IS: The Counter-Narrative

A conversation, a video essay, a poem and music about how to counteract the horror campaign and propaganda machine of the so-called Islamic State.

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Information

Date and time Saturday 21 January 2017 23:00 tot 23:45 uur
Location Theater aan het Spui - Zaal 1

The so-called Islamic State is more than a band of rebels or a terror network. Their campaign of terror in conquered villages and cities, their terrorist attacks in Europe, and their written and visual propaganda looks and sounds like a coherent horror story of "the enemy" as well as a recruitment campaign for potential international jihadists. IS publish a glossy magazine and put masses of energy into the recruitment of sympathizers among youth who are seeking identity and meaning in the virtual world. And they don't limit themselves to Muslim youth. In short, IS understands the power of the word and greatly emphasizes the imagination.

In IS: The Counter-Narrative, Hassnae Bouazza directs the conversation about how to counteract the horror campaign and propaganda machine. Dutch-Kurdish Beri Shalmashi offers up a video essay about similar groupings, visual representation and propaganda. Frank Westerman takes us into the past and shows how we in the Netherlands have reacted to extremist acts, and how we could now choose the right words and actions to win the battle of ideas. Arnon Grunberg gets under the skin of jihadists from the West, and wonders whether their existential motivation diverges fundamentally from that of an average Western military on a mission. Rodaan Al Galidi shows us the bigger picture of the relationship between Europe and the Middle East and presents his vision of how to understand IS as a symbol of today's transnational world. He also provides the night's finale in the form of a performed poem; the musical epilogue is by Jeanine Valeriano and her Spoken Beat Night.

Line-up

Frank Westerman

(Emmen, NL, 1964) studied tropical agricultural engineering and was a correspondent for the Volkskrant and NRC Handelsblad newspapers in Belgrade and Moskow. He wrote about his time there in 1994's De Brug over de Tara (The Bridge over the River Tara). Together with journalist Bart Rijs he wrote 1997's  Srebrenica, Het zwartste scenario (Srebrenica, the Blackest Scenario). Ingenieurs van de ziel (Engineers of the Soul) was published in 2002, an inquiry into the foundations of the Soviet system and the role of writers. De Graanrepubliek (The Grain Republic), about the struggle between rich gentlemen farmers and communist workers in Groningen, was published earlier. Westerman's novel El Negro en ik (El Negro and Me), inspired by a preserved South African in a Spanish museum, was published in 2004 and won the Gouden Uil prize. His revised and augmented 2015 edition of De Slag om Srebrenica (The Battle for Srebrenica) won the Prinsjes Book Prize for best political book. Een woord een woord (One Word One Word) appeared in 2016, in which he tests the strength of free speech under the pressure of terrorist threats. As a child, he experienced the Molukkan train hijacking at close quarters; as a correspondent, he witnessed Chechen terror in Russia. Drawing on these gripping experiences, he describes a series of hostage dramas. In Zeven dieren bijten terug (Seven Animals Bite Back), Frank Westerman encounters seven magnificent creatures in the wake of Willem Barentsz. Along the way, the reader becomes captivated by the wondrous tale of seven polar animals and what they have to tell us at our latitude.
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Hassnae Bouazza

(Morocco, 1973) is a journalist, columnist, translator, researcher and producer. She publishes in various media (including Dutch national daily newspaper NRC and women's magazine Linda); runs her own online magazine for culture lovers, Aicha Qandisha. She compiled a story collection about Arab women, Achter de sluier (Behind the Veil, 1999); 2013 saw the publication of her book Arabieren kijken (Looking at Arabs), about "ordinary" people in the Arab world. She made TV programs for various broadcasters, including the documentary series Seks en de Zonde (Sex and Sin). Together with Michelin-starred chef Soenil Bahadoer, she wrote the culinary books Spicy Chef (2020) and Streetfood (2022). She published two further books in 2022: Een koffer vol citroenen (A Suitcase Full of Lemons), a requiem for and portrait of her mother, and Arbeidsmigranten in Nederland (Migrant Labourers in the Netherlands).
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Arnon Grunberg

(Netherlands, 1971) is one of the most successful Dutch writers, both at home and abroad. The prolific novelist, columnist, essayist, poet and scriptwriter lives and works mainly in New York. His fiction tackles themes such as religion, parenthood, love and relationships. His essays, columns, debates and performances seek out the polemics on topical issues. His debut novel and international breakthrough, Blauwe maandagen (Blue Mondays, 1994), was followed by award-winning and internationally successful novels such as Phantom Pain (2000), The Asylum Seeker (2003), Tirza (2006), Onze oom (Our Uncle, 2007), Huid en haar (Tooth and Nail, 2010), Moedervlekken (Birthmarks, 2016) and Bezette gebieden (Occupied Territories, 2020). Between 2000 and 2008 he also published novels and essays under the pseudonym Marek van der Jagt. The prize jury called the author "a writer unequalled in ambition, productivity and intellectual power".
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Spoken Beat Night

Spoken word artist Jeannine Valeriano and her team of (guest) musicians and drawing artists - together Spoken Beat Night - create cross-over concerts in which jazz, spoken word, world music, readings, live animation and funky beats merge. The two artists do live sketches, which are personal and imagistic interpretations of the text. Spoken Beat Night plays with language; the team, plus top musicians from the comopolitan world of improvised music, pull the writers' words into the world of sound. With Jeannine Valerio (vocals), Maarten Ornstein (bass clarinet, saxophone and electronics), guitarist Paul Pallesen, illustrator and animator Floor de Goede, drawing artist Hans van de Meulengraaf, cellist Jörg Brinkmann and – in Saturday Night Unlimited - as a guest Nizar Rohana on oud.
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Rodaan Al Galidi

(Iraq, 1971) fled his country in 1998 after completing architecture studies, was given asylum in the Netherlands and settled there legally in 2007. Since then he has published poetry, novels and collections of his columns. He received the 2000 El Hizjra literature award and the 2011 Literature Prize of the European Union. In 2013 he published Liever niet, antwoordt de liefde (Maybe Not, Was Love's Reply), an anthology of refreshing love poetry. His novel Hoe ik talent voor het leven kreeg (Two Blankets, Three Sheets) tells of his experiences as an asylum seeker in the Netherlands. Al Galidi published the short story collection Duizend-en-een-nachtmerries (A Thousand and One Nightmares) in 2017 and a poem collection Neem de titel serieus (Take the title seriously) in 2018.
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Beri Shalmashi

(Paris, 1983) is a Dutch writer and filmmaker with roots in Iranian Kurdistan. She writes edgy columns for Volkskrant.nl in which she reveals an authentic voice. For example, she refused to support Nasrdin Dchar's Ieder1 movement. "I've have too much trauma left over from growing up in the Netherlands, too many experiences of being the Other." Shalmashi moved to Iraqi Kurdistan in 2012 to teach at the university of Erbil and to work on new films. She wrote about how the refugee crisis and the war with IS increasingly disrupted life in the city. Ultimately she returned to Amsterdam in 2015. Shalmashi studied at the Film Academy in Amsterdam and has made various films. The television film Mama, a collaboration with Sanne Vogel, was nominated for a Golden Kalf in 2010. The short film Het front (The Front), about a young woman who wants to go and fight for IS and based on a script by Shalmashi, was shown at NFF 2016.
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