TA3BEER

When Al Tahrir TV first emerged, it offered hope that for once, Egyptians would watch a channel free from censorship. The channel lauded itself as being the honest microphone of the revolution. For some time, this image certainly sustained itself. The channel’s name identifies with the defining space and symbol of the revolution, Tahrir Square. The channel’s slogan is “The People Want to Liberate the Minds” The channel was also partially owned by Ibrahim Eissa, a well-known Egyptian journalist famous for his blunt criticisms of Mubarak’s regime. Though Eissa’s presence would have sufficed to assure many people of the channel’s direction, it was further admired for its selection of program hosts. Like Eissa, these hosts had already established a reputation as being opinionated and confrontational regarding state criticisms. They include Dina Abdulrahman (who was fired from Dream TV following a live confrontational audio conversation with a Major General), Hamdy Qandil (a prominent journalist who was previously subjected to defamation charges after criticizing a former Foreign Minister), Bilal Fadl (another prominent journalist who quit Dream TV after his colleague Dina Abdulrahman was sacked), and Mahmoud Saad (the television host who was prevented from appearing on his Egyptian state television show after refusing to speak against the revolutionaries in the early days of the revolution).

Just over a year since its inception, Al Tahrir TV has almost transformed into a completely different channel. While Eissa earlier shared a portion of the channel’s ownership (which he later sells), it is now almost completely dominated by businessman Solaiman Amer. Hence, the ownership’s philosophy changed after first taking pride in the channel for being the first to avoid commercialization. This has triggered a series of conflicts with the channel’s hosts, some of which were forcefully removed while others resigned. Qandil resigned fearing that the new channel’s management would impose limits on his program. When Abdulrahman aired a clip from Askar Kazeboon’s anti-SCAF campaign, she was later prevented from hosting her program and has not returned to the channel since. The most recent controversy occurred with Doaa Sultan and her program Talk Shows whose episode was prevented from airing during its scheduled time at the revolution’s anniversary. She later noted that the channel had deliberately stopped the episode, titled “Celebrating What on the 25^th of January?” from airing, prompting Sultan to reproduce the episode and post it on YouTube. The above examples show how the channel continues to lose its credibility as the revolution’s microphone.

This media incident is nothing but a reflection of the current political situation in Egypt. On February 11^th, many believed SCAF and the Egyptian army had protected the revolution and that Egypt’s future was bright and positive. Today, a year following Mubarak’s resignation, the situation is completely different, with criticisms of SCAF and its management of Egypt infiltrating social media, blogs and Twitter. Al Tahrir TV started with a revolutionary name, slogan and team and has now faced the usual media backlashes, rendering it yet another disappointing addition to Egyptian satellite television channels.

One of the provisions of the Smith-Mundt Act of 1948 actively forbids Voice of America to broadcast in the United States. Today, of course, this provision, though still technically followed, has been rendered impotent. Why? Because the internet’s strange mixture of “there and now”—to use anthropologist Shanyang Zhao’s felicitous phrase—allows for livestreaming of content irregardless of regional borders. Externally directed propaganda efforts are thus now easily accessible to anyone in the internal U.S. audience who cares to listen. In much the same way, the internet has transformed information releases aimed at the U.S. citizenry into documents that communicate with a much larger, global audience.

What then, do items like travel warnings—in theory specifically targeted to U.S. citizens, but available to virtually anyone with online access—actually convey? It turns out quite a bit. This is a topic worthy of a much larger study, but here I will briefly explore five travel warnings issued by the U.S. Department of State in the months of March and April of 2011: those for Yemen, Mauritania, Iraq, Bahrain, and Syria.

But first, a word on Wordles. The image--Wordle--above, plus the five subsequent images, displays word frequencies (set to a maximum of 150 words displayed), with the most common words represented with the largest letters. This first one is a composite of the texts of all five of the travel warnings; each of the subsequent ones reflects only a single text. Their value lies in their strong visual representations of the relative weight given to different ideas. Of course, since they only measure the frequencies of specific words, rather than underlying concepts or even stems, their worth should not be overstated. That said, they do offer an interesting overview of reiterated terms. And most particularly, through the relative size of the country names, they clearly delineate a perception of the countries’ relationship--at least as it has been linguistically manifested.

This travel warning, issued on March 6, 2011, is the shortest of all of the travel warnings, coming in at only 453 words. It is also remarkable for the fact that it is the only one of the five to also offer an Arabic version. From the Wordle, it is clear that “U.S.” and “Yemen” occur almost equally frequently (15 and 12 times respectively).

Interestingly, the violent reactions of the Saleh regime to the protests that began in mid-January and continue to this day are quietly tucked away under the term “civil unrest.” This civil unrest--listed as a trigger for the issuing of this travel warning--repeatedly follows “terrorist activities,” as if merely an afterthought. Even piracy, the third security threat mentioned, receives more sentence space than this civil unrest does.

In contrast to the Yemen travel warning, the warning for Mauritania, issued March 11, 2011, is the longest of all of the warnings examined, comprised of 1246 words. Again, “U.S.” and “Mauritania” are roughly the same size, with 19 and 21 mentions respectively. Also in contrast with the warning for Yemen, here specific locations and groups also have a strong visual presence in the Wordle (e.g., Nouakchott and AQIM).

Indeed, whereas the Yemen travel warning was surprisingly sparse in details of the ongoing demonstrations and violent attempts to suppress them, this travel warning overflows with particulars of terrorist attacks stretching back to December 2007.

Interestingly, too, the text situates U.S. citizens within a broader category of “foreign nationals” and then proceeds to detail attacks on French, Italians, Spanish, and Israelis. It is the only one of the five travel warnings to offer this kind of narrative frame.

The Iraq travel warning, issued April 12, 2011, is the second longest, at 1144 words. Here the Wordle shows very clearly the relative weights given in the warning to “U.S.” and “Iraq” (42 and 27 mentions respectively). Interestingly, it is also the only warning among the five in which the word “government” appears so frequently (7 times; the next most frequent example is the Syria travel warning, with 2).

Perhaps not surprisingly, this travel warning demonstrates its predominant narrative frame quite clearly. The second paragraph is entirely given to a description of the withdrawal of U.S. forces--a description that reads as self-consciously careful in tone without providing any analysis of the potential relevance of this fact to the travel situation. A larger historical context that is assumed but never described directly can be seen in repeated assurances of improvement. Thus, for example, “...has been more stable relative to the rest of Iraq in recent years,” “...there have been significantly fewer terrorist attacks and lower levels of insurgent violence,” “...there have been no recent attacks on civilian aircraft,” etc.

Finally, there is but a single passing mention of the various demonstrations that have been ongoing in Iraq since February (“...avoid crowds, especially rallies or demonstrations”). Although, to be fair, perhaps the author(s) of the travel warning deemed these less significant than worries like unmarked landmines along the Turkey-Iraq border. On the other hand, it does seem odd not to mention demonstrations that have led to riots and fatalities when detailed description is devoted to methods of attack (magnetic bombs, improvised explosive devices, etc.).

The Bahrain travel warning, also published on April 12, 2011, was the second smallest after Yemen, coming in at 630 words. “U.S.” and “Bahrain” are again almost equal, with 18 mentions of the former and 16 of the latter. On May 13th it was replaced by a travel alert.

As with the Iraq travel warning--and in strong contrast to the detailed historical context provided in the Mauritania warning--a larger context is assumed but unspecified in phrases such as “...daily routines are returning to normal” and “...there is a returning semblance of normalcy in day-to-day life.” Curiously, given the bloody crackdowns on demonstrations in mid-March, as well as the continued--albeit much smaller--protests, the warning (again, published on April 12th) begins, “The U.S. Department of State warns U.S. citizens of the potential for ongoing political and civil unrest in Bahrain” (emphasis added).

In addition, the warning makes multiple use of a rhetorical device similar to that known to ancient Roman orators as “praeteritio,” the technique of drawing attention to something by specifically denying an interest in it (literally, “I pass over”). Or in this case, pairing the denial of a concern with an exhortation to take the concern seriously. Thus, “While demonstrations have not been directed toward Westerners, U.S. citizens are urged to remain alert...”

The Syria travel warning was issued on April 25, 2011 and comprised 810 words. As the Wordle makes clear, there are far more instances of “U.S.” than “Syria” (23 as opposed to 11).

In stark contrast to the lack of information in the Bahrain and Yemen travel warnings concerning those countries’ popular demonstrations and violent governmental responses to them, the Syria travel warning clearly states the widespread nature of the Syrian protests, the violence of the government’s responses, and the consequent fatalities. Thus the second paragraph begins, “Since March 2011, demonstrations throughout Syria have been violently suppressed by Syrian security forces, resulting in hundreds of deaths.”

Unlike the Bahrain and Iraq travel warnings which strive to emphasize ever-increasing stability, this one draws on descriptions of violence and volatility. Indeed, its overall tone is different from the other four. Thus, for one thing it directly states that “Contrary to the terms of the Vienna Convention on Consular Relations, of which Syria is a signatory, Syrian authorities generally do not notify the U.S. Embassy of the arrest of a U.S. citizen until days or weeks after the arrest.” For another, it uses scare quotes; for example, “...especially in the case of persons detained for “security” reasons.”

As a final, intriguing note, this travel warning is also the only travel warning to urge readers to visit the Bureau of Consular Affairs “for [i]information on “What the Department of State Can and Can’t Do in a Crisis.””

Certainly, some of the linguistic and content choices described here may be attributable to the quirks of individual authors; however, it seems unlikely that they all can. Indeed, many of these choices reflect specific narrative frames and political stances. And perhaps there have always been such elements. Perhaps they are a consistent feature of travel warnings--possibly now amplified and intensified by online publication and the presence of a global audience.

By Amy Johnson

[“The U.S. State Department recognizes the historic role that social media is playing in the Arab world and we want to be part of your conversations #Jan25 #Egypt”]

In its Twitter profile, the service was ascribed to the Arabic Media Hub of the State Department, an organization for which no publicly accessible info could be found on the State Department’s website, but implied additional social media presences to come. Sure enough, almost three months later, on May 4, 2011, subsequent to the killing of Osama bin Laden by U.S. Navy SEALs in Abbottabad, Pakistan, a YouTube channel was launched under the same account name.

This Arabic-language social media initiative is actually part of a broader exploration of newer communication technologies as tools of diplomacy, grouped together by the State Department under the rubric “21^st Century Statecraft.” This includes, among other elements, Twitter accounts in Russian, Spanish, Farsi, and Hindi.

But what conversations does the service actually facilitate?

In the forty-eight hours after the account’s first tweet, there were 400-plus mentions of USAbilAraby. Most were announcements of the existence of the account itself, such as this one from the Digital Communications Director at the State Department, which was then widely retweeted:

The first Arabic to appear in public conversation with/about USAbilAraby actually took the form of a translated retweet:

The first exchange to occur at least partially in Arabic appears to be the following set of three tweets, beginning with a comment in English from alysaleh, followed by a retweet by the same user of one of USAbilAraby’s tweets, and then closed by a response—in Arabic—from USAbilAraby, thanking alysaleh for the mention:

It is no secret that sexual harassment is a pervasive problem on the streets of Egypt. From inappropriate remarks- to grabbing- to even more serious assaults, women in Egypt have to deal with street harassment on a daily basis. Until recently this problem was rarely discussed and most victims would remain silent out of fear and shame. Not anymore. A recent initiative called Harassmap utilizes new technology to fight this problem: Women can now send an SMS to report sexual harassment on the spot. Alternatively, they can do so my email, Twitter, Facebook, or directly on the Harassmap website. All they have to do is report their location and the type of harassment that occurred and the incident will be placed on an interactive map available online. By going to harassmap.org one can view a map of Egypt containing all the “hotspots” of sexual harassment and read a description about each incident. There are several categories including catcalls, ogling, touching, stalking or following and so forth. One report, for instance, reads: “Five cat calls as im waiting to get a cab at nozha bridge in masr gadida.”

Goals

Harassmap’s slogan is: “Ending the social acceptability of sexual harassment.” It speaks of the biggest problem about sexual harassment- the fact that it is largely tolerated and ignored. Even after the shocking attacks on dozens of women by a crowd of hundreds of men during the celebrations of Eid-al-Fitr in 2006, the state tried to downplay the problem claiming that these were isolated incidents. It was private Egyptian citizens and bloggers who posted online videos of the assaults and publicized the problem, thus breaking the silence and forging a campaign against the harassment of women.

But how effective can such an initiative be? I would argue that although it may not really stop sexual harassment, this initiative is doing exactly what it needs to do- raise awareness about the problem. By placing sexual harassment on the map, it makes this otherwise unspoken of and ignored problem visible and forces the public to confront the issue. It also gives women, who normally find it very difficult to report harassment to the police, a platform to share their story and express their frustration. Moreover, like the activists and bloggers who combined the use of technology with old-fashioned on- the- ground work to mobilize people for protests against their oppressive government, so do the volunteers of Harassmap organize events and outreach programs and work with NGOs to spread the word and get more people involved. The project has recently gained significant publicity and media coverage putting the Egyptian government and police to shame. Hopefully this will force them to do something about the problem of sexual harassment described as “Egypt’s social cancer” by the Egyptian Centre for Women's Rights.

The Role of Technology

Harassmap utilizes FrontlineSMS and Ushahidi, an open-source software, which was first used to map reports of violence in Kenya after the post-election fallout in 2008. New media and technology are credited for playing a prominent role in the Egyptian revolution. Is it possible that new media and technology can help bring about a new kind of revolution in Egypt- a women’s revolution? Perhaps this suggestions sounds a bit too naïve and ambitious. Tackling a social problem like sexual harassment will not be easy and will require deep societal transformations. As we have seen in the aftermath of the revolution when women are once again being excluded from the political process, it seems that overthrowing a dictator will prove to be easier than changing deeply rooted gender hierarchies and social norms. However we can certainly hope that the wave of activism and citizen engagement that we have been seeing will continue to bring about positive change in Egypt and throughout the Arab world.

By Reneta Dimitrova

I will Drive Starting June 17 is a bold new campaign calling for women in Saudi Arabia holding international driver’s licenses to defy the prohibition of driving and sit behind the wheel on June 17. Perhaps inspired by the recent revolutions and protests throughout the Arab world where social media played a prominent role, a few Saudi women launched the campaign over Facebook and Twitter as they are trying to spread the word and urge more women to participate. According to the Facebook page of the event, which is scheduled to take place on Friday, June 17, 2011, currently 2,267 people say they will be attending. In addition, the campaign has 1,606 followers on Twitter. It seems that women in Saudi Arabia are hoping to take advantage of the momentum that is currently sweeping much of the Arab world. Perhaps if the campaign gains enough publicity with the help of social media King Abdullah will be forced to take women seriously and the outcome could be favorable.

Regardless of what the final result of the event might be, I think that this initiative is one more proof that what we are witnessing is indeed an Arab Awakening as people throughout the Arab world, both men and women are claiming their rights. Ordinary citizens, activists, expats are all taking part in these efforts, inspiring one another and utilizing social media in creative new ways to call for reform. It is a historic moment where in such a short period of time we have witnessed so many changes in the Arab world- most notably- two revolutions and perhaps more under way. After seeing the fate of their Tunisian and Egyptian counterparts, the remaining Arab authoritarian rulers are more cautious than ever, some giving in to the demands of the people, lifting emergency laws, promising more freedom and more rights.

Now all we have to do is wish the women of Saudi Arabia all the best and wait to see what will happen on June 17.

By Reneta Dimitrova