Synopses & Reviews
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Why Do People Hate America?", a phrase that one hears almost daily in America today. In their important new book, Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies dissect this question and get to the root of the all too complicated answer. An answer that is not a straightforward counterblast to the hatred expressed for America but rather a look at the consequences of interaction in a world in which gross disparities of power, wealth, freedom, and opportunity must be factored into each and every situation.
Already an international bestseller, Why Do People Hate America? doesn't stop there but rather examines, discusses and debates many topics, including:
- The indiscriminate use of the term 'America' to cover many different aspects of U.S. influence and operation around the world and how it is a reflection of the 'hamburger syndrome'.
- The way in which the brand called 'America' has been sold to the rest of the world and the consequences of the globalization of American culture on developing countries are examined via analysis of: American foreign and economic policies; U.S. treatment of the rest of the world at the United Nations; American control of global institutions such as the International Monetary Fund and World Trade Organization; and U.S. relationship with developing countries over the last five decades.
- Why are presumptions of innocence and self-righteousness so central to American self-image? The authors examine America's image of itself in its historic narratives and founding myths. They argue that definitions are relational terms, in that everyone's image of self includes, and in part depends on, their view of other people.
- How the power of the American media works to keep Americans closed to experiences and ideas from the rest of the world and thereby increases the insularity, self-absorption and ignorance that are the overriding problems the rest of the world has with America.
- How the foreign policy of the U.S. government, backed by its military strength, has unprecedented global influence now that the United States is the world's only superpower its first 'hyperpower'.
- The problem of 'knowledgeable ignorance': defined as knowing people, ideas, civilizations, religions, histories as something they are not and could not possibly be - and maintaining these ideas even when the means exist to know differently.
- The American construction of the 'axis of evil' is a form of grand absolutism reflecting America as a hostile, inimical perversion, endemic and operating within other nations all around the globe.
The authors of Why Do People Hate America? know that the one of the hardest things for people to do is examine oneself and admit one's own problems. The same holds true for the U.S., as a nation, creating much frustration within the country and infuriation, antipathy, hostility and even hatred beyond the bounds of America. If America refuses to reflect upon its history, its uses and abuses of power and wealth at home and abroad, the consequences of its lifestyle and abundance, the relations between quality of life and values, the relation between ideals and practical application of those ideals to all of its people, then what chance has the rest of the world of engaging America in reasoned discussion?
First published in the U.K., the book was described as "required reading" by the Independent and as "original and thought provoking" by the New Statesman, while the Times Higher Education Supplement found it to be "packed with tightly argued points."
Review
"Why Do People Hate America? contains valuable information and insights that we should know, over here, for our own good, and the world's." Noam Chomsky
Review
"Why Do People Hate America? is a welcome antidote to the self-serving drivel that passes for sophisticated analysis in much of U.S. media and mainstream commentary. I strongly recommend this provocative book to anyone concerned with the United States and its role in the world." Robert W. McChesney, Author, Our Media, Not Theirs
Review
"For a most considered view and analysis that seeks to reduce that hate while showing its true causes, have a look at Ziaudin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies's new book Why Do People Hate America?. It's all there in tragic black and white, with the political context missing in most surveys and news reports." Danny Schechter, Executive Editor, Mediachannel.org
Review
"The authors do a good job...in establishing Americans' ignorance of the effects of their foreign policy, the double standards American politicians apply to other countries (the rejection of the Kyoto treaty can stand for many other decisions), and the unwillingness of Americans to recognize the destruction of other countries' economies and biodiversity in the interest of a fast American buck." Houston Chronicle
Synopsis
An essential book for those trying to understand why America--and Americans--are targets for hate.
Synopsis
The controversial bestseller that caused huge waves in the UK! The Independent calls it "required reading." Noam Chomsky says it "contains valuable information that we should know, over here, for our own good, and the world’s." We call it our biggest book so far and will be backing it from day one with guaranteed co-op spending, a national publicity and review blitz, talk radio bookings, various retail sales aids including postcards, and of course the usual full court press on the Web and via email.
This is NOT just another 9/11 book: it is the book for those of us trying to understand why America—and Americans—are targets for hate. Many people do hate America, in Europe, Asia, South America and Africa, as well as in the Middle East. Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies explore the global impact of America’s foreign policy and its corporate and cultural power, placing this unprecedented dominance in the context of America’s own perception of itself. In doing so, they consider TV and the Hollywood machine as a mirror which reflects both the American Dream and the American Nightmare. Their analysis provides an important contribution to a debate which needs to be addressed by people of all nations, cultures, religions and political persuasions—and especially by Americans.
Described by The Times Higher Education Supplement as "packed with tightly argued points," the book is carefully researched and built to withstand the inevitable criticism that will be aimed at it. A book that some reviewers will love to hate and others will praise for its insights, it’s guaranteed to cause a stir.
Ziauddin Sardar is a prominent and highly respected journalist and author. Prolific and polymath, he is a familiar U.K. television and radio personality.
Merryl Wyn Davies, writer and anthropologist, is a former BBC television producer.
Synopsis
The controversial bestseller that caused huge waves in the UK!
The Independent calls it "required reading." Noam Chomsky says it "contains valuable information that we should know, over here, for our own good, and the world's." We call it our biggest book so far and will be backing it from day one with guaranteed co-op spending, a national publicity and review blitz, talk radio bookings, various retail sales aids including postcards, and of course the usual full court press on the Web and via email.
This is NOT just another 9/11 book: it is the book for those of us trying to understand why America--and Americans--are targets for hate. Many people do hate America, in Europe, Asia, South America and Africa, as well as in the Middle East. Ziauddin Sardar and Merryl Wyn Davies explore the global impact of America's foreign policy and its corporate and cultural power, placing this unprecedented dominance in the context of America's own perception of itself. In doing so, they consider TV and the Hollywood machine as a mirror which reflects both the American Dream and the American Nightmare. Their analysis provides an important contribution to a debate which needs to be addressed by people of all nations, cultures, religions and political persuasions--and especially by Americans.
Described by The Times Higher Education Supplement as "packed with tightly argued points," the book is carefully researched and built to withstand the inevitable criticism that will be aimed at it. A book that some reviewers will love to hate and others will praise for its insights, it's guaranteed to cause a stir.
About the Author
Ziauddin Sardar is a writer, broadcaster and cultural critic. He is the editor of
Futures®, a multidisciplinary refereed journal that "seeks to examine possible and alternative futures of all human endeavours." His numerous books include
The A to Z of Postmodern Life (2002);
Aliens R Us (2002);
Orientalism (1999) and
Postmodernism and the Other (1998). He has also written a series of highly successful illustrated guides in the "Introducing" series, including
Islam, Mathematics, Chaos, Media Studies, Science Studies, Postmodernism, and the international bestseller,
Cultural Studies. He is widely known for his regular contributions to the
New Statesman and national and international newspapers and magazines.
Merryl Wyn Davies is a writer and anthropologist. A former television producer for BBC and the author of a number of books, including the highly-acclaimed Knowing One Another: Shaping an Islamic Anthropology (1998), and the co-author of Distorted Imagination: Lessons from the Rushdie Affair (1990) and Barbaric Others: A Manifesto on Western Racism (1993). Her most recent books are Darwin and Fundamentalism (2000) and Introducing Anthropology (2002).
Table of Contents
Introduction (5)
CHAPTER ONE (15)
Standing at Ground Zero
CHAPTER TWO (39)
'They' 'Evil', 'Hate' 'America'
CHAPTER THREE (63)
America and the World as America
CHAPTER FOUR (103)
American Hamburgers and Other Viruses
CHAPTER FIVE (137)
American Stories and Telling Stories to America
CHAPTER SIX (171)
The Burden of the American Hero
CHAPTER SEVEN (193)
Hating America and Transcending Hatred
Notes (213)
Select Bibliography (219)
Index (225)