POLS 272 - MIDDLE EAST POLITICS, SPRING 2005

Newspaper Assignment Round 1

Dailies 

The Jordan Times www.jordantimes.com

The opinion section here is titled "opinion and analysis." Make sure in this section to focus on the editorial by the staff (titled "editorial"). 

The Daily Star - Lebanon www.dailystar.com.lb

The Star has two sections with editorials - "Editorial" and "Opinion." Look at both. In answering Question #1 below on moves towards or away from democratization in "your countries," consider "your countries" to be both Syria and Lebanon. As Syria exercises great control over Lebanon's politics, The Star frequently covers internal Syrian politics.

The Kuwait Times www.kuwaittimes.net

Go to the left-hand side of the screen and you will see an indicator for "6 Days Archive" with initials for the days of the week (M/T/W, etc.) printed there. When you click on the letter for a day a screen will come up with numbers on the top; these are the page numbers of that issue. Pages 1-6 of each issue will be primarily Arab and Kuwaiti news; page 11 is usually the editorial page. Make sure each time to read the front page and the editorial page; on the editorial page pay particular attention to the cartoon.

Weeklies and Biweeklies

The Yemen Times (biweekly) www.yementimes.com

Al-Ahram Weekly - Egypt (weekly) www.ahram.org.eg/weekly

Students in this first round of the newspaper project will read one daily and one weekly or biweekly English-language Arab newspaper over a period of 26 days. By the end of the 26 days you should have read somewhere between eighty and 100 articles; you don't have to read your papers every day, but you should do so at least four days a week. Editorials should account for at least half of your reading; editorial cartoons should be included in your analysis where relevant. Several of these papers carry both editorials written by Arab authors living in the Middle East and editorials contributed by Western authors; you should focus almost exclusively on editorials written by Arab authors (editorials written by non-Arab writers will usually have a paragraph at the end saying where the writer is from or naming the Western newspaper from which the article is reprinted.)

Some of these newspapers do not keep back copies of the paper on their site, so don't expect to go to the papers' websites a week before your paper is due and download all the back issues to read all at once; you won't find them.

In making your arguments in your paper you need to refer specifically to as many articles as you can, citing the article's name, newspaper and date either in parentheses within the text or as footnotes/endnotes. Similarly, since you won't be able to go back and find the articles later on the sites, you should print out articles that you read so that you can refer back to them as specifically as possible when writing your paper. You MUST include copies of any articles that you specifically cite in your paper with your paper when you hand it in.

Papers will lose 5 points (1/2 grade) per late day unless your dean provides proof of exceptional circumstances which have prevented you from turning the paper in on time. Anything more than a very small number of spelling and/or grammatical errors will result in points being deducted from your final grade, so proofread carefully.

On T Mar 22 you will turn in, in class, a 5-7 page paper addressing the following questions:

1) What have the key issues in democratization in your countries been in this period? (For example, if you are reading The Jordan Times and al-Ahram Weekly, "your countries" are Jordan and Egypt. To answer this question, think about whether have there been any demonstrations on political issues during your reading period. Any debates among political figures about or court rulings on the subject of political freedoms? What issues have these centered on?) Does there seem to be movement towards more or less political freedom in your countries, or do things seem to be staying the same?

2) What did you learn about current events in Iraq from reading these papers? (Another way of thinking about this is to ask yourself: did I read information about Iraq in these papers that I do not read in the U.S. press?) How is U.S. involvement in Iraq portrayed, either explicitly in editorials or implicitly through the types of events in Iraq which writers cover? What would these papers advocate that the U.S. do in Iraq?

3) Has there been discussion in your papers about American attempts to promote democratization in your country or in the Arab world - or calls by editorial or other writers for the U.S. to take particular actions vis-à-vis Arab democratization efforts? How are these American efforts perceived, and what approach to Arab democratization would these papers advocate that the U.S. take?

First Round of Newspaper Analysis Assignments - Th Feb 10 - T Mar 15

(note: this period is 34 days long but includes spring break; if you don't want to read your papers over break than you need to be reading them almost every day of the rest of this period).

Jordan Times & Yemen Times - three students

Kuwait Times & al-Ahram Weekly - four students

Jordan Times & al-Ahram Weekly - three students

Kuwait Times & Yemen Times - two students