Sophia Balakian on Broeck and Mariani

This essay argues that both Broeck and Mariani implicitly and explicitly frame discourses of anti-Americanism as a form of name-calling, and that this involves condemnation in specifically gendered ways as well as in racist and homophobic ways used in a variety of contexts by children, adolescents, and adults. Mariani and Broeck both demonstrate that name-calling, or at least something close to it, takes place on a global and transnational level and in both cultural and state-centered politics. The essay asks how thinking about the term “anti-American” as a form of name-calling shifts the way we think about discourses of Americanization and anti-Americanism, and whether this framing might spotlight certain aspects of both essays. Balakian notes that both Mariani and Broeck critique U.S. exceptionalism, but wonders if it might not be especially helpful to shift the emphasis away from the idea that “America” is exceptionally hated to the idea that “America” is exceptionally powerful.