Grad Finds Correlation Between Warnings, Approval

By | October 18, 2004

President Bush’s approval ratings increase after the government issues a terror alert, according to Robb Willer grad, sociology. Willer conducted a study, “The Effects of Government-Issued Terror Warnings on Presidential Approval Ratings,” published in the online journal Current Research In Social Psychology earlier this fall.

From Feb. 1, 2001 to May 9, 2004, Willer recorded nationally reported terror alerts from The Washington Post. He used the Gallup Polls to follow general presidential approval ratings and ratings of the President’s handling of the economy.

Willer then ran several time-series data and regression analyses and found a clear pattern of government-issued terror threats leading to an increase in approval ratings for President Bush.

By measuring the impact of the events of Sept. 11, 2001, Willer found that the President’s approval ratings went from 51 percent on September 10 to 86 percent on Sept. 15.

Willer said that this phenomenon can be explained by the social identity theory — the idea that support for current political leaders increases when there is a national fear of outside attacks. On average he found a 2.75 percentage point increase in general presidential approval the week after a terror alert. “The implications are that government-issued terror threats have a bigger effect than previously thought,” Willer said.

Willer followed approval ratings of the President’s handling of the economy, an aspect of the President that is unrelated to terrorism.

He tested for a halo effect — the concept of assuming that someone would be highly regarded in one trait because the individual is highly rated in another trait. Willer wanted to see if a terror alert would effect ratings on the President’s handling of the economy due to the halo effect. Approval ratings for Bush’s handling of the economy increased after Sept. 11, from 54 percent on July 11 to 72 percent on Oct. 5, 2001.

“This is an example of the ‘rally around the flag’ effect; when there is some kind of threat, people tend to support the president,” said Prof. Walter R. Mebane Jr., government.

He added that this is one reason why it is hard to defeat the incumbent during a presidential election when the country is at war.

“I found it very compelling and think that it would be interesting to look at what else is going on in the world when a terror alert is issued and if leaders raise the terror alert when they are in need of more approval,” said Prof. Mabel M. Berezin, sociology.

Willer plans on following up the study with experimental research.

Archived article by Vanessa Hoffman
Sun Staff Writer

Crossing Borders

By October 19, 2004

The Handwerker Gallery of Ithaca College is currently hosting the traveling exhibition “Art Across Borders,” featuring contemporary artwork from Iraq and Palestine. For most of the audience, the sampling of Middle Eastern art will serve as an introduction to art from a region the Western world has often ignored. What is more striking perhaps about this particular collection are the conditions under which the artworks were conceived, created and collected. At the height of the still on-going U.S. war on terrorism and the subsequent Operation Iraqi Freedom, Meg Novak, an American artist, and Flo Razowsky, an American-born Jewish artist, embarked upon a mission in order to aid Iraqi and Palestinian citizens. In addition to the common charitable donations of medical supplies and children’s clothing, the group brought with them a great amount of art supplies donated by American artists. Novak, executive director of the Babylon Art and Cultural Center, a non-profit, Minneapolis-based group that ties art and social activism together, visited and conducted interviews with artists, most of whom are dormant due to political coercion or simply lack of supplies. Despite limited mobility and strictly enforced curfews, the curators brought back a collection to be used on display in the first exhibit featuring Iraqi artists living in Iraq since before the Gulf War. The exhibit offers a wide range of subject and media; gouache, oil and watercolor illustrate landscapes (surrealist and impressionistic), people and intricate, geometric graphic designs. Despite the political realities of the contemporary Middle East, the artworks do not necessarily reflect the particularly American concern with the area. Instead, the artists offer a distinctly humanist and individualistic vision of their society that resists the current Western political discourse; it provides a piece of Arabic culture and history, as well as gender, particularly the traditional representation of Muslim women. One example is a piece by Noori Al- Rawi that gives us a markedly different picture of Baghdad — a name that has grown in American households to be synonymous with images of street explosions and military occupation. On the bottom right corner of the gouache piece is a dedication, written in Arabic and translated, “For my dear Meg, To remember Baghdad.” The piece is everything but the picture of Baghdad with which we are acquainted. The representation was a blend of warm tones, working strictly from an earthy palette. In contrast to the violently destructive image of news coverage, Al-Rawi gives an impression of harmony. Sky and land is meshed into one flat surface making no distinction between human construction and nature. There is no human presence, but the representation is not evacuated of human influence. A building is embedded smoothly into the landscape. There is a powerful nationalistic sentiment in the ink drawings of Abdul Rahman Al-Mozayen, a former general in the Palestinian Liberation Organization (now the Palestinian Authority). His skillful illustrations convey a powerful nationalistic pride through the figure of a woman, Anat, the ancient goddess of the Canaanites, a symbol for the soul and strength of Palestine. The woman that appears in a series of drawings is motherly, curved, bent in a way that is congruous with the cyclical nature of the earth. Her body is representative of both culture and nature; the wheat that she gathers is imprinted on her dress along with Arabic lettering and scenes of the distraction of the city of Jenin. In the same exhibit, peace and harmony is challenged. The nature in full accordance with the female body is in stark contrast with Iraqi artist Mu’Ayad Muhsin’s representation of the Islamic woman. She sits firmly on a chair, feet on the floor, positioned as if they were ready to stand and walk off. The Muhsin woman is dressed in traditional black garb, wearing a head wrap that exposes her face. There is defiance in the stern and stiff lips, but safety in the unchallenging eyes that look distantly past the viewer. Hands are regimented on her lap, either in closed fists or disciplined on top of another. I was once more reminded of how grossly essentialized Iraq and its neighboring regions are in the news media when I drew near an unmistakably Christian piece from Majd Shaliar of Kurdistan. The image of Christ’s crucifixion is smeared on the surface, the Savior’s head tilted to one side, lids closed yet alive enough that one may expect tears to flow any second. The figure looms largely over the landscape — a line for the horizon and a cross. The ubiquitous symbol of Catholicism — the crucifix — populates the surface, re-writing itself over and over again on the plane, even on the body of Christ itself, perhaps suggesting the symbol’s overwhelming dominance over cultural experience. Indeed, haven’t stock photos of blown-up buses and chaotic streets stood in place of people? Thankfully, “Art Across Borders” offers an alternative to those images. Art Across Borders: Contemporary Art form Iraq and Palestine will run through November 7, 2004 in the Handwerker Gallery. In addition, Ithaca College’s Department of Politics faculty members Asma Barlas and Beth Harris will join artist and curator Meg Novak for a gallery talk on Thursday, October 28, at 7:30 p.m. Archived article by Whine Del RosarioRed Letter Daze Staff Writer
Take One

By October 19, 2004

With Halloween looming, a horde of purportedly unnerving, bloodcurdling films is set for release. This Friday, The Grudge, a remake of the haunting Japanese film Ju-On, opens nationwide. Victims in the film suffer from an enigmatic paranormal curse that inflicts an uncontrollable fury upon them before they die. This unfortunate syndrome spreads rapidly as an American nurse tries desperately to escape it. Also opening on Friday is The Machinist, in which the title character is besieged by a living nightmare. Having endured a year without sleep, his mental health begins to rapidly deteriorate. Equally disconcerting will be the gruesome hostility promised by Saw, a horror flick scheduled to open on Halloween weekend. In this unsettling film, complete strangers find themselves in life-or-death predicaments, all for the distasteful amusement of a sadistic villain. Of course, it remains to be seen if these films will succeed in frightening audiences. After all, so many alleged horror films wind up as objects of mockery, relative failures when measured against the high standard set by thrillers such as Psycho, The Exorcist, and The Silence of the Lambs. What cinematic elements create an exceptional horror movie? A horror film, as distinct from a horrifying film (e.g. Gigli, From Justin to Kelly), need not, for instance, boast special effects of bloodthirsty fiends attacking innocent humans. What are often the most truly horrifying moments are those that insinuate rather than demonstrate. The ability of the actors, and the director, to convey a chilling ambiance, a sense of apprehension and anxiety, and to imply the potential eeriness of an upcoming scene, is much more provocative than blood and gore. The effect of silence in a horror movie is often dynamic. A successful horror film, then, should include a profound and insightful psychological ingredient, — rationale that the American Film Institute surely considered when they named The Silence of the Lambs the fifth-most thrilling film of the 20th Century. They also named the film’s central character, Dr. Hannibal Lecter, the greatest villain of all time (while rounding out the top five are Norman Bates in Psycho, Darth Vader in The Empire Strikes Back, The Wicked Witch of the West in The Wizard of Oz, and Nurse Ratched in One Flew Over a Cuckoo’s Nest). Silence has an uncanny ability to achieve an indescribable, intangible attribute of a good horror movie: that elusive manner in which it manages to creep under our skin. When Lecter challenges Clarice Starling emotionally, the viewer may begin to feel vulnerable as well. One can recognize a good horror movie if it causes even an ephemeral suspension of reality, and when certainty is confused with an illusion, the results can be terrifying. Lecter, played by Anthony Hopkins, is undoubtedly the benchmark as far as horror film villains go. Author Thomas Harris, who, after a troubled childhood, became enthralled with serial killers, created this character who mixes charm and vice, acumen and extravagance. His disquieting riddles, metallic pitch, and piercing eyes can induce dread in anyone who listens to him. And of course, there was the time he attacked a nurse at the Baltimore State Forensic Hospital, chewing out her tongue — and his pulse never went above 85. The psychological aspects of Silence transcend those created by many other serial-killer thrillers, such as Halloween or even The Texas Chainsaw Massacre. Similarly, over the past few years, the most disturbing movies to a large portion of the viewing public seem to have been The Blair Witch Project and The Ring, a sequel to which is scheduled to open March 24. But whether or not the upcoming Halloween releases will scare us as well will depend in large part on their novelty and of course on their ability to get under our skin. Archived article by Avash KalraSun Staff Writer