Another Loopy Anthropologist

[SteveMetz]

Actually, I'd love to see Professor McKenna get his shot here. He might be able to intellectually intimidate young people but our students would eat him alive and pick their teeth with his bones. Their first question might be, "Well, Professor McKenna, you're going to teach us about war. Do tell us about your experience with it. And reading Gramsci in a dangerous coffee shop doesn't count."

I think he's much safer staying in his academic alternative universe.

COUNTERPUNCH, May 28, 2008

Why I Want to Teach Anthropology at the Army War College

...As an anthropologist, I want equal time in the War College. In the February 2008 edition of the Society for Applied Anthropology Newsletter, Captain Nathan K. Finney, an anthropologist with the Human Terrain System, called for informed discussion with his anthropology critics. "Let us open our minds as our anthropology professors instruct in Anth 101 and objectively discuss each other's ideas and concerns in order to find the best way forward together".

OK. I'd like to take Finney up on his offer and have access to the military and its soldiers directly. I have a ten-point curriculum.......

......A central purpose of anthropology is to help citizens recognize their ethnocentrism so that they can think more clearly about the world. So, if I had a chance to teach "Introduction to Anthropology" at the War College, here is how I might do it.

Day 1: Orientation: Discussion. Introductions. Overview of Course. Where are you from? How long have you been here? What's the best thing about the military? What's something you'd like to see changed? Film screening: In the Valley of Elah

Day 2: Smedley Butler Day. Review and discussion of War is a Racket Speech; View and discuss Eisenhower's farewell address. Read Uri Avnery's "The Military Option <http://counterpunch.com/avnery04292008.html> " in CounterPunch. Film screening and discussion: Ghosts of Abu Ghraib

Day 3. NACIREMA: Discussion Where is this? What is capitalism? Discussion of Marx's labor theory of value. George Carlin on Football & Baseball. <http://www.baseball-almanac.com/humor7.shtml>

Day 4: Fieldtrip to US Veteran's administration hospital. Tour Guide: Wheelchair veteran Bobby Muller from Vietnam Veterans against the War <http://www.vvaw.org/>

Day 5 Iraq Veterans Against the War Day <http://ivaw.org/> ; How to file CO, information on war resisting. Film screening and discussion: Hearts and Minds

Day 6. How to keep from Dying: Are you safe? Discussion of April 17, 2008 RAND report which details 101,000 U.S. casualties a year. See "Invisible Wounds of War: Psychological and Cognitive Injuries, Their Consequences, and Services to Assist Recovery. Other Readings: Grand Theft Pentagon: How they made a Killing on the war on Terrorism.

Day 7: Rod Ridenhour and the My Lai Massacre. Discussion of war hero Ridenhour who was a whistleblower against this war crime. Discussion of Geneva Convention. Film screening: In the Year of the Pig

Day 8: Hitler and Totalitarianism: Can it happen here? Film screening: Seven Days in May

Day 9: Debate on Iraq War. Two teams of four students per team will debate the question "Is the War in Iraq a Just War?" Like college debate, students will be responsible for arguing both sides of the issue in two debates.

Day 10: The Deceptions of Military Recruiters. What did they tell you? Read "Lies Military Recruiters Tell <http://counterpunch.com/jacobs03052005.html> " by Ron Jacobs....