, air passenger profiling, prisoner interrogations systems, thermal imaging systems, fiber optics security systems, tear gas products and ejector systems and much more." Naomi Klein in her new book, The Shock Doctrine, the rise of disaster capitalism, lists the Israeli security industry's reach around the world since September 11, 2001, and concludes: "The extraordinary performance of Israel's homeland security companies is well known to stock watchers, but it is rarely discussed as a factor in the politics of the region." In this paper we will look at the political economy of the U.S. Homeland Security policy since 9/11 and evaluate the vested interests in actually reducing the terrorist threat.
11h : George Brown (ancient membre du "Black Panther Party for Self-Defense") :
"Racism as a Counter-Revolutionary Strategy to Secure a 'Permanent War Economy'
in the United States since World War II"
Abstract: The Black Panther Party for Self-Defense) represented a cultural revolution in African American relations in the United States. It was founded in northern California 1966 by Bobby Seale and Huey P. Newton. Their famous Ten Point Program for the Panther Party included:
* We want power to determine the destiny of our black and oppressed communities.
* We want full employment for our people.
* We want an end to the robbery by the capitalists of our Black Community.
* We want decent housing, fit for the shelter of human beings.
* We want decent education for our people that exposes the true nature of this decadent American society. We want education that teaches us our true history and our role in the present-day society.
* We want completely free health care for all black and oppressed people.
* We want an immediate end to police brutality and murder of black people, other people of color, all oppressed people inside the United States.
* We want an immediate end to all wars of aggression.
* We want freedom for all black and oppressed people now held in U. S. Federal, state, county, city and military prisons and jails. We want trials by a jury of peers for all persons charged with so-called crimes under the laws of this country.
* We want land, bread, housing, education, clothing, justice, peace and people's community control of modern technology.
This political Declaration in conjunction with practical social service programs, such as the Panthers' Free Breakfast for Children program, constituted a positive socialist strategy which attracted great resistance by pro-capitalist forces, including infiltration, harassment, sabotage, and assassinations. Our discussion on April 11 will attempt to place the Panthers' initial struggle against racism in its historical context and outline the evolution of this movement from 1966 until today.
12h : déjeuner collective (group lunch).
13h30 : Patrick Litsangou (Doctorant en langues et littératures anglaises et anglo-saxonnes à l’Université Paris X, Nanterre. Sujet de thèse :Les implications de l’Avènement du Phénomène du Blogging aux Etats-Unis :Bouleversement des Sources Traditionnelles d’Informations,Emancipation de l’Individu du Pouvoir des Médias,Démocratisation et Amélioration de l’Information. Thèse sous la direction du Professeur Francis Feeley. 2007 :Obtention du Master ll,en études anglophones à L’Université Stendhal,Grenoble lll. Sujet du mémoire de Master :Les Tentatives de Privatisation de la Sécurité Sociale Américaine :Acteurs des Campagnes de Sensibilisation et Tactiques de Persuasion des Libéraux. 2005 :Obtention de la maîtrise au département d’anglais de l’Université Omar Bongo au Gabon. Sujet du mémoire :The Socio- Political Agitation and Ensuing Reforms in Victorian Britain from 1815 to 1867.) :
"La Couverture des Evénements dans l’Irak Post-Invasion : Une des Nombreuses Illustrations de la Concurrence Croissante entre les Médias Traditionnels
et les Médias Alternatifs"
Résumé de la Communication : La communication est axée sur la concurrence de plus en plus vive entre les médias traditionnels et les médias dits alternatifs en termes de couverture de conflits armés. Pour illustrer ce fait l’analyse du contenu du weblog de Dahr Jamail,journaliste américain indépendant en Irak,a été necessaire.La compilation des dépêches qu’il envoyait regulièrement aux Etats-Unis,a fait l’objet d’un ouvrage dans lequel il décrit la situation politique mais surtout socio-économique peu de temps après la seconde invasion de l’Irak.Le journal en ligne de Dahr Jamail visait à donner à l’opinion publique américaine et même à la communauté internationale une version différente de celle des grands médias très souvent inféodés au pouvoir politique,concernant la situation en Irak.
14h30 : Gilles Vachons (Poète, marqué par la guerre, vécue dans le Paris de lÂ’occupation nazie, G.B. Vachon opte dÂ’emblée pour une vie et une carrière internationale. Après des études en France, Angleterre et Allemagne, il enseigne et vit au Brésil, au Danemark et en Tunisie, et termine sa carrière sur deux lignes parallèles : alphabétiseur de travailleurs immigrés et professeur de lettres au lycée international de Grenoble. Ecrivain, dramaturge, poète, il fonde la Maison de la Poésie Rhône-Alpes à St-Martin-dÂ’Hères en 1986. Enseigne actuellement le yoga et le sanskrit.) :
"Résistance civile et militaire dans la France de Vichy : A Familial Testimony"
Résumé de la Communication : Mon vécu de la Résistance sous Vichy est simplement celui d’un enfant parisien qui, de sa huitième à sa treizième année, observe ce qui se passe dans sa famille traversée par les événements : bombardements, exodes, blessures, restrictions, persécutions variées, clandestinité, affrontements politiques. On pourra cependant voir se dessiner différents aspects des structures sociales où se vivaient, dans mon milieu, la guerre et l’Occupation nazie : du prolétariat à la classe moyenne, naissante puis affirmée, en particulier. On montrera comment l’éclatement des modes de vie familiaux favorisait les prises de position dans une population civile qui, en majorité, semblait faire le gros dos. L’immédiat après-guerre réglant ses comptes à la vieille société, déterminera parfois dans ma famille un nouvel élan vers des engagement politiques d’avenir : Europe, communisme ou anticommunisme, etc. Le bilan en 2008 m’incite à une vision distancée des choses.
15h30 : Anthony Wilden (Professeur émérite de l'Université Simon Fraser et l'auteur du livre, Men and Women, War and Peace) :
Presentation of Professor Wilden's documentary film collage, "Chorus Line, Hollywood representations of women and war."
(presented by Francis Feeley, with discussion after the showing)
Abstract : The unifying thesis of this documentary collage of Hollywood films is that sexism which is reproduced in mass culture constitutes a precondition for military indoctrination and, in general, for training in the acceptance of other illegitimate dependent hierarchies that American people learn to accept beginning at a very early age.