Ottoman Maps of the Empire’s Arab Provinces, 1850s to the First World War

In recent years the central Ottoman archive in Istanbul has been gradually releasing and computerizing thousands of maps stored in its collections. Our study introduces 137 maps already available to researchers that focus either directly or indirectly as part of broader presentations of imperial domains on the Ottoman Empire’s Arab provinces. These maps, which all date to between the middle of the nineteenth century and the First World War, differ widely in character, content and function. The maps are briefly described according to their content and set in their historical context.     

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.     

Narrating the Self among Arab Americans: A Bridging Discourse between Arab Tradition and American Culture

This article expounds the nature of Arab American identity through an exploration of discourses and practices related to traveling and movement at global and local levels, with a particular emphasis on personal narratives of both men and women of different ages and socioeconomic backgrounds. Travel is dealt with here in its broad meaning and connotes migratory travel, and immigration. It also indicates traveling back and forth between the homeland and new land. Despite the fact that cross‐cultural studies of travel are scant, population movements and transnational migration are currently the focus of broad academic debates and surround such issues as transnational cultural relations, the renovation of migrants' social cosmologies, ¹ and the dynamics of identity reconstruction ( Axel, 2004 ; Clifford, 1988 ; Cohn, 1987 ; Coutin, 2003 ; el‐Aswad, 2004, 2006a ; Euben, 2006 ; Hall, 1990, 1992 ; Julian, 2004 ; Kaplan, 1996 ; Kennedy & Danks, 2001 ; Mintz, 1998 ; Tsing, 2000 ). This inquiry is contingent on ethnographic material gathered from 20 case studies addressing various experiences of Arab Americans living in the community of Dearborn, in the metropolitan Detroit area of Michigan. ² These case studies reveal some important and comparative theoretical insights that help us understand core features of the unity as well as the multiplicity, diversity, and plasticity of Arab American identity. The study concentrates on narratives of personal experience, defined as verbalized, visualized, and/or embodied framings of a sequence of actual or possible life events, through stories, narrations, diaries, memoirs, and letters ( Herman & Vervaeck, 2009 ; Ochs & Capps, 1996 ). Although personal narratives encompass a wide range of daily experiences, they are prototypes that express people's views of other cultures generated by travel or direct contact. Travel is used here to mean a range of material and spatial practices that generate knowledge, stories, traditions, books, and other cultural expressions ( Clifford, 1997 ; Euben, 2006 ). Cultures are understood by studying sites of dwelling, the local ground of collective life, and the effects of travel ( Clifford, 1997 ). Travel and migration or Diaspora ³ are prototypical rites of passage involving transition in space, territory, and group membership. They transform people's sense of themselves and others. For instance, migrants experience profound changes in their outlook and orientation as they move from the state of belonging to the homeland to that of belonging to the new land, generating a unique sense of multiple identities. The article aims to answer these questions: To what extent have travel and migration of the Arabs transformed their worldviews, including images of themselves, of others, and of new and old homelands? To what extent have these experiences of movement been incorporated into Arab American identities and articulated in their narratives as well? Do they view themselves as having one unified transnational identity, as being “Arab American,” or multiple identities? Is there a conflict of having multiple identities and maintaining one encompassing identity? And to what extent can Arab Americans be viewed as cultural mediators or agents bridging the West and the East (the Middle East) as well as the north and the south? These questions are examined within the perspectives and views of both Arab American writers and ordinary Arab immigrants of the Detroit metropolitan area. ⁴     

RAF Ein Shemer: A Forgotten Case of Jewish and Arab Work in a British Army Camp in Palestine during the Second World War

This article explores lingering recollections of a marginalised sphere of participation by Jewish and Arab citizens of Mandatory Palestine in the Allied war effort. During the war, Palestine became a major staging ground for Allied troops in the Middle East. Some 15,000 Jewish and 35,000 Arab workers worked in administrative, construction, catering, and maintenances roles within the newly built army bases. The story of civilian labour in RAF Ein Shemer reveals previously neglected normative and non-normative patterns of inter-communal relations between British soldiers and Jewish and Arab workers on the social, economic, ideological, and romantic levels within the context of a colonial-era military installation.     

Proselytizing Nationalism: Protestant Missionaries and the Arab Awakening Debate

This article examines the historiographical debate concerning the origins of Arab nationalism as postulated by George Antonius in his book, The Arab Awakening: The Story of the Arab National Movement and the theory of historical construction. After establishing the theoretical framework of the study with an overview of Hayden White's views on how history is written, it progresses into a study of the historiography of Arab nationalism. Here, the scholars Sylvia G. Haim, C. Ernest Dawn, Rashid Khalidi, and Fruma Zachs and their writings are chronologically dissected, with each academic analyzed via White's theories of historical construction. Through studying their respective positions, it is shown that these texts are culturally relative according to the era in which they were written. It is argued that no work of scholarship can be fully removed from outside influences. Specifically, politicization of academics and the consequences of such endeavors are shown as inextricable from the created narrative. Because of the need for culturally relative knowledge so that it can be applicable to audiences outside of academia, scholars who write for an express purpose (such as answering a question for the benefit of others) should not be considered inherently biased. This article poses that academics have a moral obligation to disseminate knowledge to their respective societies due to their assumed removed status as academics. By doing so, human error is acknowledged and room is made for improvement within the field of history. Knowledge does not need to be created for its own sake, but rather so that it might be utilized by society at large. It is suggested that to foster a deeper understanding of a scholar's relationship with society, there should be an increase in academics' civic engagement. This additionally requires serious reflection and enquiry into the standards that would consequently need to be implemented to maintain the integrity of the produced scholarship.     

Gender,sexuality and power in Arab society: Arab feminist criticism of discourse and social order

Adnan, Etel. Sitt Marie Rose. Sausalito, California: Post‐Apollo Press, 1982. 105 pp. $7.50 paper.

El Saadawi. Woman at Point Zero. London: Zed Press, 1983. iv + 106 pp. $6.25 paper.

Sabbah, Fatna A. Woman in the Muslim Unconscious. New York: Pergamon Press. 132 pp. including footnotes and index. $22.50 cloth, $9.95 paper.     

Algorithmic War: Everyday Geographies of the War on Terror

Abstract:  Technologies that deploy algorithmic calculation are becoming ubiquitous to the homeland securitization of the war on terror. From the surveillance networks of the city subway to the biometric identifiers of new forms of border control, the possibility to identify "association rules" between people, places, objects and events has brought the logic of pre-emption into the most mundane and prosaic spaces. Yet, it is not the case that the turn to algorithmic calculation simply militarizes society, nor even that we are witnessing strictly a commercialization of security. Rather, algorithmic war is one form of Foucault's sense of a "continuation of war by other means", where the war-like architectures of self/other, here/there, safe/risky, normal/suspicious are played out in the politics of daily life. This paper explores the situated interplay of algorithmic practices across commercial, security, and military spheres, revealing the violent geographies that are concealed in the glossy techno-science of algorithmic calculation.     

Refugees in the Arab Middle East: Academic and Policy Perspectives

The field of Refugee Studies is relatively unfamiliar to Middle East area specialists despite the significance of refugees in the region. The strong policy orientation of much of the work in the field has often shaped the way refugee issues are framed by scholars as well as practitioners. Concerns and discourses about refugee‐producing regions in general, and the Arab Middle East in particular, have tended to reflect Western notions of belonging, citizenship, and the state; and in recent years, have been seen through a lens of securitization in the region. This article addresses the development of the field, the subject of displacement and dispossession in the Arab Middle East from a Western perspective, the significant role that Arab cities play as sites for hosting refugees, and the challenges presented by the continued existence of Palestinian refugees.