Buy this book with With Liberty For Some: 500 Years of Imprisonment in America by Scott Christianson today!

Buy Together Today: $36.66

• With Liberty For Some: 500 Years of Imprisonment in America by Scott Christianson
• The Age of War: The United States Confronts the World by Gabriel Kolko
• The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East by Robert Fisk
• Overthrow: America's Century of Regime Change from Hawaii to Iraq by Stephen Kinzer
• Worse than Slavery: Parchman Farm and the Ordeal of Jim Crow Justice by David M. Oshinsky

Explore similar items : Books (47)

Book Description

Under the rule of Saddam Hussein, the prison of Abu Ghraib (the Father of the Raven) was a place of ill omen, notorious for horrific suffering and torture and mass executions. After the invasion of Iraq, the U.S. military made Abu Ghraib one of the major detention centers for Iraqis suspected of sympathizing with the resistance. The revelations since April 2004 of systematic torture and sexual humiliation of Iraqi detainees at Abu Ghraib have not easily been assimilated into the mythology of the U.S. "war on terror."

The Language of Empire focuses on the response to these revelations in the U.S. media, in congress, and in the larger context of U.S. global politics and ideology. Its focus on the media is a prelude to showing how the language of multiculturalism, humanitarianism, and even feminism have been hijacked in the cause of an illegal and brutal imperialist war.

The media have colluded with the Bush administration in manipulating images of the U.S. occupation of Iraq in such a way as to present it as a clash between civilization and barbarism, and in selectively using legal and procedural issues to distract from the basic criminality of the invasion itself. The circuitous logic through which U.S. imperialism presents itself as a defender of legality and democracy is exposed for all to see in this important and timely work.

From the Back Cover
"With a calmness and clarity of purpose worthy of Virgil, Lila Rajiva leads us step-by-step into a darkness none of us want to confront. But face it we must, if we have any hope of derailing the mad machinery of death and torture unleashed on the world by the Bush Imperium. The horror chambers of Abu Ghraib have become a stomach-turning symbol of the official sadism of the Iraq war. A tragic excess, say some; the work of a demented few, say others. But Rajiva looks deeper, exposing how the perverse logic of torture has infected the language and psychology of the American imperial project, from its sycophants in the press and its evangelists in the pulpit. Her book is an unsettling expedition into the political consciousness of cruelty." —JEFFREY ST. CLAIR, coeditor of CounterPunch and author of Grand Theft Pentagon

"Lila Rajiva has written a citizen's report on the scandal of Abu Ghraib. With the eye of a forensic scientist, she assembles material from the media and reframes it in such a compelling way that I am led to conclude that we, in the U.S., have lost our moral compass. Our government knew the extent of the damage and yet, aided by the media, managed to disguise its culpability. This book is a must-read for anyone who wants to see America become what it has not yet been." —VIJAY PRASHAD, author of The Karma of Brown Folk and Darker Nations: The Rise and Fall of the Third World

"There can be no mistaking the putrid stench clinging to the events, processes and mentality described with the eloquence of excruciating precision in this fine study by Lila Rajiva. It is that of Nazism, by any other name. Hence, like the good Germans before us, today's good Americans bear an unequivocal obligation—morally, legally, and in every other sense—to do whatever is necessary to expose the myriad Eichmanns, large and small, residing within our ranks. As The Language of Empire makes abundantly clear, to shirk such responsibility is to forfeit claim to any humanity we might still possess." —WARD CHURCHILL, author of A Little Matter of Genocide and On the Justice of Roosting Chickens --This text refers to the Hardcover edition.

See all Editorial Reviews

First Sentence:
 Read the first page Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
Abu Ghraib, United States, Washington Post, Cold War, Middle East, Geneva Conventions, Red Cross, New York Times, White House, Nicholas Berg, President Bush, State Department, Amnesty International, Abu Gliraib, Christian Science Monitor, Daniel Pearl, Fox News, Michael Berg, Saddam Hussein, Human Rights Watch, Saudi Arabia, Donald Rumsfeld, Douglas Feith, Gulf War, Homeland Security New!
Concordance | Text Stats Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Copyright | Table of Contents | Excerpt | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!

Search Inside This Book:

If you are a publisher or author and hold the digital rights to a book, you can make it available as an eBook on Amazon.com. Learn more.

I Own It Not Rated Your Rating Don't Like It < > I Love It! Save Your Rating    ? 1 2 3 4 5

Average Customer Review: Write an online review and share your thoughts with other customers.

Search Customer Reviews (What's this?)

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful: Powerful, February 26, 2006 Reviewer: S. Sherman "lefteyeonbooks.org" - See all my reviews    This book was clearly hastily written, and is thus somewhat uneven. At times the author lets her voice get in the way of her evidence. The chapter analyzing the congressional hearings, which attempts to trace where the orders for Abu Graib came from, is confusing. Although Nicholas Berg (the American 'civilian' beheaded in Iraq) emerges as a fascinating character, some of the theories about his story seem to cancel each other out--for example, if he was done in by Russian mob associates (as is implied at one point), then what does this have to do with the rationality of terrorism (the issue raised at another point)? Nevertheless, in toto the book provides a vivid, compelling portrait of the Abu Graib torture and is ultimately convincing in arguing that this is part of the essence of the American intervention in Iraq, rather than an unfortunate failure. Rajiva's argument that this is rooted in a belief in the exercise of power for the sake of power, among virtually all levels of the civilian and military authorities, is unsettling, as is her dissection of the discourses of legalism and moral purity used to obscure the crimes. The idea that torture is central, not marginal, to the occupation will linger with you. Probably not the book to hand someone who supports the US occupation of Iraq (the author's rhetorical excesses will likely turn them off) it will nevertheless strengthen the conviction of those who already understand that liberation does not come through 'shock and awe'.

Be the first person to add product information.

Products:

abu ghraib | iraq government

• Subjects > Nonfiction > Current Events > Terrorism
• Subjects > Nonfiction > Government > Public Affairs & Administration
• Subjects > Nonfiction > Politics > General
• Subjects > Nonfiction > Politics > U.S.
• Subjects > Nonfiction > Social Sciences > Media Studies

Atrocities
Government - U.S. Government
Iraq War, 2003-
Mass media and the war
Media Studies
Political Freedom & Security - Terrorism
Political Science
Politics / Current Events
Politics/International Relations
Prisoners and prisons, American
Public Affairs & Administration


i.e., each book must be in subject 1 AND subject 2 AND ...