There’s an interesting new project based out of the University of Kent who’s methods seem really cool, even if the ultimate ends seem questionably ambiguous. Through four new projects, the research programme Radical Distrust hopes to gain an understanding on global youth culture and its radicalisation through “a comparative study of literary texts and performance culture across the areas of postcolonial and Middle Eastern studies.”

The project’s conceptual design is unique and seems well though out, however the aim of  informing how Global Security policies can be pursued without creating mistrust among these youth who are purportedly as “risk” of becoming “radicalised” seems rather connected to the UK’s Department of Foreign Affairs language….  Despite this byline, the researchers behind the programme and the purported projects have a unique and commendable approach that’s highlighted through involving artists and creative collaborators that are interested by the cultural and literary representation in North Africa, Southern Africa and the Middle East.

Their first project culminates in a two-day symposium entitled “The Siege of Beirut and the Ethics of Representation” based on a post-1982 Israeli invasion of Beirut and the cultural outpourings that followed.

As described by the event organizers,

This symposium seeks to consider the literary representations of the siege alongside representations of the siege in journalism, and possibly also art and film. The project aims at investigating and promoting an awareness of an ethics of representation on questions of extreme emotional investment through comparing responsible reportage of traumatic events with literary renditions of those events. The following questions will be central to the area of enquiry: How can literature, journalism and art contribute to overcoming the dangers of forgetting and denial, memorial excess and fundamentalism, the radicalisation of violence and the complete breakdown of trust at international levels? How can they promote acknowledgment and mourning across divided communities? How can representation of the siege be compared to representations of 9/11 and other traumatic events? What are the challenges entailed in the witnessing of traumatic events? What is the role of language and visual and verbal metaphors in these representations?