November 21, 2010

Bias Expected, Evidence Optional for NYU Professor

By Alan Jacobs
An audience of forty journalism students and die-hard fans packed the TV studio at New York University's Carter Journalism Institute on Wednesday, November 3. Visibly excited to meet cartoon journalist Joe Sacco after a discussion of his work with NYU's Middle East professor Zachary Lockman, a number of students arrived early to get their copies of Sacco's new graphic novel, Footnotes in Gaza, and his older work, Palestine, autographed. After thirty or so Starbucks espressos were discarded and most phones were silenced, the "conversation," part of an NYU series entitled "Primary Sources: Coverage in Context," began on schedule. The conversation focused mainly on Footnotes in Gaza, which employs comic strips to chronicle alleged Israeli abuses in Gaza in 1956.Immediately noticeable was the mutual agreement between cartoonist and historian that objectivity should be scorned. In Lockman's words, "People approach history from current concerns...which forms how...(Read Full Article)