Al-Hurra/ الحرة

ttp://www.alhurra.com/ProgramDetails.aspx?id=2244593&CID=1

The link above is to the magazine section of Al-Hurra. Al-Hurra (Arabic for Freedom) is the channel the US Military created in the Arab world with their invasion of Iraq and to respond to other channels such as Al-Jazeera. In our class discussion last Wednesday Dhvani spoke of her frustration that Media of the 'first' world bombards 'us' in the 2/3rds world Majority.

I think things like Al-Hurra are fairly powerful tactics --and it's referenced by name (page 3) in the article by Nye, "Public Diplomacy and Soft Power." I really encourage you to browse the site, and realize just how much ideology and hegemony permeate it. Of course, the channel is broadcast in Arabic. A lethal power indeed is soft power. Though others may disagree. I find 'soft power' and cultural hegemonic trends one of the most alarming powers the US uses internationally. I imagine even White Europeans must be sick of it. It disturbs me because so many people don't have Media literacy internationally and they lack critical tools to distinguish a discourse of race available only to the 'privileged' few of us in the US. The reality we live in, gives none of us tools against this phenomena.

I'm disturbed. We, the 2/3rds world Majority, are loosing. Everyone will be culturally white soon enough and perform whiteness without any ability to distinguish otherwise, or see a flaw. We have no tools and no strength to combat this monster. It's far too big and the pockets are far too deep. If we happen not to perform whiteness then we perform the lens of stereotype whiteness stages us in instead, thinking and identifying with it as authentically our own.

I reflect back on Leanna’s comments of her experience as a Peace Corps Volunteer in one of the poorest African countries. There too, children consume American Media and it affects their culture. I reiterate, in the US we are the strongest and most protected population against US cultural imperialism. BUT, What does the 2/3rds world majority have to combat it? What alternatives are given us? . . .