American Colonialism in the Philippines: Different but still Colonialism

Book reviewed:
Julian Go and Anne L. Foster, eds. The American Colonial State in the Philippines, Global Perspectives . Durham, NC and London: Duke University Press, 2003. 312 pp. Index. $79.95 (cloth), $22.95 (paper).     

The symbolism of the Arab flag in modern Arab states: between commonality and uniqueness*

ABSTRACT. The national flag, anthem and emblem are the three symbols through which an independent country proclaims its identity and sovereignty. Although each state has its distinctive flag, there are similarities in the flags of certain countries, such as in Scandinavia (the cross) and Africa (colours). These symbolise certain propinquity in terms of ideology, culture and history. Similarity is also to be found in the flags of the Arab countries: out of the twenty‐two current members of the Arab League, ten share the same colours on their flags (green, white, black and red), while a certain Islamic symbol (eagle, star) in some flags represents the uniqueness of that country. Of the other twelve countries, most rely on one colour of the four (usually red or green) while nine use Islamic symbols (stars, crescent and sword) on their flags. In spite of the importance of this national symbol, the study of the modern Arab flag is almost non‐existent. This article explores the modern evolution of the Arab flag and the reasons for the similarities in many Arab flags. In particular, it will deal with the pan‐Arab flags of the Hashemites Kingdom of the Hijaz (1916–26), Jordan, Iraq, Palestine, Syria and Egypt.     

The Archaeological Study of Spanish Colonialism in the Americas

Spanish colonial archaeology has undergone a fundamental shift since the Columbian Quincentenary due to the adoption of a bottom-up understanding of colonialism that emphasizes the analysis of local phenomena in a global context and the active ways in which people negotiated the processes set in motion by the conquest. This review examines five key research foci: culture change and identity, missionization, bioarchaeology, economics, and investigations of the colonial core. It ends with a consideration of ongoing challenges posed by the archaeology of colonialism, particularly the relationship of the individual to broader social processes and the emerging role of comparison.     

The View from the Verandah: Levuka Bungalows and the Transformation of Settler Identities in Later Colonialism

The residential architecture of Levuka, Fiji, contains a diverse and well-preserved sample of what architectural historians have called the British tropical bungalow. Dating to the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, these small frame structures bear witness to the in situ development of a descendant colonialist identity amongst the European settlers of the port town. Analysis of the degree to which these houses conform to, and diverge from, the normative traits of the global bungalow style provides insight into the material processes of later colonialist communities and their increasingly complex cultural and social identities.     

The limits of constructedness: memory and nationalism in the Arab Middle East

Abstract. This paper examines the influence of the historical trajectory on the creation of nationalism in the twentieth century Middle East. While it is not claimed here that everything was decided in preexisting history, the paper claims that history was important. If the story of Middle Eastern nationalism is the story of the tension between ethnic Pan‐Arabism and geographical state nationalism, the fact is both these phenomena are highly distinct in the sources used for this study, mainly seventeenth‐ and eighteenth century biographical dictionaries. The modern countries (Egypt, Syria) are in daily use, serving partially as terms of identity, non‐political though it might have been. A sense of Arabism existed as well, probably surviving from the early Islamic period. It had much to do with the survival of Arabic literary genres as the preoccupation of the intellectual elite. The Ottomans did their bit in this regard, by treating the Arabic‐speaking Middle East as substantially one unified unit, their provinces being superficial and unimportant barriers, mentally no less than physically. Thus, when the Ottoman Empire disappeared in the early twentieth century, the ambivalence between Arabism and state‐based nationalism already existed, and was by no means invented by colonialism. The later success of this or that version of nationalism could only be explained by reference to modern factors, but the repertory owed much to the cultural history of the region.