Discourse and Public Diplomacy in Israel

Discourse and Public Diplomacy in Israel

63-239-18

Lecturer: Dr. Elie Friedman

Course:ElectiveSchool year: 2016-17Year: 2nd

Semester:2nd, Wednesday, 14:00-15:30Credits: 1 annual credit

Mail:

Description and Purpose

The term "public diplomacy" refers to the efforts made by official and unofficial actors to advance the interests of the state in foreign states by influencing the public in these states. Public diplomacy is based on the use of "soft power", as opposed to military or economic power. Primarily, public diplomacy messages are mediated through mass media; thus, to a large extent public diplomacy engages in a battle over the public agenda and framing in foreign media. Thus, the public diplomacy effort utilizes textual and visual messages to create cultural proximity within various contexts and with different audiences.

Various theories of discourse analysis – including Critical Discourse Analysis, Narrative Analysis, Pragmatics, and Politeness Theory – provide tools to examine the public diplomacy of Israel, including the use of rhetoric, framing, and the use of cultural values and codes.The course will utilize these tools to specifically examine the challenges for Israeli public diplomacy in the international sphere.

This course intends to provide students with the ability to critically examine public diplomacy messages (both textual and visual) through the use of discourse analysis tools.

Course Outline

1. Soft power and public diplomacy

A background to the term public diplomacy which illustrates how states can use soft power as opposed to hard power; the lecture will examine how the term has evolved since the cold war until the present digital age.

Gilboa, E. (2008). Searching for a theory of public diplomacy. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science. Sage: 616: 55.

Ejournal (125618)

Nye, J. (2008). Public diplomacy and soft power. The ANNALS of the American Academy of Political and Social Science.616(1): 94-109.

Ejournal (125618)

2. Political values and political culture in the international arena

An examination of political values and culture through an analysis of Ingelhart and Welzel's World Values Survey. A discussion of the relevancy of Huntington's famous clash of civilizations theory.

Ingelhart, R. and Welzel, C. (2010). Changing mass priorities: The link between modernization and democracy. Perspectives of Politics, 8(2): 551-567.

Available via Google scholar

Huntington, S. P. (1993). The clash of civilizations. Foreign Affairs. 72: 22-49.

909.829 CLA 1996 (1167176)

3. Asymmetric conflict and public diplomacy

An introduction to the term asymmetric conflict and an examination of how conflict between state actors and non-state actors, and role of civilians in such conflict, impacts the public diplomacy effort.

Sheafer, T., and Shenhav, S. R. (2009). Mediated public diplomacy in a new era ofwarfare. The Communication Review. 12(3): 272-283.

Ejournal (2404373)

4. Legitimacy, image and nation branding

An examination of how organizations and/or states are deemed "legitimate" and this term impacts how states are branded. We will look at current efforts being made by the MFA to brand Israel "beyond the conflict".

Van Ham, P. (2001). The rise of the brand state: The postmodern politics of imageand reputation. Foreign Affairs. 80(5): 2-6.

Journal & Ejournal (146564)

Liran-Alper, D (2009). Life in Israel beyond the conflict. In D. Shinar (ed.) The Neaman Document: A Study on Israeli Public Diplomacy. Samuel Neaman Institute:70-76

Available in Hebrew

דיפלומטיה ציבורית בישראל(פרק 3, עמ' 59-64)

5. Public diplomacy in the social media age

An examination of how public diplomacy has changed in the age of social media; an analysis of new public diplomacy actors who operate primarily over social media, and the content and form of their messages.

Cull, N. J. (2011). WikiLeaks, public diplomacy 2.0 and the state of digital publicdiplomacy. Place Branding and Public Diplomacy. 7: 1-8.

Ejournal (1134756)

6. Face, Politeness theory and public diplomacy

An examination of how Goffman's theory of "face", the social identity actors create to portray to others, impacts public diplomacy. An analysis of how Brown and Levinson's Politeness theory extends the concept to include positive and negative face and face- threatening acts in public diplomacy situations.

Chilton, P. (1993). Politeness, politics, and diplomacy. Discourse & Society. 1(2): 201-224.

Ejournal (2716784)

7. The narrative approach

An examination of how overarching narratives impact public diplomacy; an analysis of the role of story-telling and its components in public diplomacy discourse.

Shenhav, S., Sheafer, T., Gabay, I. (2010). Incoherent narrator: Israeli public diplomacy during the disengagement and the elections in the Palestinian Authority. Israel Studies. 15(3): 143-162.

Ejournal (332975)

8. The role of metaphors in public diplomacy

An examination of how overarching metaphors have guided Israel's public diplomacy efforts and the impact of such metaphors on political culture.

Lakoff, G. (1993). The contemporary theory of metaphor. Metaphor and Thought. 2: 202-251.

Available via Google scholar

Gavriely-Nuri, D. (2009). Friendly fire: War-normalizing metaphors in the Israeli political discourse. Journal of Peace Education. 6 (2): 153–169.

Ejournal (2404582)

9. Speech acts and public diplomacy

A background to Speech Act theory through an examination of how speech acts determine reality; an analysis of how speech acts are mediated and contribute to public diplomacy.

Kampf, Z. (2013). Mediated performatives. Handbook of Pragmatics. Eds: Ostman, J. and Verchueren, J. 2013 Installment.

Ejournal (498556)

10. Vagueness, equivocation and diplomatic discourse

An examination of the discursive tools utilized to balance public diplomacy demands with domestic demands; the lecture will focus on vagueness and equivocation strategies.

Gruber, H. (1993). Political language and textual vagueness. Pragmatics. 3: 1: 1-28.

Available via Google scholar

Friedman, E. and Kampf, Z. (2014). Politically speaking at home and abroad: A typology of message gap strategies. Discourse & Society 25(6): 1-19.

Ejournal (271678)

11. Student presentations

12. Student presentations

13. Student presentations

Breakdown of grade

40% - final exam

30% - final assignment: submission of a 2000-2500 word paper which analyzes a specific public diplomacy text. The paper will include the presentation of the specific discourse analysis theory to be utilized followed by its application to empirically analyze specific textual or visual public diplomacy content. The paper must cite at least five sources from the course readings (from either the required or optional reading list). At mid-semester, must submit a one page research proposal, explaining the text chosen and the theoretical framework to be applied. The paper will be submitted five weeks following the final lecture.

20% - final presentation: a 10 minute presentation based on the final assignment + 5 minutes for questions and answers.

10% - attendance and participation

Optional Reading

Barnett, M. (1999). Culture, strategy, and foreign policy change: israel’s road to oslo.European Journal of International Relations. 5:5–36.

Brown, P. and S. Levinson. (1987). Politeness. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.

Bruner, J. (1991). The narrative construction of reality. Critical Inquiry. 18:1: 1-21.

Cameron, L. J. (2007). Patterns of metaphor use in reconciliation talk.Discourse & Society. 18 (2): 197-222.

Caplan, N. (2010). The Israel-Palestine Conflict: Contested Histories. West Sussex, UK: Wiley Blackwell.

Chilton, P. and Shaffner, C. (1997). Discourse and politics. In T. Van Dijk (Ed.). Discourse as Structure and Process. Vol. 2. London: Sage Publications.

Cillia, R., Reisigl, M. and Wodak, R. (1999). The discursive construction of national identities". Discourse & Society. 10: 149-173.

Fairclough, N. (1989). Language and Power. London: Longman Group UK Limited.

Gavriely-Nuri, D. (2014). Saying ‘peace’, going to ‘war’: Peace in the service of the Israeli just-war rhetoric. Critical Discourse Studies.11 (1):1-18.

Goffman, E. (1967). Interaction Ritual: Essays on Face-to-Face Behavior. New York: Knopf Doubleday Publishing Group.

Kampf, Z. (2009). Public (Non-) Apologies: The Discourse of Minimizing Responsibility. Journal of Pragmatics. 41: 2257-2270.

Lakoff, R. T. (2000). The Language War. Berkeley, California: University of California Press.

Liebes-Plesner, T. (1984). Shades of meaning in President Sadat's speech. Semiotica. 48(3/4): 229-265.

McGee, M.C. (1975). In search of 'the People': A rhetorical alternative. Quarterly Journal of Speech. 61(3): 235-249.

Putnam, R. (1988). Diplomacy and domestic politics: The logic of two-level games." International Organization. 42:427–460.

Shinar, D. and Bratic, V. (2010). Assymetric war and Assymetric peace: Real realities and media realities in the Middle East and the western Balkans. Dynamics of Assymetric Conflict. 3(2): 125-142.

Suchman, M. C. (1995). Managing legitimacy: Strategic and institutional approaches. The Academy of Management Review. 20(3): 571-610.

Van Dijk, T. (2001). Critical Discourse Analysis. In D. Tannen, D. Schiffrin & H. Hamilton (Eds.). Handbook of Discourse Analysis. (pp. 352-371). Oxford: Blackwell, 2001: 352-371.

Wodak, R., de Cillia, R., Reisigl, M., and Liebhart, K. (2009). The Discursive Construction of National Identity. 2nd Ed. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.

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