inklings

the war of geopolitics

excitement & boundless possibility

The heading sounds a tad more optimistic than I currently feel about the research project, but it's mostly true. As I've committed to the TV series Jack Ryan as my primary source (no turning back now!), pondering more about the issues it addresses has opened up a plethora of routes to take in my paper. It's been fascinating to watch a show I'd previously regarded with a kind of simplistic childlike fascination unravel into a tangled mass of conflicting ideologies. Pulling at just one string catapults you into this vastly complicated geopolitical discourse with a myriad of perspectives to grapple with. So as overwhelming as this sounds (and it is), I'm genuinely excited to keep pulling.

nuance & boundless headaches

The complexities of Jack Ryan are twofold.

The actual diegetic content of the show in terms of narrative, plot, and opposing character representations.
The extent to which such a narrative is accurate.

While Jack Ryan does ultimately adhere to the stereotypical terror-oriented plot that pits the white male hero against the Muslim villain, I don't think the show promotes a strictly black and white morality by any means. In terms of its diegetic content alone, the gray ethics emerge instantaneously. Each character is emboldened with a rich backstory that both informs their exigency and the rationale of their actions throughout the show and permits the audience to enter into their mind and identify with them.

I think nuance also abounds as for how the series shapes meaning and viewer perception. There's nuance in the producers' intent - the extent to which they intended for this to be a piece of nationalist media and the effort they made to keep it from being such. Further, is there any truth to the representations they outline in the show, or is belief in such portrayals simply cultured and reinforced by a history of being repeatedly fed that same storyline? This leads me to my ...

~ research questions ~

How can we regard geopolitical morality? As an American production, how much does the show deviate from or weather down the American hero / Muslim villain trope, if at all? Does the show even make an effort to? And if so, does it succeed?

Is its ultimate relegation of Muslim individuals to the role of antagonist sufficient to condemn the show as a dehumanizing work?

How has the historical tradition of Muslim tropes informed Jack Ryan? How did bringing on a professor of Islamic studies - Omer Mozaffar - affect the representation of Muslims in the show, if at all? What was Mozaffar's own consulting experience like?

Is nationalism as a generalized concept inherently bad? For a show to cultivate or cater to nationalistic aspirations, must the dehumanization of indigenous international opponents occur?

How has 9/11 changed or reinforced negative portrayals of Muslims in Hollywood? Is cultural sensitivity finally on the rise or still on the backburner?

In the political American spy drama genre, is the primary objective to build an American hero who protects his fellow citizens and domestic interests (promoting the American representation) or is it to vilify indigenous and international peoples (demoting the Muslim representation)? Must the latter occur to achieve the former? Does doing either necessarily equate being American to being white?

Is the concept of the noble savage employed in the show? What does the show have to say about gender and gender differences between American and Middle Eastern cultures?

Apart from being ideological fodder for a nationalistic audience, do Jack Ryan and like-minded media directly or indirectly benefit America at a governmental level? When agencies like the CIA in particular inform the production of such movies or television shows, are they conveying an overly flattering image of themselves? How accurate a portrayal are we deriving from film? Is such a portrayal enhancing our own - the audience's - perception of the CIA and the American government?

Jack Ryan poster

is terrorism only an international issue?

Jack Ryan, the CIA agent action hero

"We can do it, too."

Dina Shihabi in Jack Ryan

Omer Mozaffar - Muslim chaplain at Loyola University Chicago & consultant for Jack Ryan

winner winner chicken dinner secondary source

secondary sources

“With so many Hollywood scripts, the Arab villains are just faceless terrorists. I managed to convince the producers that these aren’t all people just driven by theology, that they have their own back story, that they should be part of the drama, not just ‘terrorists.’ You can watch a film that you may not agree with the politics of, but at least if they get the drama right, there’s a lot you can forgive.”

This is some of what Omer Mozaffar, who was brought on as a cultural consultant for Jack Ryan, had to say about his experience. His writing about the cultural desensitization of American filmmaking and how this can potentially be mitigated or even reversed was incredibly fascinating.

I was definitely most worried about finding a good range of secondary sources, due to how recent and relatively obscure Jack Ryan (especially the series) is.

But Mozaffar's firsthand account is one of the best direct relations to the show that reflects how it, amidst a longstanding history of misrepresentation, has shaped and continues to shape meaning.

Apart from Mozaffar's article, there are a few other scholarly sources (mainly regular online articles) on the show itself, which similarly criticize its stereotypically Islamophobic terror-oriented narrative.

A wider reading of the show lends way to the involvement of government agencies like the CIA in production, and how their influence can shape portrayal on all sides.

This is especially significant for post-9/11 film media, and work that addresses the War on Terror.

the inklings

I titled this webpage "inklings" because this is really the beginning of my research process. As I look into secondary material and go back to Jack Ryan in order to deconstruct it, I'm beginning to see the inklings of a paper - one with potentially really interesting issues at hand that I truly hope to address well. It's also called "inklings" because I'm realizing that there's inklings of truth to every dual argument addressed by the show - nuance. That's really what I'm hoping to dive into my paper, and hopefully this materializes! Also please enjoy the trailer for Jack Ryan if you have absolutely no clue what I've been talking about for the past half hour. And thank you for your time. <3

red, white. & blue

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