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'American' in crisis: opinion discourses, the Iraq War and the politics of identity

Department of Journalism, California State University, Northridge, USA, pyramedia98{at}hotmail.com

Mervat Yousef

Department of French, Grinnell College, IA, USA, youssef{at}grinnell.edu

Dan Berkowitz

School of Journalism and Mass Communication, University of Iowa, USA, dan-berkowitz{at}uiowa.edu

During the Iraq War, news of the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal and the beheading of American citizen Nick Berg disturbed Americans, as they were left trying to negotiate the meanings of these events, wondering what `we' (Americans) stand for versus what `they' (Iraqis) do. These events — and the news media's communication of them to the American public — created a situation we call `nationalistic ambiguity', where occurrences present a mixed message to the public mind about national identity and purpose. This article investigates how opinion columns and letters in US newspapers, which addressed these events, reconciled the paradox of America's mission to liberate a people with the Abu Ghraib prison abuse scandal and the beheading of Nick Berg.

Key Words: Abu Ghraib • ambiguity • American • identity • Iraq War • national • newspapers • Nick Berg • opinion

Media, War & Conflict, Vol. 2, No. 2, 149-170 (2009)
DOI: 10.1177/1750635209104652


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