Research Fellow, Post-Doctoral Studies
ybenmoshe@univ.haifa.ac.il
Contribution to Newspapers:
“Trump is only a Symptom” (Haaretz, 25.2.2017)
“Changing Perspectives on the Holocaust” (Haaretz 22.1.2017)
“Swing to the Right – The Threat for Europe is not Terrorism but Populism” (Maariv, 4.12.2016)
Research Project
Coming from the field of political science and communication, I have studied interdisciplinary research topics that integrated cultural studies, history, national and international cinema, television and popular culture. In my doctoral research I focused on the representation of Hitler in historical films which were produced in America and both German states between 1945 to the present. The aim of my research was to explore the imagery of Hitler’s figure as a reflection of the changing political agendas, historical perspectives and social needs in different periods of time. By embedding the film analysis with the respective socialpolitical developments and cultural ethos of each state the comparative analysis enabled me to highlight the peculiarities of the “different Hitlers” as historical figures to remember over two generations after the war. Film theory and critical thought in media studies and cultural studies, which were part of this project, are integral to my current postdoc research on the reconceptualization of terrorism in TV series and feature films produced after 9/11 in Israel, Germany and the United States.
My current post-doc research centers on the representations of terrorism in the age of new wars. By that I refer to the age of a-symmetrical conflicts, which characterize most global armed battles since the end of World War II. The qualitative deconstruction of TV and cinematic representation explores the modification within the conceptual change and the following framing of war, as an arrow of the political environment on which it underlines. My research suggest a pictorial definition for ‘terrorism’ with the components it embeds – from the motivation for an act to the psychological and physical implication, as a demonstration of group-power and its shifting towards privatization of the action and its motivation. By reflecting upon the contemporary political conflicts conveyed in the media, the analysis set an essential theoretical basis for “what is terrorism” which lack a juristic as well as theoretical consensus.
Abtract : The Depiction of Hitler: Forming Collective Memory of Hitler in German and American Historical Film-Narratives between 1945-2009