Dissent from the Homeland

Essays after September 11

Frank Lentricchia, Stanley Hauerwas, Frank Lentricchia, Stanley Hauerwas

• Publisher: Duke University Press Books
• Year: 2003
• Print ISBN: 9780822332213, 9780822332312
• eBook ISBN: 9780822385059
• Topic: History
• Subtopic: North American History
• Index: History

Dissent from the Homeland is a book about patriotism, justice, revenge, American history and symbology, art and terror, and pacifism. In this deliberately and urgently provocative collection, noted writers, philosophers, literary critics, and theologians speak out against the war on terrorism and the government of George W. Bush as a response to the events of September 11, 2001. Critiquing government policy, citizen apathy, and societal justifications following the attacks, these writers present a wide range of opinions on such issues as contemporary American foreign policy and displays of patriotism in the wake of the disaster.

Whether illuminating the narratives that have been used to legitimate the war on terror, reflecting on the power of American consumer culture to transform the attack sites into patriotic tourist attractions, or insisting that to be a Christian is to be a pacifist, these essays refuse easy answers. They consider why the Middle East harbors a deep-seated hatred for the United States. They argue that the U.S. drive to win the cold war made the nation more like its enemies, leading the government to support ruthless anti-Communist tyrants such as Mobutu, Suharto, and Pinochet. They urge Americans away from the pitfall of national self-righteousness toward an active peaceableness—an alert, informed, practiced state of being—deeply contrary to both passivity and war. Above all, the essays assembled in Dissent from the Homeland are a powerful entreaty for thought, analysis, and understanding. Originally published as a special issue of the journal South Atlantic Quarterly, Dissent from the Homeland has been expanded to include new essays as well as a new introduction and postscript.

Contributors. Srinivas Aravamudan, Michael J. Baxter, Jean Baudrillard, Robert N. Bellah, Daniel Berrigan, Wendell Berry, Vincent J. Cornell, David James Duncan, Stanley Hauerwas, Fredric Jameson, Frank Lentricchia, Catherine Lutz, Jody McAuliffe, John Milbank, Peter Ochs, Donald E. Pease, Anne R. Slifkin, Rowan Williams, Susan Willis, Slavoj Zizek

Table of contents

• Contents
• Introductory Notes from the Editors
• After
• Seventy-Five Years
• End of War
• Thoughts in the Presence of Fear
• The Wars Less Known
• The Dialectics of Disaster
• Sovereignty, Empire, Capital, and Terror
• A Muslim to Muslims: Reflections after September 11
• Groundzeroland
• Dispelling the ‘‘We’’ Fallacy from the Body of Christ: The Task of Catholics in a Time of War
• Old Glory
• Welcome to the Desert of the Real!
• September 11 and the Children of Abraham
• L’Esprit du Terrorisme
• Our Good Fortune
• John Walker Lindh
• September 11, 2001: A Pacifist Response
• Ground Zero; or, The Implosion of Church and State
• Afterword: From Virgin Land to Ground Zero
• Contributors
• Index