The word "crusade" does seem to fit in with a collection of "pro-religious" words that Bush is sporting just as willingly. I have a feeling that if I don't pray for someone these days, I'm an insensitive cretin with animosity toward America and Americans, not a person who asserts his right to practicing a non-god-based "religion." In fact that's what disturbs me most about this whole issues: we have a bunch of "Allahu aqbar" screaming fanatics on one end and a bunch of "God bless" screaming fanatics on the other. Nothing good has ever come from confrontation laced with irrational religions--with apologies for the tautology. ==Reinhold Johanna Rubba wrote: > > The media have been covering issues of language along with everything > else related to this disaster. The LA Times has had two pieces, one by > Geoffrey Nunberg and one by a staff writer interviewing several language > specialists (including the Atlantic Monthly's Barbara Walraff). Issues > of word usage, tone, hesitation, etc. are discussed. I imagine you could > access these via the LA Times website. Maybe some fellow listers could > let us know of similar reports that they know of. There have also been > electronic media reports, of course, and the only details I recall from > these are notes that Colin Powell was judged by one communications > expert to be the most effective of the government's spokespeople, while > the President was going a little too far in the direction of aggression > while at the same time sounding uncomfortable and not terribly fluent. > (These aren't my own judgments, just what I heard.) > > The use of 'crusade' was quite unfortunate, from my viewpoint. Europeans > and Americans don't realize how much meaning the ancient conflict > between Christian Europe and the Islamic countries still has for > residents of the Arab world. It is a very salient part of their > appreciation of their own history and culture. From my personal > experience with Muslims and Arabs (including 4 years living in a > Muslim/Arab country), such a remark would immediately (rightly or > wrongly) be interpreted as a resurrection of that ancient conflict, > indicating the 'West's' desire to 'take back' territory from the Islamic > world and setting the conflict up as a religious conflict, rather than a > political one. I don't know what Bush's intentions were in using the > word, but it is a highly inflammatory word in Muslim countries, > especially in the Arab portion of the Muslim world (by which I mean > parts of the world in which the majority of residents or very > substantial portions of the population are Muslims who also perceive > themselves as Arabs). > > Whether avoidance of the word would constitute 'political correctness' > or not is less important to me than its practical inflammatory value. > Bush's use of the word was the first and main headline on the BBC's > headline news one or two evenings this week, showing the BBC's > understanding of its rhetorical value for the Arab/Muslim audience. My > reason to avoid it wouldn't be political correctness, but a desire to > avoid inflaming the situation further (of course, this might have been > Bush's intention). I don't know if Bush was informed of the practical > consequences of using this word. > > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > Johanna Rubba Associate Professor, Linguistics > English Department, California Polytechnic State University > One Grand Avenue • San Luis Obispo, CA 93407 > Tel. (805)-756-2184 • Fax: (805)-756-6374 • Dept. Phone. 756-2596 > • E-mail: [log in to unmask] • Home page: http://www.cla.calpoly.edu/~jrubba > ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~ > > To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: > http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html > and select "Join or leave the list" > > Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/ To join or leave this LISTSERV list, please visit the list's web interface at: http://listserv.muohio.edu/archives/ateg.html and select "Join or leave the list" Visit ATEG's web site at http://ateg.org/