US Information resources

Stephen Mallinger reveals the wealth of official US information available on the Web

The Centre recently arranged a talk on web-based US Government information resources for staff and students at Macquarie University. The talk was given by Stephen Mallinger, a US Information Resource Officer based in Bangkok and Peter Gilbert of the Information Resource Centre at the US Consulate in Sydney.

The talk revealed a staggering amount of easily-accessed information from .gov and .mil sites. This is all official government information but the range and depth of what is available surprised all who attended.

Much of the information of interest to students in Politics and International Relations is available on the US Dept of State website at www.state.gov. However Mr Mallinger gave the audience several useful tips. There is a specialized search engine at www.google.com/unclesam which gives particularly fast access to most US Government information which is publicly available. Another particularly good site on US policy is at the US embassy in Brussels at www.uspolicy.be

In depth reports are prepared for members of Congress by the Congressional Research Service. Many of these reports are available to the public at: http://www.opencrs.com, http://2act.org/p/576.html, and http://zfacts.com/p/576.html. Academics, librarians, researchers and students can contact Peter Gilbert for help with particular issues at usissyd@uunet.com.au

Simulating the Arab/Israeli conflict for high schools

Over the past several years the Centre for Middle East and North African Studies has been adapting its award-winning program of computer-based simulations of Middle East politics for local high school students. For many years now, as part of its Outreach Program, the Centre has been advising selected high schools on the Arab/Israeli component of the Higher School Certificate syllabus.

But a few years ago Dulcie Miltiades who was a History teacher at Killara High School and Maria Hill from North Sydney Boys High School suggested that the simulation technology could be made available for high schools. We were able to do this through close cooperation with Macquarie University’s ICT Innovations Centre, which has been established to further technology-aided teaching at the high school level.

After a couple of experimental sessions involving only two schools, the program has flourished. In early 2005 for example, the Centre arranged two simultaneous simulations, which linked over one hundred students from:

• Pennant Hills High School
• South Strathfield High School
• Merewether High School
• Maitland High School
• Fort Street High School.

Unlike the University-level simulations, which concentrate on the politics of the whole region, the high school simulations focus in on the Arab/Israeli dispute, but they still run for about three weeks. Students from the participating high schools are brought on campus for a briefing session before the simulation starts (in the case of country high schools, staff from the Centre travelled to the school for this briefing), and then they are brought back again for a conference at the conclusion of the simulation.

The simulation program has been carefully vetted by the NSW Education Department beforehand, and given a green light to proceed provided it is run by the Centre for Middle East and North African Studies. The reactions from both the student participants and their teachers alike were overwhelmingly positive, and we look to bigger and better high school simulations in the future.

Middle East glossary

The Centre has set up a Middle East glossary on its website as a service to students. If you are confused by terms like Hijab, Hajj, Hegirah and Hejaz you'll find quick and simple definitions on the website. From Abbasid to Zionism, it's all There.

Australia's trade success with the Arab World

The Centre was involved in organising a large breakfast meeting to listen to the success of Australia's trade with the Gulf. Australian businesses are delivering more than $1.1bn worth of exports to UAE Kuwait, Bahrain, Oman and Qatar.

The breakfast, attended by more than 100 people was jointly organised by the Arab Australia Chamber of Commerce and Industry, The Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade and the Australian Institute of Export.

The Centre's Patron-in-Chief, the Governor of NSW, Her Excellency Professor Marie Bashir AC, told a packed audience of businessmen and women at a Sydney breakfast last week, that those doing well in the Middle East understood the ‘rhythm’ of business meetings. Successful Australian traders have established a cooperative and collaborative relationship with their Mid-East buyers and clients.

Two very successful Australian exporters and businesses in the Middle East told the meeting about their achievements. They were consulting engineers and master planners, GHD, and plastics product exporter Pilon Plastics, have learnt the value of understanding the culture and the history of the ancient trading region. This task, the Governor cajoled newcomers to trade in the region, washes away any vestiges of prejudice or misperception that people may hold.

The Governor’s opening of the breakfast was followed by the launch of DFAT’s East Asia Unit’s report, More than Oil: Economic developments in Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar and the United Arab Emirates by the Hon Sandy Macdonald, Parliamentary Secretary to the Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Trade.

Mr Stephen Deady, lead negotiator of Australia’s free trade agreement with the United Arab Emirates explained that this bilateral negotiation between Australia and the UAE was moving well with the able assistance and contribution of the UAE Ambassador, His Excellency, Dr Saeed Mohammed Al Shamsi, who also addressed the meeting.

Essay Prize and Travelling Scholarship

The Centre is pleased to announce that the Australia Arab Chamber of Commerce and Industry is once again generously supporting Middle Eastern studies at Macquarie by sponsoring the Annual Essay Prize and Travelling Scholarship.

These scholarships are open to all Macquarie students who have studied any of the Middle East Politics subjects offered. The awards are a $1000 cash prize for the best essay from a Middle East Politics subject and a $3000 travelling scholarship granted to a student to experience the Middle East for the first time whilst undertaking an academic project.

Further details and conditions are on the Centre’s website.

Coming talks

Friday Sept 9th
Peter Rodgers, former Australian ambassador to Israel, speaking on Israel & Palestine: Hope after Gaza? Peter Rodgers has written numerous articles and two books on the Israel/Palestine situation: "The Prison of Memory" and "Herzl's Nightmare". His talk will provide an insightful analysis of the current situation in Israel and Palestine. Fri. Sep. 9 at 12:00 noon in Building E7B, room 100.

Friday October 7th
The distinguished international scholar, Professor Michael Carter, Professor of Arabic, University of Oslo, Norway, will speak on: The Arabic Language and Islamic Fundamentalism Fri, Oct 7th at 12:00 noon, in Building W6A, room 107.

Andrew Vincent re-elected

Dr Andrew Vincent

Dr Andrew Vincent, The Centre's Director, has been re-elected to the position of President of the Australia Arab Chamber of Commerce and Industry, NSW chapter for 2005/2006. The Chamber has 120 members in NSW and 450 across Australia. Its role is to improve Australian Arab relations and increase business opportunities between Australia and Arab countries.

For further details of the Chamber, visit: www.austarab.com.au

Bias in war reporting

The Centre arranged a particularly thought-provoking talk last month by Dr. Annabelle Lukin, postdoctoral research fellow from the Department of Linguistics speaking on " Reporting the Iraq War: Perspectives from the ABC's AM Programme and Al-Jazeera" In her presentation, Dr Lukin spoke about her current research project, 'Reporting war: mapping meaning and the potential for bias in the news', a three-year investigation of the reporting of the Iraq war, to consider issues about how different media sources have represented it.

She reported on some recent work, comparing the reporting of the Coalition attack on Falluja, in the week of November 8th to 15th, 2004, from the English website of the Arabic news service, and from ABC Radio National's morning current affairs programme, AM. While it would be natural to expect differences between these news sources, given that the Aljazeera service does news reporting, while AM is a current affairs program, the news stories were considered from a more general question: what does each service offer their readers/listeners by way of an experience of the Iraq war?

A clear finding is that much stronger orientation in the Aljazeera reports to the perspective of the experience of civilians, who turn up much more frequently as participants in the events of war across the different stories provided by Aljazeera. Civilians are more frequently represented as both affected by the actions of others, and as taking action in response.

When compared to Aljazeera, the AM programme more strongly favours the Coalition perspective, by giving people associated with the Coalition a much stronger presence, both as spokespeople, and as those taking responsibility for the events of war. In addition, the events of war are presented in the AM stories as more typically impacting the combatants fighting against the Coalition, and much less, compared with Aljazeera, as impacting on civilians.

Using these findings as an illustration, Annabelle suggested the need to develop a more complex understanding of bias - to see beyond the 'loaded words' over which people typically argue, in order to consider the less overt dimensions of language choice, which affect the way the media 'mediates' our experience of war.

One Day Lebanon Conference at Macquarie

Prof. Michael Hudson

The Centre for Middle East and North African Studies in conjunction with the School of Economics and Finance held a one-day conference on Lebanon recently. The conference was opened by the Vice Chancellor Professor Di Yerbury and the keynote speaker for the conference was Professor Michael Hudson from Georgetown University in Washington DC.

A career from Middle East studies

The Centre’s Director, Dr Andrew Vincent recently received an unexpected email from a former student at Macquarie: Dear Dr Vincent, This will probably seem a bit corny, but I am just writing to let you know what a great start your courses in Middle Eastern politics have given my career. Thanks to your courses, I was able to study in Morocco (again, with your support) and able to undertake two internships with the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Canberra where I was reviewing cases from the Middle East. I also was able to get involved with the United Nations Development Fund for Women in Australia, where I was a volunteer project assistant for an Afghanistan Gender and Law project. As of October last year I have been working as a Protection Counsellor for the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees in Hong Kong, and just love my job. While I conduct refugee status determination for many nationalities, my background in Middle Eastern studies has been hugely beneficial (and in demand!) in examining the increasing number of cases from that region. So, just to say thank you for terrific courses, teaching and opening up a field which is hugely interesting and offering great opportunities. I wish you all the best, and hope that you realise what a big impact you have had. Yours sincerely Claire James

Distinguished Israelis speak at Macquarie

Two distinguished Israeli academics have given talks at Macquarie recently at the invitation of the Centre. Dr. Uri Davis is an honorary research fellow at the University of Durham's Institute for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies (IMEIS) and at the University of Exeter's Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies spoke to a large audience in June on "Lifting the veil on Israeli apartheid". Last month, Professor Eli Salzberger, Vice Dean, Faculty of Law, Haifa University, Israel, spoke to many students and staff on "Balancing Human Rights and National Security: the Situation in Israel".