Dr Luke Howie - Researcher Profile

Luke Howie

Address

School of Political & Social Inquiry
Faculty of Arts, Clayton

Biography

Prescribing placebos for a terrified metropolis 

“The remarkable impact of September 11 is as much testimony of the time and space in which it occurred as the act itself.”

 

 

Dr Luke Howie is investigating the ways in which we have collectively responded to September 11.

In his earlier book, Terrorism, the Worker and the City, he argues that terrorism has arrived in Australia only as a ‘simulation’. 

“The fact of the matter is that terrorism has not – and does not – occur on Australia streets. Instead, it’s something we watch on television, something we see on the internet. An attack occurs in New York City, and people in Melbourne run for cover – a bizarre outcome of media discourses in a globally linked, internet-based society made up of social networking websites. The funny thing is, that did not stop Australian firms and departments spending around $8 billion on a problem that in some conceptions simply doesn’t exist here.”

In his research, Luke has found managers of major infrastructure who believe that a terrorist attack is both unlikely to occur yet impossible to prevent. He spoke to sporting event organisers, who talked about how at major events they do ‘100 per cent bag searches’. 

“As I pressed such people they eventually said, ‘Look, we all know we can’t do a 100 per cent bag search, we know it’s impossible, we know a certain percentage get through.’ And so, we never mean what we say when we’re talking about security. We want to go to a major event, we want to enjoy it, and a 100 per cent bag search makes us feel good even though we know that if someone had a suicide vest attached to themselves they’d probably get in a lot of the time.”

Just as the threat arrives to us as a simulation, so too should we respond to it with ‘simulated security’. The appearance of security would be enough to deter most terrorists, Luke says.

“It makes would-be violent terrorist in this mythical scenario say, ‘Hmm ... that sounds like a more difficult target.’ And if you were able to reduce the psychological impact that terrorism has on a society, terror tactics lose much of their appeal.”

Luke’s most recent book, Terror on the Screen, looks at the ways in which an attack in New York City has reverberated through our pop-culture artefacts. In it, he talks about TV shows such as South Park, The Simpsons, Family Guy, and films such as 25th Hour, which integrate terrorism into their canon. And he contrasts these with shows such as Friends, The West Wing and How I Met Your Mother, which he describes as depictions of a parallel universe, and “post-September 11 tributes to a world that did not blow up”. 

“These shows’ narratives never confronted September 11 head on; they just pretended it never occurred. They didn’t want September 11 to be part of the fictional narrative of our television. As an analysis of pop culture and social situations, I think that’s ridiculous. Why pretend that there was no such thing as September 11? Surely it’s part of the world.”

 

Qualifications

DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY
Institution: Monash University
Year awarded: 2008
COMMERCE
Institution: Deakn University
Year awarded: 2002

Publications

Books

Howie, L.J., 2012, Witnesses to Terror: Understanding the Meanings and Consequences of Terrorism, Palgrave Macmillan, Hampshire, UK and New York, USA.

Howie, L., 2011, Terror on the Screen: Witnesses and the Re-animation of 9/11 as Image-event, Popular Culture and Pornography, New Academia Publishing, Washington DC, USA.

Howie, L.J., 2009, Terrorism, the Worker and the City: Simulations and Security in a Time of Terror, Gower, Surrey England.

Book Chapters

Howie, L.J., 2009, Australia's History of Terrorism: Institutionalized Discrimination and the Response of the Mob, in Doomed to Repeat? Terrorism and the Lessons of History, eds Sean Brawley, New Academia Publishing, USA, pp. 251-276.

Journal Articles

Howie, L., 2011, They were created by man... and they have a plan: Subjective and objective violence in Battlestar Galactica and the War on Terror, International Journal of Zizek Studies [P], vol 5, issue 2, University of Leeds, Institute of Communications Studies, http://zizekstudies.org/index.php/ijzs/index, pp. 1-23.

Howie, L.J., 2009, A role for business in the War on Terror, Disaster Prevention & Management [P], vol 18, issue 2, Emerald Group Publishing Ltd, UK, pp. 100-107.

Howie, L.J., 2009, Representing Terrorism: Reanimating Post-9/11 New York City, International Journal of Zizek Studies [P], vol 3, issue 3, University of Leeds, Institute of Communications Studies, UK, pp. 1-22.

Howie, L.J., 2007, The Terrorism threat and managing workplaces, Disaster Prevention and Management, vol 16, issue 1, Emerald Group Publishing Limited, United Kingdom, pp. 70-78.

Howie, L.J., 2005, The threat of terrorism and social change, Human Rights Defender, vol Nov/Dec 05, issue Special Issue, Human Rights Centre, University of New South Wales, Sydney NSW Australia, pp. 22-23.

Conference Proceedings

Howie, L.J., 2009, An Age of Celebrity Terrorism?, The Future of Sociology, 1December 2009 to 4 December 2009, TASA (The Australian Sociological Association), Canberra, Australia, pp. 1-12.

Howie, L.J., 2008, I'll be there for you - the meanings and consequences of 9/11 in Friends, The annual conference of The Australian Sociological Association 2008. Re-imagining Sociology: Conference Publication Proceedings, 2 - 5 December 2008, The Australian Sociological Association (TASA), Australia, pp. 1-21.

Howie, L.J., 2007, Corporate Counter-Terrorism: The Key Role for Business in the War on Terror, Proceedings of the 2007 RNSA Security Technology Conference, Melbourne 2007, 28 Sept 2007, Australian Homeland Security Research Centre, ACT Australia, pp. 319-330.

Howie, L.J., 2007, Corporate Counter-Terrorism: The Crucial Role of Business in The War on Terror, TASA & SAANZ Joint conference 2007 (Public on Sociologies: Lessons and Trans-Tasman Comparisons), 4-7 December 2007, The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) & the Sociological Association of Aotearoa NZ, New Zealand, pp. 1-7.

Howie, L.J., 2007, Real Fiction: Witnessing terrorism without violence, TASA & SAANZ Joint conference 2007 (Publication Sociologies: Lessons and Trans-Tasman Comparisons), 4-7 December 2007, The Australian Sociological Association (TASA) & the Sociological Association of Aotearoa NZ, New Zealand, pp. 1-7.

Howie, L.J., 2006, Melbourne as a terrorist target and the human response, Recent Advances in Security Technology: Proceedings of the 2006 RNSA Security Technology Conference, 19 September to 21 September 2006, Australian Homeland Security Research Centre, Deakin ACT Australia, pp. 169-179.

Howie, L.J., 2006, Terrorism and the human consequence at work, 21st Century Work: High Road or Low Road, 1 February 2006 to 3 February 2006, The Association of Industrial Relations Academics of Australia and New Zealand, Australia, pp. 267-274.

Howie, L.J., 2006, Terrorism as opiniotainment: perceptions warriors and the public battlefield, Proceedings of the 7th Australian Information Warfare and Security Conference, 4 December 2006 to 5 December 2006, School of Computer and Information Science, Edith Cowan University, Perth WA Australia, pp. 31-37.

Howie, L.J., 2006, Terrorism in indirectly affected populations, Social Change in the 21st Century, 27 October 2006, Centre for Social Change Research, School of Humanities and Human Services, Queensland University of, Brisbane QLD Australia, pp. 1-10.

Howie, L.J., 2006, The importance of being September 11: terrorism and indirectly affected populations, TASA 2006 Annual Conference Proceedings: Sociology for a Mobile World, 4 December 2006 to 7 December 2006, The Sociological Association of Australia, WA Australia, pp. 1-9.

Howie, L.J., 2006, Thought contagion theory and terrorism in the media, TASA 2006 Annual Conference Proceedings: Sociology for a Mobile World, 4 December 2006 to 7 December 2006, The Sociological Association of Australia, WA Australia, pp. 1-9.

Howie, L.J., 2005, The evolution of the terrorist threat: tyrannicide to cyber-terrorism, Proceedings of 6th Australian Information Warfare & Security Conference, 24 November 2005 to 25 November 2005, Deakin Univesity, Geelong Vic Australia, pp. 42-47.

Howie, L.J., 2005, The threat of terrorism and workplace relations, Engaging the Multiple Contexts of Management: Convergence and Divergence of Management Theory & Practice, 07 December 2005 to 10 December 2005, ANZAM, Canberra ACT Australia, pp. 1-11.

Howie, L.J., 2005, There is nothing to fear but fear itself (and terrorists): public perception, terrorism and the workplace, 2005 Proceedings: Social Change in the 21st Century, 28 October 2005, Centre for Social Change Research, QUT, Brisbane Qld Australia, pp. 1-11.

Howie, L.J., 2005, Workplace relations and the impact of the terrorist threat, TASA 2005 Conference, 5 December 2005 to 8 December 2005, The Sociological Association of Australia, Hobart Tas Australia, pp. 1-10.

Other

Howie, L.J., 2006, Safety in numbers, The Australian, News Limited, Australia.

Howie, L.J., 2005, Laws that light a fuse, Herald Sun, Herald and Weekly Times, Melbourne Vic Australia.

Postgraduate Research Supervisions

Current Supervision

Program of Study:
(DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:
TERRORISM - TREATING THE SYMPTONS or INITIATING THE CURE?.
Supervisors:
Lentini, P (Main), Howie, L (Associate).
Program of Study:
(DOCTORATE BY RESEARCH).
Thesis Title:
The Self- Interested State in a Cosmopolitan World.
Supervisors:
Howie, L (Main), Ahmad, I (Associate), Walter, J (Associate).