Abstracts of research papers written for this seminar.

An investigative assessment of the evolutionary shift we have seen in interaction, along with the rise of the internet and following the attacks of September the 11th. In a post-apocalyptic landscape, how does society find itself adapting to new forms of expressionism and organizing realms of importance? Personal sites like ‘Myspace’ and ‘facebook’ are created by users and informally invite the rest of the world to share within their life, in pictures, friends and notes….. and in some cases, their death. Is the internet the digital age’s new necropolis? Is there any connection between the ‘Myspace’ memorials and the decision for variant funeral arrangements for young people? What drives the desire to resolve life online? Is the tradition wailing at a headstone in a graveyard alone dying in vain? To whom are these messages actually addressed? Does anyone actually believe that a past life is still checking their websites? If not, to whom are these letters of grief and sorrow posted? Are we just purging our strongest emotions in tune to the chaotic disorder of the times through the spaces left by the dead or is it that in an crowd of mass production and overpopulation the power of grief has found a new, excited audience to regard the pain of those who around us, while allowing a safe distance from the ‘real’. The terrorist movement online, finding martyrdom dot com. Seeking out death on the internet. Other awesome digressions.

*Regarding the Pain of Others, Ground Zero, The Spirit of Terrorism, Welcome to the Desert of the Real, The Power of Mourning and Violence. As well as other researched articles/editorials/theorists

For my research paper I am working on the topic of 9/11 and terrorist funding, and what has been done since 9/11 in America. Terrorist funding was realized after 9/11 to be a more serious threat than previously thought. I will be using the 9/11 Commission Report as well as other sources. I want to explore the links between terrorism and money; both pre and post 9/11. There are various ways in which al Qaeda raises, launders and moves money from shell business and shell bank accounts to charities and legitimate businesses. Most recently, drug traffiking and opium in particular has been the number one way in which terrorist's operations have been funded. I

I am going to be discussing the role of media throughout 9/11 and what the event would have been like without pictures, television, radio, etc. Media impacted the views of September 11th and was really the way that the world had an idea of what was occuring. I think it is very important to also discuss how the event was viewed hours after the attacks in different countries, which would bring up the topic of censorship. September 11, 2001 is still known as the most photographed day. I will be using many of the readings that we read in the seminar including David Friend's Watching the World Change and Susan Sontag's Regarding the Pain of Others. Crimes of Art and terror is also going to be very important especially pertaining to the chapter entitled "Groundzeroland". In conclusion, my paper will be discussing the roles of various medias on September 11th and what those sources did for society (ex. how it created some idea of visual pleasure).

I’m going to be doing my project focusing on the 9/11 Commission Report. I will be researching how the Report was put together, why there was objective language, and how the United States reacted to the Report’s suggestions. Also, I will try and broach the subject of the nonfiction novel and how the 9/11 Commission Report fits into this category popularized by Truman Capote.

Many of our earlier readings dealt with the event of 9/11 as an expression of contempt for America. Art may be the most widely defined word in our language, but I plan on analyze this topic, and the idea of art as an expression of morals and ideals. I hope to address Stockhausen’s quote that ‘September 11th was the greatest work of art in all of the cosmos’ and the idea of devotion to ideals as an Art Form. I plan to use excerpts from Baudrillard, Virilio, Lentricchia, Butler, and Beigbeder to reinforce my argument.
This event was a tragedy, I am sure all Americans will agree with me there. But the motives of the terrorists must be more complex than many believe. For instance, many write it off as Islamic Extremism, but how many news programs have gone into Jarrah’s view of the Israel/Palestine conflict? Was this purely religious zealotry? And most importantly, does this devotion to belief deserve the title of Art?
To preface this research paper, I believe Art is not only a creation holding aesthetic value, but anything that opens the mind to new ideas. Picasso was amazing because he showed a completely new concept of art. Banksy, who is known for his graffiti in the UK, forces lessons to be learned even if the viewer did not pay an admission fee to a museum. Artists are people who use new methods to send a message or express ideals.

Postmodern literature has a unique way of addressing issues. The literature in general sees the world not as concrete, solid, or absolute. It is often fragmented, difficult to follow, and tends to push the limits of what literature is and can be. In this way, the genre is capable of expressing certain concepts in a way that previous literary forms were not.

For my research paper I plan to do an analysis of Safran Foer's "Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close" as postmodern literature, using Kathy Acker's "Empire of the Senseless," another postmodern work, as a comparison. I will attempt to address the value of postmodern literature when dealing with tragic, traumatic, violent, and emotional issues and topics such as September 11.

I am going to be analyzing the portrayal of the 9/11 terrorists in the following texts and films: The 9/11 Commission Report, the Martin Amis short story “The Last Days of Muhammed Atta”, Frank Lentricchia and Jody McAuliffe’s Crimes of Art and Terror and the films the Hamburg Cell and United 93. I will explore the history of al-Qaeda and the events leading up to 9/11, as well as the initial reactions of government officials to the attacks and how they came to conclude who the perpetrators were. I will analyze the American media’s depiction of the terrorists and the impression made on the American public. I will also analyze the links between 9/11, al-Qaeda and the US military response that followed 9/11 as they are explained in the Commission Report.