ABSTRACT
On 1 May 2010, Faisal Shahzad attempted to detonate a car bomb in the middle of New York City’s bustling Times Square. Fortunately, the makeshift fertilizerfueled bomb malfunctioned and failed to detonate, and Shahzad was arrested two days later. In the days that followed, as more and more information surfaced, media accounts as well as the street conversations and online discussions of ordinary people came to be dominated by Shahzad’s personal and professional life. Though born in Pakistan, Shahzad was a naturalized U.S. citizen who had lived in the United States for more than a decade. He had earned an M.B.A., gained employment as a financial analyst, married, and bought a house. To all appearances, his life seemed not only mundane but also completely middle class. In other words, for many Americans, he seemed utterly and thoroughly American, an image not dispelled—and perhaps encouraged—by the photograph of him most frequently displayed and circulated by the media. The photo, which Shahzad appears to have taken of himself while driving, performs a carefully constructed and rather familiar identity. With his stylish jacket, mirror lens designer sunglasses, sharply trimmed beard, gel-combed hair, and Bluetooth headset, Shahzad embodies to no small degree the image of youth, affluence, and urbanity that so dominates American popular culture depictions of the ideal(ized) male.
