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Captured by the camera's eye: Guantanamo and the shifting frame of the Global War on Terror

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posted on 2023-06-08, 13:38 authored by Elspeth Van Veeren
In January 2002, images of the detention of prisoners held at US Naval Station Guantanamo Bay as part of the Global War on Terrorism were released by the US Department of Defense, a public relations move that Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld later referred to as ‘probably unfortunate’. These images, widely reproduced in the media, quickly came to symbolise the facility and the practices at work there. Nine years on, the images of orange-clad ‘detainees’ – the ‘orange series’ – remain a powerful symbol of US military practices and play a significant role in the resistance to the site. However, as the site has evolved, so too has its visual representation. Official images of these new facilities not only document this evolution but work to constitute, through a careful (re)framing (literal and figurative), a new (re)presentation of the site, and therefore the identities of those involved. The new series of images not only (re)inscribes the identities of detainees as dangerous but, more importantly, work to constitute the US State as humane and modern. These images are part of a broader effort by the US administration to resituate its image, and remind us, as IR scholars, to look at the diverse set of practices (beyond simply spoken language) to understand the complexity of international politics

History

Publication status

  • Published

File Version

  • Published version

Journal

Review of International Studies

ISSN

0260-2105

Publisher

Cambridge University Press

Issue

4

Volume

37

Page range

1721-1749

Department affiliated with

  • International Relations Publications

Full text available

  • Yes

Peer reviewed?

  • Yes

Legacy Posted Date

2012-11-14

First Open Access (FOA) Date

2016-03-22

First Compliant Deposit (FCD) Date

2017-03-07

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