Review
Those familiar with the topic will immediately recognise the names of well-respected scholars from the Anglo-American paradigm, including David Miller, Greg Philo and Philip Seib, among the contributors. However, the book goes further in offering a truly global perspective, with contributions by academics, researchers and journalists from geographical backgrounds ranging from the Scandinavian countries to the Middle East and Russia, and with research interests as wide-ranging as the games, film and media industries and peace journalism and cultural studies.
Drawing on these diverse perspectives, the book comes well equipped with the tools needed to unravel the media-terrorism-politics triangle. To mention just the most compelling, those include semiotics (Lena Jayyusi), political theory (Christian Fuchs), inter-sector approaches (Toby Miller, Oliver Boyd-Barrett, David Herrera and Jim Baumann), controversial comparative analysis (Justin Lewis), and the first-hand experiences recounted by journalists Dahr Jamail and Danny Schechter
THE Textbook Guide
Acts of political violence, including terroristic violence, come in different forms, in different parts of the world and perpetrated by different sorts of actors (states, military, insurgents, individuals) who can be motivated by different interests and identities. In today's media environment, the relation between terrorism and media is often no less complex or politically consequential. Historically momentous and deadly as the so-called 'global war on terror' has proved to be, it does not exhaust the complexities of media and terror or their interactions around the world. Media and Terrorism: Global Perspectives intelligently and incisively broadens the discussion, situating it within contexts of global inequality and geopolitical interests, contemporary media environments and strategic and symbolic politics
Simon Cottle
Professor of Media and Communications, Cardiff University
[The book] pulls together so many facts and arguments that it will help anyone grappling with the last eleven years of mayhem, laughingly referred to as the 'war on terror'. Above all it is a long-overdue unscrambling of the deliberate confusions behind the modern use of the word 'terrorism'.
Chris Nineham
Counterfire
A new publication that seeks to not only join but also move forward the established literature on media and terrorism needs to be out of the ordinary. Freeman and Thussu's book 'Media & Terrorism: Global perspectives' appears to be that kind of publication. Marked by smart editorial decision making, this book maps the dynamics of media and terrorism in the era defined by the US as a 'war on terror' with new and interesting academic content, producing an overall package that contrasts positively with the approach and features of many of its forerunners... In sum, this is a unique and interesting book that brings together significant contributions in one place... [and] this book is a must read for students and scholars who wish to understand the relationship between media and terrorism in global context.
Julian Matthews
Internet Journal of Criminology
About the Author
Des Freedman is Reader in Communications and Cultural Studies in the Department of Media and Communications, Goldsmiths, University of London. He is the co-author (with James Curran and Natalie Fenton) of
Misunderstanding the Internet (forthcoming 2011), author of
The Politics of Media Policy (2008) and
The Television Policies of the Labour Party, 1951-2001 (2003) and co-editor (with Daya Thussu) of
War and the Media: Reporting Conflict 24/7 (2003). He is an editor of the Sage journal
Global Media and Communication and a member of the research team in the Goldsmiths Leverhulme Media Research Centre.
Daya Kishan Thussu is Professor of International Communication and Co-Director of India Media Centre at the University of Westminster in London. He is the Founder and Managing Editor of the Sage journal
Global Media and Communication. Among his main publications are:
Electronic Empires (1998);
International Communication - Continuity and Change, second edition (2006);
War and the Media: Reporting Conflict 24/7 (2003);
Media on the Move – Global Flow and Contra-flow (2007);
News as Entertainment (2007) and
Internationalizing Media Studies (2009). He is series editor for two Routledge book series: Internationalizing Media Studies and Advances in Internationalizing Media Studies.
