Note: Forum journalists will be available for interviews while in Chapel Hill.

Arab, French, Western journalists to debate war coverage in UNC forum

CHAPEL HILL -- How Arab journalists viewed coverage of the war in Iraq by Western reporters, and vice versa, will be discussed in a free public forum Nov. 8-9 at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

Prominent Arab, French and North American journalists also will debate whether articulation of specific U.S. government interests shaped media portrayals of Iraq, the Middle East and Arab society and culture.

Academic experts on the media also will speak in the forum, "Critical Perspectives on Arab and American Media Coverage of the Iraq War." Questions and audience participation will be encouraged.

The University Center for International Studies and the International Center for Media Studies in Amman, Jordan, organized the forum, to be held in Hanes Art Center auditorium off South Columbia Street. Paid parking will be available in the Swain visitors lot off Cameron Avenue, and free parking in some other nearby campus lots.

A free Middle East Film Festival on campus will bookend the forum. Four documentaries about media coverage of the first Gulf War will precede the forum, on Nov. 4 and 6; four films about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict will be shown afterward, on Nov. 11 and 13.

Festival moderators will include Malik Athamneh, a columnist and political analyst for three media outlets in Jordan, on Nov. 4. The University Center for International Studies and the media resources center of UNC’s Robert B. House Undergraduate Library will sponsor the festival, with screenings from 7-9 p.m. in the library. For details, visit http://www.ucis.unc.edu/events/film_festival.htm.

"The Iraq war provides a unique window for analyzing the role of media in fulfilling its responsibilities to serve the public interest," said Dr. Chad Haines, a research associate at the UNC center. "The forum is a unique opportunity for people to gain an international perspective on the U.S. media, as well as to learn about how the Arab media covered the war."

Three discussions will comprise the forum:

• Nov. 8, 9 a.m.-noon: "Media and the National Interest."
  
  
• Nov. 8, 1:30-4:30 p.m.: "Official-Speak, Experts and Embedded Journalists: Sources and Resources for Covering the War."
  
  
• Nov. 9, 9 a.m.-noon: "The Media's Audience : The Role of the Public in Shaping News."

Issues discussed will include questions about sources of intelligence on weapons of mass destruction, reliance on official voices for analysis and the new practice of embedding journalists with military units. Panelists will be:

• Jihan Ammar, photo editor for the French news agency Agence France Presse, who was on assignment in Iraq last summer. Raised in North Carolina, Ammar recently received the 2003 FiftyCrows International Fund Award for Documentary Photography in Africa for her photo essay "Playing Cards with Nana: Intimate Stories from the Middle East."
  
  
• Malik Athamneh, a columnist and political analyst for Al-Rai (a leading Jordanian daily newspaper), Al-Hadath, (an independent Jordanian weekly) and Al-Maraya (an Arabic language electronic bulletin for Arab-Americans). He is founding co-director of the International Center for Media Studies in Amman and co-coordinator of the forum.
  
  
• Maad Fayad grew up in Iraq and worked as a journalist for newspapers and radio programs there. Currently he edits the Al-Majallah Newspaper, based in London.
  
  
• Rouman Haddad, a journalist, columnist and political analyst in Jordan. Haddad is senior editor for AmmanNet, the first Arab radio news broadcast on the World Wide Web, and a doctoral candidate in international law.
  
  
• Najwa Kandakji, a TV actress and news personality in Syria who trains women journalists. During the war, she circulated a petition stating that the Arabic media was misleading the public, which was signed by leading Arab journalists. She is producing a documentary comparing U.S. and Arabic media coverage of the war.
  
  
• Betool Khedairi wrote "A Sky So Close," a coming-of-age story about a girl growing up in wartime Iraq. She lives in Jordan and is working on her second novel.
  
  
• Donna Leinwand, a 1989 alumna of UNC’s School of Journalism and Mass Communication, covered the war from Baghdad for USA Today. She chose to cover stories about Iraqis rather than being embedded with U.S. troops.
  
  
• Justin Podur of Canada writes on Middle East issues and the role of the media in shaping public opinion for Znet, an online magazine with alternative news, opinions and resources.
  
  
• Jay Price, military affairs reporter with The News & Observer of Raleigh was embedded twice in Iraq with the 82nd Airborne Division from Fort Bragg.
  
  
• Ahmed Shawki, an Egyptian journalist living in the United States, editor of the bi-monthly International Socialist Review.
  
  
• Nancy Snow is an assistant professor in the College of Communications at California State University, Fullerton, and adjunct assistant professor in the Annenberg School for Communication, University of Southern California. She wrote "Propaganda, Inc.: Selling America's Culture to the World" (Seven Stories Press, 2002) and "Information War: American Propaganda, Free Speech and Opinion Control Since 9/11 (Seven Stories Press, 2003).

For more information on the conference, call the UNC center at (919) 962-3094 or visit http://www.ucis.unc.edu/events/media_conference.htm. For more on the film festival, call the center or visit http://www.ucis.unc.edu/events/film_festival.htm.

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To arrange interviews contact Dr. Chad Haines, (919) 962-5374, chad_haines@unc.edu
News Services Contacts: Print: L.J. Toler, (919) 962-8589, laura_toler@unc.edu; broadcast, Karen Moon, (919) 962-8595, Karen_Moon@unc.edu