Alumni & Friends
Thursday, March 25, 3:30 Kiva Auditorium
Dr. David Ian Hanauer, Indiana University of Pennsylvania
Political Graffiti and the Discourse of the Israeli-Palestinian Conflict: The Discursive Construction of the Separation Wall at Abu Dis
Dr. Hanauer explores the role of graffiti as micro-level, political discourse designed to influence national and international actions concerning the Palestinian-Israeli conflict over national territorial boundaries, self determination and human rights. Specifically, in this lecture I will analyze the discursive function of graffiti on the separation wall in the contested space of Abu Dis. This 20 foot concrete wall with graffiti markings running through the center of the town Abu Dis, on the outer eastern border of Jerusalem, is situated at the heart of both Israeli and Palestinian national, territorial aspirations and as such is at the nexus of competing nationalizing and historicizing discourses. The data for this study consists of photographic documentation of the graffiti at a specific area of the wall that crosses through a central road in the town of Abu-Dis. This data was collected as a part of a tour arranged by a joint Israeli and Palestinian women’s organization called Bat Shalom (Hebrew for Daughter of Peace) and can be seen as part of a process of political tourism. This study addressed the following questions: What are the linguistic and informational characteristics of the graffiti at Abu Dis? What is the social function of this graffiti? And what is the nature of the discursive construction of the wall at Abu Dis through this graffiti? The results of the study reveal that the separation wall is constructed in five different ways that directly interact with the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The graffiti on the wall at Abu Dis is a microcosm of the broader conflict and offers an insight into the different chains of political discourse in action in the discussion of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. The ramifications of considering graffiti as ‘bottom-up’ political discourse interjecting within the arena of public literacy will be discussed.
David Ian Hanauer’s research employs artistic, theoretical, qualitative and quantitative methods and focuses on the connections between reading and writing authentic texts and their social functions in first and second languages. Among other issues, his research has investigated the genre specific aspects of poetry reading in L1 and L2, scientific discourse, graffiti research, cognitive aspects of literary education, cross-cultural understandings of fable reading and academic literacy across disciplines. His articles have been published in Science, Applied Linguistics, Discourse Processes, TESOL Quarterly, Canadian Modern Language Review, Research in the Teaching of English, Teaching and Teacher Education, Language Awareness, Cognitive Linguistics, The Arts in Psychotherapy, Poetics, and Poetics Today. He is the author of five books Scientific Discourse: Multiliteracy in the Classroom, Active Assessment: Assessing Scientific Inquiry; The Balanced Approach to Reading Instruction and Poetry and the Meaning of Life. His most recent book deals with using poetry writing as a research method within applied linguistics and will be published in 2010.Dr. Hanauer was the recipient of a National Science Foundation Grant for 2003-2005 for the study of science-literacy connections in the elementary school classroom and a Howard Hughes Medical Institute grant for 2005-2009 for work on representation and assessment in the field of microbiology. Dr. Hanauer is Professor of English at Indiana University of Pennsylvania and the Assessment Coordinator and educational researcher in the PHIRE (Phage Hunting Integrating Research and Education) Program in the Hatfull Laboratory, Pittsburgh Bacteriophage Institute at the University of Pittsburgh.
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 1
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 2
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 3
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 4
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 5
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 6
T.E.S.O.L. Presents Dr. David Ian Hanauer, IUP- Part 7
