Dr Jared Ahmad
BA (Salford); MA, PhD (Manchester)
School of Journalism, Media and Communication
Lecturer in Journalism, Politics and Communication
Programme Director MA International Public and Political Communication
+44 114 222 2530
Full contact details
School of Journalism, Media and Communication
The Wave
2 Whitham Road
Sheffield
S10 2AH
- Profile
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Jared joined the school in September 2017 as a Lecturer in Journalism, Politics and Communication. He is the director of the MA degree International Public and Political Communication and a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education Academy (SFHEA). Jared also has a PGCert in Teaching and Learning and previously taught at the University of Liverpool and University of Manchester.
Jared’s research focuses on questions of identity, representation and power in regard to non-state terrorism, with a particular focus on Salafi-Jihadi movements such as al-Qaeda and the Islamic State. His latest book, The BBC, the War on Terror and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism: Representing ‘Al-Qaeda’, was published by Palgrave-Macmillan in 2018. It explored the BBC’s portrayal of the al-Qaeda terror threat over a 10-year period (2001-2011), combining rigorous multimodal discourse analysis of news content alongside interviews with senior editors and journalists from the organisation. A summary of the book can be read on the Reframing Russia blog.
Jared has also published in leading international journals such as Critical Studies on Terrorism, Media, War and Conflict and International Journal of Communication. His research has been funded by the University of Manchester and the University of Sheffield.
- Research interests
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Jared’s research interests are interdisciplinary and are located at the intersection between cultural studies, postcolonial theory, and (visual) political communication. In particular, he is interested in questions of identity, representation and power in regard to non-state terrorist groups, alongside the broader communicative interactions that take place between different actors (politicians, journalists and citizens) when re-imagining and re-mediating terror threats.
His most recent work has focused on the visual communication strategies employed by the Islamic State in their image operations. He shows how Islamic State propagandists seek to appropriate time-worn stereotypes about Islam and the “dangerous Orient”, together with discourses of nostalgia and hegemonic masculinity, in an attempt to exploit and amplify audience perceptions of the group. Jared has also written about the way British television news providers sought to re-imagine the Islamic State in the aftermath of the November 13th Paris attacks, and the way journalists helped perpetuate an “elite”-centred understanding of the threat, thus legitimising subsequent airstrikes in Syria. Jared's forthcoming book seeks to draw these different strands of research together and will be entitled Imagining the Caliphate: Analysing Public, Political and Popular Representations of the Islamic State.
- Publications
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Books
- The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism: Representing al-Qaeda. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.
Journal articles
- Picturing the “Hordes of Hated Barbarians”:
Islamic State Propaganda, (Self)Orientalism & Strategic Self-Othering. International Journal of Communication, 16, 2935-2957. View this article in WRRO
- Constructing the Islamic state : analysing the interplay between media and policy frames in the aftermath of the November 13th 2015 Paris attacks. Critical Studies on Terrorism, 13(4), 568-590. View this article in WRRO
- Serving the same interests: The Wood Green ricin plot, media–state–terror relations and the ‘terrorism’ dispositif. Media, War and Conflict, 12(4), 411-434. View this article in WRRO
- A shifting enemy: analysing the BBC’s representations of “al-Qaeda” in the aftermath of the September 11 th 2001 attacks. Critical Studies on Terrorism, 9(3), 433-454. View this article in WRRO
- Book review: Social media at BBC NEWS: The re-making of crisis reporting. Media War & Conflict, 8(2), 281-283. View this article in WRRO
Chapters
- Islamic State, strategic self-othering and the weaponisation of propaganda images In Veneti A & Lilleker D (Ed.), Research Handbook on Visual Politics Edward Elgar Publishing
- The May 2nd 2011 Killing of Osama bin Laden, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 141-165). Springer International Publishing
- Introduction: The BBC, The ‘War on Terror’ and ‘Al-Qaeda’, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 1-20). Springer International Publishing
- Conclusion: A Shifting Enemy, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 167-192). Springer International Publishing
- Understanding Al-Qaeda as a Discursive Phenomenon, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 21-58). Springer International Publishing
- The January 5th 2003 Wood Green Ricin Plot, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 85-109). Springer International Publishing
- The July 7th 2005 Transport Bombings, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 111-139). Springer International Publishing
- The September 11th 2001 Attacks, The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism (pp. 59-83). Springer International Publishing
- Nightmarish Visions? Shifting Visual Representations of the ‘Islamic’ Terrorist Throughout the ‘War on Terror’, Studies on Performing Arts and Literature of the Islamicate World (pp. 54-78).
- Nightmarish Visions? Shifting Visual Representations of the ‘Islamic’ Terrorist Throughout the ‘War on Terror’, Seen and Unseen: Visual Cultures of Imperialism (pp. 53-78). BRILL
Book reviews
- Book review: Media and terrorism: Global perspectives. Global Media and Communication, 9(1), 74-76.
Website content
- 9/11: how politicians and the media turned terrorism into an Islamic issue.
- Envisioning Terror: Representations of Al Qaeda on the BBC.
- The BBC, The 'War on Terror' and the Discursive Construction of Terrorism: Representing al-Qaeda. Cham: Palgrave Macmillan.
- Teaching activities
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Jared is course leader for MA International Public and Political Communication (IPPC) and module leader for JNL6210 Research Methods and JNL6000 International Visual Public and Political Communication.
- PhD supervision
Jared is particularly interested in supervising doctoral students in the following areas:
- Media discourses and representations of the East, Islam, terrorism and political violence
- The politics/processes of terrorist (self)representation, knowledge and power
- Violent Jihadi or far-right extremist propaganda
- Terrorism and visual political communication