CCAS Winter/Spring 2012 Newsletter

CCAS

newsletter

Center for Contemporary Arab Studies

Georgetown University

Inside

Post-Elections Egypt: Revolution or Pact?

3 Board Member Feature: HRH Prince Turki al-Faisal 4 Publications: “Revolutions” Occasional Paper published

A MAAS alumnus analyzes the political situation in Egypt with an eye on all parties involved.

5 Faculty News: Recent faculty publications and awards

8 Alumni Abroad: MAAS alumna monitors Tunisia’s elections

Winter - Spring 2012

FEATURE STORY

2 Letter from the Director

6 Feature Story: Jadaliyya co-editor reflects on Egypt’s revolution (continued from cover)

ccas.georgetown.edu

By Hesham Sallam

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or many people, it is compelling, if not intuitive, to think of Egypt’s parliamentary elections as a logical extension of what Egyptians started on January 25, 2011. Elections, the conventional reasoning goes, are a critical step in Egypt’s transition toward a democratic form of governance that is poised to replace the decades-old rule of former President Hosni Mubarak’s now-defunct National Democratic Party. Seen from the inside, however, this reasoning seems fairly detached from a much more complex reality.

10 Public Events: Fall 2011 events and Spring 2012 symposium 12 Outreach: Summer & Fall 2011 workshops and activities 15 Alumni: MAAS brunch and updates

tics, including electoral institutions and national legislatures. The SCAF sees the recent elections as a way to channel unruly political dissent into an organized sector that it can

The Universe of Transition

Jonathan Rashad

16 Faculty Feature: Dr. Osama Abi-Mershed on recent research

It has become embarrassingly obvious for most Egyptians that the advent of parliamentary elections has divided the country into two “universes” that, for the time being, seem very distant from one another: the “universe of transition” and the “universe of revolution.” The “universe of transition” is occupied and led by the Supreme Council of Armed Forces (SCAF) and a host of elite politicians who, for different reasons, have advanced the narrative that Egypt’s revolution and its goals will find a new life in organized poli-

easily manipulate and control through legal engineering and limited pacts. Specifically, the SCAF sees in the elections, the parliament they are yielding, and the constitution that this parliament will produce, an opportunity to work with elite politicians to carve out a political system in which competitive elections and national legislatures would not pose any meaningful threats to the military establishment’s longstanding political and economic privileges. Of more immediate concern to the officers, continued on page 6

‫ﻣﺮﻛﺰ اﻟﺪراﺳﺎت اﻟﻌﺮﺑﻴﺔ اﳌﻌﺎﺻﺮة‬

Letter from the Director: Osama Abi-Mershed

New Chapters

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s I step into the directorship of CCAS, I salute my predecessors Barbara Stowasser and Michael Hudson for their long and outstanding service to the Center and the SFS. CCAS prospered and flourished for decades under their guidance, and after but a few months in the director’s seat, I have gained a deeper appreciation for the rigors of the position and for their respective dedication to the Center’s faculty, staff, and students.

I also thank my CCAS colleagues for their diligence and enthusiasm as the Center enters a new chapter in its history and in the history of the Arab world. This past year has been challenging, yet exhilarating, for CCAS. The magnitude of the Arab revolts necessitates a deeper understanding of the region, and the moment seems propitious for scholars of the Middle East and North Africa to rethink the landscape of the region as a whole, and to devise more enriching paradigms with which to conceptualize the sweeping historical transformations at hand. CCAS is well-positioned to continue playing its leading role in debates about the Arab world’s new realities. Its unique multidisciplinary focus and curriculum of instruction, and its renowned commitment to academic excellence, have long made the Center a vital and unprejudiced voice in academic and public initiatives that engage mutually the U.S. and the Arab world.

In this vein, I congratulate CCAS faculty for some recent achievements. Rochelle Davis won a 2011-2012 Fellowship at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars, where she is working on a book project, “Cultural Knowledge and U.S. Military Strategy.” Rochelle also won the Albert Hourani Book Award for her book Palestinian Village Histories (Stanford, 2010). Fida Adely secured grants to research women, marriage, and work in Jordan from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the American Center for Oriental Research, and Columbia University’s Middle East Research Center. Joseph Sassoon’s Saddam Hussein’s Ba‘th Party: Inside an Authoritarian Regime will undoubtedly become essential reading for scholars of modern Iraq and Arab authoritarian regimes. And our 2011-2012 Qatar Post-Doctoral Fellow, Rania Sweis, was awarded both the MESA Graduate Paper Prize and the Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies Graduate Paper Prize for her paper “Saving Egypt’s Village Girls.”

I also acknowledge the return or addition of faculty and staff key to the strength of our programs. I am especially happy to welcome back Judith Tucker as Director of the MAAS program after her two years with the School of Foreign Service in Qatar.

I congratulate Marina Krikorian on her well-deserved promotion to Public Affairs Coordinator, and I am delighted to welcome Steve Gertz as our new Multimedia and Publications Editor. Steve has been busy revamping our newsletter, streamlining the website, and finalizing the occasional paper “Averroes and Thomas Aquinas on Education” as well as a compilation of conference papers on Morocco.

Finally, I am encouraged by the budding partnership between CCAS and Peking University’s School of Foreign Languages. In December 2011, I accompanied Judith Tucker, Rochelle Davis, Jean-François Seznec, and Noureddine Jebnoun to Beijing for a two-day conference on “China and the Arab World.” The conference confirmed the importance of promoting dialogue between China and the Arab world and afforded CCAS the opportunity to partner with Gerd Nonneman of SFS-Q in developing this significant initiative. I look forward to future collaboration with PKU and SFS-Q, beginning with a second conference in Georgetown in October 2012.

Until then, I extend to my friends, colleagues, and students at CCAS my best wishes for a productive year.

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Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

CCAS

newsletter

CCAS Newsletter is published twice a year by the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies, a component of the Edmund A. Walsh School of Foreign Service, Georgetown University

Faculty-Executive Commitee Osama W. Abi-Mershed Associate Professor; History-Middle East and North Africa Director; Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS) Fida J. Adely Assistant Professor; Holder of the Clovis and Hala Salaam Maksoud Chair in Arab Studies Elliott Colla Associate Professor Chair, Arabic and Islamic Studies Department Rochelle A. Davis Assistant Professor Yvonne Y. Haddad Professor Jean-François Seznec Visiting Associate Professor Samer S. Shehata Assistant Professor of Arab Politics Barbara F. Stowasser Professor of Arabic & Islamic Studies Sultanate of Oman Chair in Arabic and Islamic Literature Judith Tucker Professor of History Director, Master of Arts in Arab Studies Program

Staff Rania Kiblawi Associate Director Zeina Azzam Director of Educational Outreach Steven Gertz Multimedia and Publications Editor Kelli Harris Academic Program Coordinator Marina Krikorian Public Affairs Coordinator Liliane Salimi Development Coordinator Courtney Smith Grant Administrator

Newsletter design by DesignCordero.

BOARD MEMBER FEATURE

Bridging the West to the Arab World CCAS Board Member HRH Prince Turki may be a member of the Saudi royal family, but he is no stranger to Georgetown.

By Steven Gertz

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Center for ContempoArab Studies was first forming in the mid-1970s, it needed for its Board of Advisors reliable and trustworthy individuals who knew intimately both Arab and Western cultures. His Royal Highness Prince Turki al-Faisal, from the royal family of Saudi Arabia, who had graduated in the previous decade from the McDonough School of Business at Georgetown University, was one of the people to whom the Center turned. As the decades have passed, and as CCAS has continued to develop both its educational programs as well as its public affairs and research activities, Prince Turki’s experience and stature have helped guide the Center. hen the

The Georgetown Years

rary

When Prince Turki entered Georgetown University in the mid-1960s, the United States was experiencing political upheaval. The media and Congress were heatedly debating the nation’s involvement in Vietnam and raising larger questions about America’s role in the world at large.

Georgetown’s proximity to Capitol Hill gave the prince the opportunity to observe politics in action, though it did not always match his expectations. He remembers going to a speech delivered in the Senate hall by the charismatic senator of New York, Bobby Kennedy, and being surprised by how few people attended.

This had nothing to do with the senator’s popularity, however; it was, the prince dis- Prince Turki has weighed in on many international debates, covered, how busi‑­ such as this one over Iran’s nuclear ambitions, held at the 2011 ness was done in World Economic Forum.

Washington. Senators might make statements if they so wished, but it was committee sessions that drew out the numbers.

Sebastian Derungs

Growing Up

Prince Turki was born in 1945, just as the Second World War was drawing to a close. At the age of five, his parents sent him to the Ta’if Modern School, an establishment based on the British model in the vicinity of Mecca. His parents then sent him at the age of 14 to Princeton, New Jersey, where he boarded for a year along with his brothers at the Hun School before transferring to the Lawrence­ ville School. There, Prince Turki engaged in a number of extracurricular activities, including fencing, soccer, French club, and Glee club. He also remembers being obliged to attend chapel as one of only two Muslims in the school, an experience he found intellectually interesting.

The prince credits his studies at Lawrenceville with opening his first window into American culture. “Americans, I discovered, are hospitable, open, and friendly.”

The boys at his school, he remembers, were very inquisitive. “They would ask me how many camels I had as an Arab, or what kind of tent I lived in. They were not being malicious, but were rather keen to get to know me in as short a time as possible.”

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rince Turki’s Georgetown years were also a time of personal transition for the prince–a month after he arrived, his father Faisal became king. “The dean of the university left a message with me asking me to come to his office. I had not heard yet about my father’s ascension to the throne, as we did not have the communications technology that we do now. When I arrived, the dean said, ‘Well, Turki, what do we do now?’”

The prince’s blank face prompted the dean to tell 

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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PUBLICATIONs

Announcing publication of the ‘Revolutions’ occasional paper

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CAS is pleased to publish our first compilation of essays covering the Arab Spring in “Revolution in the Arab World: The Long View.”

In the first article, Dr. Laleh Khalili compares the Arab Spring with other revolutions in the twentieth century, pointing out how difficult it is to ascertain what the effects of revolutions might be. Next, Dr. Jillian Schwedler also takes a historical approach to the study of revolution by looking systematical-

Revolution in the Arab Wor ld:

The Long Vie

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Laleh Khalili Jillian Schwed ler William Zartma n Gamal Eid

ly at protests in Jordan over several decades with a focus on law, urban space, and spectacle. Third, Dr. William Zartman focuses particularly on the events in Tunisia, commenting on different groups vying for leadership. Fourth, Gamal Eid writes about how youth have used social media to rally support and organize protests in Egypt.

Edmund A. Walsh Georgetown Unive School of Foreign Servic e rsity

Center for Contempora Arab Studiesry

‫اﻟﺪراﺳﺎت اﻟﻌﺮﺑﻴﺔ اﳌﻌﺎﺻﺮة‬

‫ﻣﺮﻛﺰ‬

To download or order a copy of this paper, go to: http://ccas.georgetown.edu/research/papers/ 

PRINCE TURKI continued from page 3

him the news. “Do you want any security?,” the dean asked. “Absolutely not!” came the prince’s reply. The prince would later attend a White House dinner in his father’s honor in 1966 when King Faisal came to visit President Lyndon B. Johnson.

At Georgetown, Prince Turki brushed shoulders with future President Bill Clinton, who at the time was studying at the university.

The prince remembers Clinton as a gregarious and affable student. He recalls one time when Clinton loaned him some class notes; after the exam, Clinton ruefully noted that Prince Turki had done better than he even though the prince had not done as much studying!

Serving in Saudi Intelligence

Upon leaving Georgetown in 1967, Prince Turki went on to graduate studies at the University of London, and he started a family at that time. In 1973, he returned to Saudi Arabia and was appointed Counselor to the Royal Diwan (which is the Saudi equivalent to the White House staff ). He was placed on a special committee that dealt with foreign intelligence, and when the Ramadan/Yom Kippur war broke out, he was pulled into the work of liaising with the Egyptian and Syrian governments. In 1977, the prince would

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go on to become the Director General of the General Intelligence Directorate, a role that he held until 2001.

Reflecting on those years, Prince Turki focuses on two important character traits he says he learned on the job: dedication and honesty.

“Intelligence is not a 9am-5pm job; it consumes all your time, and I learned that one has to be dedicated to one’s work. I also learned that one must be completely straightforward in intelligence work. If you succumb to the temptation to invent or embellish your findings, your superior will reach a wrong conclusion, which can lead to some serious consequences.”

Prince Turki has not escaped scrutiny for his work in intelligence, the most notable criticism being that in his capacity as head of intelligence, he met with Osama bin Laden in the 1980s to support his efforts against the Soviet Union in Afghanistan. But the prince rejects any association with Al-Qaeda and its worldview; on the contrary, he has been actively involved in promoting understanding between Muslims and non-Muslims through the C-100 group, a peace initiative of the World Economic Forum. He observes that “being a Muslim in a non-Muslim community has widened my scope of understanding and has helped me engage with others.”

Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

Ambassador to the West

In 2002, Prince Turki was appointed Saudi Arabia’s ambassador to the United Kingdom of Great Britain, and then in 2005, as ambassador to the United States, a position he held for nearly two years. The prince enjoyed these roles immensely, particularly because he was able to interact with the people of these countries. “An ambassador should not just deal with leaders, but he or she should reach out to the people as well as the government. It is a true joy to go out and meet people, appear on panels and radio, and address universities, industrial, and commercial groups.”

As board member, Prince Turki is an enthusiastic supporter of the Center. “CCAS is the only center in the U.S. that is totally dedicated to contemporary Arab studies.

I hope that my presence here as a visiting lecturer will contribute to the value of the Center, and I know that [the Center’s new director] Dr. Osama Abi-Mershed will carry it forward to new heights of accomplishment and goodwill.” 

Steven Gertz is Multimedia and Publications Editor at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

Faculty NEWS

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meritus Professor Michael Hudson capped a career of distinguished service in the field of Arabic and Middle Eastern studies by winning the Jere L. Bacharach Service Award. Prof. Hudson became director of the Center in 1976, and led it intermittently until his retirement in 2011. Dr. Hudson is now the Director of the National University of Singapore’s Middle East Institute.

For the academic year 2011-12, Assistant Professor Rochelle Davis is a fellow at the Woodrow Wilson International Center for Scholars in Washington, D.C. Her project is on the U.S. military’s conception of culture in the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan, and she is currently working on a number of articles and a book manuscript on the subject. Her book, Palestinian Village Histories: Geographies of the Displaced (Stanford University Press, 2010), which examines over 100 Palestinian village books to discuss how Palestinians today are writing histories of their villages that were destroyed in 1948, co-won the Albert Hourani Book Award from the Middle East

Studies Association (MESA). She continues as a senior researcher on a CCAS-Institute for the Study of International Migration (ISIM) grant conducting policy-oriented research on urban refugees in Amman and Damascus. She also has a forthcoming book chapter on “Palestinian Childhood in Jerusalem before 1948,” coming out in Jerusalem Interrupted: Modernity and Colonial Transformation 1917–Present, ed.

Lena Jayyusi (Interlink Books, 2012).

Dr. Rania Sweis, CCAS’s Qatar Post-Doctoral Fellow, won both the MESA Graduate Paper Prize and the Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies Graduate Paper Prize for her paper “Saving Egypt’s Village Girls.” Dr. Sweis is an anthropologist whose research intersects the bio-politics of humanitarianism and the social production of childhood and youth in contemporary Egypt.

Associate Professor Elliott Colla won the English PEN “Writers in Translation Supporting Award” (2011-12), for his translation of Rabai al-Madhoun’s The Lady from Tel Aviv.

Interview with

Yvonne Haddad Professor Yvonne Haddad published Becoming American? The Forging of Arab and Muslim Identity in Pluralist America with Baylor Press in 2011. CCAS interviewed her about her book.

What led you to write this book?

Part of the text comes from lectures I gave at Baylor University in 2002. It is a topic that has captured my interest since the 1980s, and I have been researching, lecturing, and writing about it.

Your book gives a lot of attention to Muslims grappling with pluralism and how Islam makes place for other religions. Who do you find to be the most convincing scholar on this topic and why?

They are each convincing in their own way. The authors are responding to a challenge posited by westerners who accuse Muslims of being intolerant of other religions. I was intrigued by their reflections and re-interpretations of Qur’anic verses to prove the superiority of Islam since pluralism is an essential part of God’s plan for humanity.

He also published “The Poetry of Revolt,” in Jadaliyya ( January 2011), and was the winner of the 3 Quarks Daily 2011 Arts & Literature Prize for writing on blogs.

Adjunct Professor Joseph Sassoon recently has published Saddam Hussein’s Ba`th Party: Inside an Authoritarian Regime (Cambridge University Press, 2011). He gave a book talk at CCAS on January 24, 2012, with Assistant Professor Samer Shehata as the discussant. In addition, Dr. Sassoon received a fellowship for the spring term, 2012, at All Souls College, Oxford University.

Adjunct Assistant Professor Noura Erakat has published her article “Wanted: Rights for 12 Million Stateless” during the International Human Rights Week in a U.N. publication on December 7, 2011.

Visiting Professor Salim Tamari has published Year of the Locust (Berkeley: University of California, 2011). Dr. Tamari gave his book talk at CCAS on September 20, 2011. 

The last section of your book deals with the experience of Muslims and Arabs in the U.S. post-September 11, 2001.

You focus particularly on American Muslim relations with the Bush administration. Do you see any appreciable differences between the Bush administration and how the Obama administration has interacted with American Muslims?

Muslims supported and voted for President Obama. They had great hopes that things would change for the better. He did appoint a few Muslims to consultative positions, but the laws that sanction profiling and incarceration without cause are still on the books.

Islamophobia has intensified, particularly as the nation commemorated the tenth anniversary of 9/11. Some believe that Obama cannot do more due to the fact that some Americans continue to believe that he is a Muslim.

What (if any) aspects of your research particularly surprised you?

I continue to be surprised by the amount of hatred and suspicion that some Americans harbor towards Muslims. 

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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feature story EGYPT continued from cover

at a time when Mubarak and his associates face trial for murdering peaceful protesters, SCAF members fear that they could face prosecution for similar charges unless they shepherd this transition through an exclusive political process that they can manage and control.

For their part, the establishment “politicians” who have secured significant gains at the ballot boxes, chief among them the Muslim Brotherhood’s Freedom and Justice Party (FJP), see in the formal political arena an opportunity to secure the upper hand in shaping the rules of the political game, not to mention making critical policy decisions in the near future. While working obediently through the SCAF-designed legal framework puts them in a weak position with respect to the military establishment, it strengthens them vis-à-vis other members of the political community that failed to garner the same electoral agility demonstrated by groups like the FJP, the Salafist Al-Nour Party, and to a lesser extent, the liberal Al-Wafd Party as well as the secular-leaning coalition known as the Egyptian Bloc. Thus, it was not surprising to recently hear voices from inside the Muslim Brotherhood suggest-

ing that the group is ready to entertain a pact with SCAF that would give military institutions and their leaders some form of reserved powers in the new constitution such that they would remain beyond the reach of public transparency and parliamentary oversight. Nor was it surprising to hear a tacit silence from other political leaders who seem, at best, ambivalent about this alleged pact.

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Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

Apart from ballot boxes, vote-counts, and parliamentary politics, the “universe of revolution” encompasses all the groups and protest movements that have refused to cede to the SCAF’s demand to demobilize and work through—if not, defer to—SCAF-sponsored formal political channels (e.g., elections) in advancing their agendas and objectives.

These activists remain convinced that in light of SCAF’s demonstrated determination to limit the scope and depth of this transition through legal engineering, repressive practices, and deadly violence, Egypt’s January 25 Revolution will remain an inconclusive struggle until military leaders step aside and make way for more transformative changes. Whereas the “universe of transition” sees Egypt advancing through an interim transitional framework, the “universe of revolution” sees Egypt suffocating under the rule of military dictatorship.

From the perspective of those who inhabit the “universe of revolution,” the critical battle at hand is not convening free and fair elections, but giving these elections depth and meaning by ensuring that real power in the remainder of this transition and over future decision-making rests within institutions that are truly accountable, transparent, and responsive to popular demands. For them, achieving the goals of this Revolution—bread, freedom, and social justice—requires much deeper transformations in the Egyptian state than what the SCAF-managed transition, along with one round of elections, can possibly offer. Specifically, the real challenge they see is the task of taming unruly bureaucracies that shape the daily lives of millions of Egyptians in order to make them more transparent, accountable, and responsive to public needs. These bureaucracies include military institutions—the alleged guardians of this so-called transition—that still dominate significant sectors of the Egyptian economy and state resources, all outside the framework of public transparency and parliamentary oversight. They also include the Ministry of Interior, which continues to host Mubarak’s coercive apparatus that has yet to cease its old ways, as evidenced by the deadly violence it has repeatedly employed against unarmed protesters in the past ten months and its persistent intimidation and arrests of political activists.

To this list must be added the Ministry of Information, which remains an instrument of propaganda for wielders of power, especially in their current efforts to publicly stigmatize political dissent using tactics not dissimilar to those followed during the Mubarak era. Also included are the Ministry of Finance and other government bodies that make economic decisions affecting the lives of millions of Egyptians away from any form of public deliberation or transparency.

Hossam el-Hamalawy http://www.flickr.com/photos/elhamalawy

Nearly 1,000 protesters have been killed in clashes with the police and over 9,000 injured since the Revolution began.

The Universe of Revolution

For the committed activists who occupy the “universe of revolution,” overhauling these institutions cannot be achieved through a SCAF-designed political system that accommodates and privileges unaccountable sectors of power inside the Egyptian state. In other words, those who have persistently gathered in public squares in protest of SCAF’s rule over the past ten months seek a transformative revolution, not a limited pact with the officers.

These activists view the January 25 Revolution as a rebellion against not only the rule of Mubarak, but also against elitist politicians who have a long history of underhanded deals with the former president—deals that, for many, resemble the emerging pact between the military and the winners of the parliamentary elections.

Samer S. Shehata

Contesting Interpretations: One Year Later

The tension between the “universe of transition” and the “universe of revolution” was perhaps most pronounced in preparations for January 25, 2012, the first anniversary of the 18-day uprising that toppled Mubarak. SCAF, as well as major organized political groups like the Muslim Brotherhood, treated this day as one of celebration, with the clear assumption (and perhaps message) that the goals of the Revolution have decisively been accomplished through the recent elections. Occupants of the “universe of revolution,” on the other hand, saw no reason to celebrate with the military still in charge, and viewed January 25 as an opportunity to contest and resist SCAF’s domineering role in determining the future of this country. As candidates and parties closely followed vote tallies, activists and protest movements worked tirelessly to spread awareness of both the abuse that Egyptians have suffered at the hands of security forces under SCAF’s leadership as well as of the nation-wide protests held on January 25.

While the “universe of transition” wanted to make that day about January 25, 2011, the “universe of revolution” was determined to make it about January 25, 2012, and what will follow it.

Elections in Alexandria, Egypt, brought into the streets candidates from multiple parties, like these from the Muslim Brotherhood.

Free and fair elections are an integral part of any established democracy. However, for students of politics, whether elections alone can be the vehicle for attaining a truly democratic system remains—at best—debatable.

In a context in which Egyptians have to grab onto their gas masks and helmets every time they go out to peacefully express their political views, there is only so much that elections can achieve by themselves. Thus, whether or not the recent elections will be a channel for advancing the type of transformative change that Egyptians called for on January 25, 2011, depends on the ability of popular pressure coming from the “universe of revolution” to trump elitist pacts and to have its say in debates over Egypt’s emerging political and social order.

Egypt today faces a choice between an officers-politicians pact that could help the country “transition” to a managed form of limited political competition and participation, versus a much more comprehensive process of revolutionary change dictated and advanced by popular pressures and demands. More specifically, on January 25, 2012, Egyptians faced a choice between celebrating the anniversary of their revolution while deferring to the “elders” to negotiate their future, or taking matters into their own hands and building upon the memory of January 25 to finish what they started one year ago. 

Hesham Sallam is a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Government at Georgetown University and coeditor of Jadaliy­ ya ezine. Jadaliyya’s Egypt Elections Watch (EEW) project is co-sponsored by the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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alumni abroad

“Their Faces Brought Me to Tears” MAAS alumna Schadi Semnani reflects on the success of elections in Tunisia.

By Schadi Semnani

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tion to the polling centers, I cried. I never thought that I would be able to vote in a real election in my country.” Mr. Limayem smiled, turned, and, addressing me, remarked: “We never thought we’d be working in this building, the former headquarters of the RCD [former ruling party Rassemblement Constitutionnel Démocratique].”

The Eastern Central/Sahel city of al-Munastir, the hometown of Tunisia’s first post-

Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

independence president Habib Bourguiba, was busy with final electoral preparations and campaign rallies. The Carter Center deployed me there as an election monitor, and my fellow monitor and I spent our first day in al-Munastir walking through the city, trying to get a glimpse of these final arrangements.

The following day, October 22, 2011, was designated as a “day of silence,” during which campaigning was prohibited. Although there were no rallies, many voters walked around the city, looking at information on the parties’ platforms that were posted on walls throughout the city. In an attempt to ensure a level playing field between parties, the interim government allotted parties a place in each city to post information about their platform.

I asked one would-be voter about his predictions and observations of the process thus far.

He assured me that he had faith in the system and believed elections would run smoothly.

The apparent satisfaction with the process on the part of the candidates and the voters was astonishing.

Election day started very early. We arrived at our first polling station in the small city of Bannan at 6:30 am to witness opening procedures. We continued on to al-Baqalta, Tabulba, Sayada, al-Muknin, Qasr Hilal and al-Munastir, visiting 10 polling stations throughout the day. The atmosphere was full of excitement, and we were welcomed by both staff and citizens as witnesses to the transparency of the process. The simple act of voting and the optimistic expressions on people’s faces brought me to tears on more than one occasion that day. People looked proud, as if their dignity was restored; it was the first time they were asked to participate in choosing the leadership of their country. In one particular instance, an old man was helped

All photos this spread: Schadi Semnani

No space was too sacred for politics as parties raised their platforms on medieval city walls.

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Hamed Limayem, the head of al-Munastir governorate’s Instance Régionale Indépendante pour les Élections (IRIE), the body charged with administering the elections in Tunisia.

Mr. Limayem was explaining the IRIE’s final preparations for the 48 hours before the elections when a staff member walked into the office to inquire about a procedural detail. Addressing Mr. Limayem, he recounted, “Wallahi (by God) — when I placed that first ballot box on the military truck for distribusat down with

The elections in Tunisia succeeded in part because of the efforts of non-partisan youth (left) who traveled from city to city educating voters.

into the polling station to vote. He made his way to the ballot box, cast his vote, and then immediately returned to the end of the line. When the staff members saw him again, they asked him, “Hajj (sign of respect), what are you doing? You already voted.” He agreed that he had, but that he wanted to do it again.

Every person in the station smiled. “Next year, inshallah,” was the collective response.

Democracy and revolutionary change do not take place overnight through one election; real, substantive change takes years to achieve.

But these elections give cause for optimism about Tunisia’s future. Although we only observed a small fraction of the 304 polling stations in the governorate of al-Munastir, we observed a number of positive trends. First, Tunisians showed up to the polls in incredible numbers. (Some news sources estimated that over 70 percent of the population voted, though this is difficult to verify.) Second, based on the statistics collected by the Carter Center mission as a whole, there appeared to be few real irregularities in the process. Third,

although staff and voters had no previous experience and very little training, the elections were remarkably well-administered.

I will not claim that the elections were without flaws, the lack of voter education primary among them. Yet, I do not believe any of these mistakes seriously undermined the electoral process. Even the outburst of protests in Sidi Buzid following the election was not so much about rigged results as it was about confusion over the strict campaign and electoral laws.

The pessimists among us will pick at every detail and talk about how it could have been done better. I, on the other hand, hoped to see what the Tunisian voters, party members, and electoral staff had worked so hard to achieve: successful, peaceful and legitimate elections that would set a precedent for the rest of the Arab world. And that is exactly what I saw. 

Schadi Semnani graduated from Georgetown University with a Master of Arts in Arab Studies in 2011.

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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PUBLIC EVENTS

Timothy Mitchell of Columbia University Speaks at 2011 Kareema Khoury Distinguished Lecture

By Robert Duffley

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n November 3, 2011, Dr. Timothy Mitchell presented some of his latest research in “Carbon Diplomacy: Political Power in the Age of Oil.” In that speech, he examined the relationship between oil production and democratization and argued that an accurate understanding of contemporary political power, both in the Middle East and in the West, mandates knowledge of energy infrastructures and their history.

He emphasized the inaccuracy of ideas such as the ‘oil curse’ hypothesis, which claims that dependency on oil is responsible for Middle Eastern countries’ tendencies to be less democratic than Western nations. In Dr. Mitchell’s view, this phenomenon arises not from any fatalistic connection between oil itself and repression, but how authoritarian regimes use (or abuse) oil profits. Such regimes historically have tended to control oil production, but reform movements have tried to undermine authoritarian rulers by contesting this control. He cited the ways in which popular protests (both in Palestine in 1936-9 and in Iraq in 1948) centered around the Kirkuk-Haifa pipeline. Workers realized that by cutting off petroleum, they could attain some level of political leverage over their rulers.

Dr. Mitchell connected these ideas to the Arab Spring, arguing that 2011’s revolts were heavily influenced by recent oil production. Specifically, he said that the countries with the strongest movements all experienced production declines leading up to the revolts. As oil supplies declined, popular protests spread.

Dr. Mitchell’s full study, also titled Carbon Diplomacy: Political Power in the Age of Oil, was published by Verso Press in late November, 2011.

Before teaching at Columbia, Dr. Mitchell served for 25 years as director of the Center for Near Eastern Studies at New York University after earning his Ph.D. at Princeton. His research is focused on the economics of expert knowledge, the politics of large-scale technical systems, and the role of colonialism in the making of modernity. He is the author of several other scholarly works, including his 1991 book Colonising Egypt.

Established in 1986, the lecture series is named in honor of Lebanese scholar and immigrant to the United States Kareema Khoury, who worked from 1948-1967 as a translator at the Library of Congress and the CIA. Her endowment sponsors the lecture series, which hosts distinguished scholars and experts in diverse fields related to the Middle East. 

Robert Duffley is an undergraduate student at Georgetown University.

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Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

From Tunisia to Oman: Fall 2011 Public Events

By Marina Krikorian

C

CAS’s public affairs program presented a wide variety of events aimed at highlighting new faculty research, analyzing and contextualizing current events, and showcasing film and music from the Arab world. These themes will continue to be explored throughout the spring semester of 2012.

The State of Higher Education in the Middle East September 20, 2011

Dr. Joseph Jabbra, President of the Lebanese American University, and Dr. Judith Tucker, Professor of History and Director of the Master of Arts in Arab Studies Program at Georgetown University, discussed the current situation of higher education in the Middle East. In particular, they focused on the role of American institutions and American-style education in the region.

The Year of the Locust: The Erasure of Palestine’s Ottoman Past September 29, 2011

Salim Tamari, CCAS Visiting Professor, presented his latest book, The Year of the Locust (University of California Press, 2011). He explained how the book uses the diary of an Ottoman soldier, Ihsan Hasan al-Turjman, to capture daily life in Palestine at the end of the Ottoman Empire and World War I. His presentation included the reading of several passages from the diary. Dr. Tamari is also Professor of Sociology at Birzeit University in the West Bank, and is the Director of the Institute of Jerusalem Studies.

Looking Ahead for the Palestinians After the UN Vote October 4, 2011

Helena Cobban, a British-American writer and researcher on international relations and founder of Just World Publishing, LLC and CCAS Visiting Professor Salim Tamari led a discussion on consequences for Palestinians of a U.N. vote on statehood.

The Tunisian Revolution and the Arab Spring: Context, Challenges, and Perspectives October 4, 2011

CCAS, in cooperation with the Office of Protocol, hosted His Excellency Beji Caid Essebsi, Prime Minister of Tunisia, for a discussion on the Tunisian revolution and the consequences for Tunisia and the region. His presentation was followed by a lively question-and-answer session.

over the preceding 14 months, this story is told through the eyes of Egypt’s youth activists, labor movements, and political opposition figures. It is an account of their struggle against extraordinary odds to remove an uncompromising U.S.-backed authoritarian regime determined to stay in power. The film screening was followed by a discussion with Paquette and CCAS professors Samer Shehata and Adel Iskandar.

Khaled Abol Naga on the Revolution in Egypt and in Film November 1, 2011

At the reception following his lecture, Tunisian prime minister Beji Caid Essebsi visited with CCAS board member Clovis Maksoud.

The Ethnographic Arriving of Palestine October 13, 2011

CCAS Visiting Researcher Khaled Furani presented his current research on ethnographic engagement with Palestine since the nineteenth century. He identified four different modes of inquiry: Biblical, Oriental, absent, and post-structural. Discussant Ted Swedenburg, CCAS’s 2011–12 Levant Visiting Professor, highlighted the practical implications of Furani’s theory for academics conducting research on Palestine. The event was co-sponsored by the Department of Anthropology.

Phil Humnicky

Film Screening of We Are Egypt: Voices of Egypt’s Youth October 27, 2011

CCAS co-sponsored, along with the Mortara Center for International Studies, a film screening of Lillie Paquette’s We Are Egypt: Voices of Egypt’s Youth. The film is the story of the struggle for democracy in Egypt that led to the historic uprising in January and February, 2011. Filmed on the ground in Egypt

Egyptian actor, film maker, and activist Khaled Abol Naga discussed at CCAS the Egyptian revolution and more recent developments there since January, 2011, including the revolution in film making. Naga’s film Microphone was part of the Arabian Sights Festival, and at his presentation, he showed both clips of Microphone and of footage of the revolution. Other films he has worked on include Heliopolis and Civic Duty.

Book Release Celebration for Dr. Ibrahim Oweiss November 9, 2011

Dr. Ibrahim Oweiss, Emeritus Professor at Georgetown University, presented his new autobiography, A Tale of Two Cultures. In his talk, he reflected on his productive life in both Egypt and the United States. He spoke at length about his family and friends and thanked many of the guests around the room for their support and contribution to his success. Dr. Oweiss taught at Georgetown University for 42 years.

The Egyptian Economy Post-January 25: Challenges and Prospects November 10, 2011

Dr. Magda Kandil, Executive Director and Director of Research of the Egyptian Center for Economic Studies (ECES), gave a very detailed and data-rich presentation on the Egyptian economy before and after the revolution. She discussed economic factors such as GDP, inflation, and cost of living that contributed to the revolution, and she gave suggestions for how to move forward in the current situation.

Music in Oman: Politics, Identity, Time, and Space in the Sultanate November 15, 2011

This colloquium on music in Oman featured moderator D.A. Sonneborn, Associate Director of the Smithsonian Folkways Recordings at the Smithsonian’s Center for Folklife and Cultural Heritage, and three panelists, who each analyzed a different aspect of Omani musical culture. Nasser al-Taee, Director of Education and Outreach at the Royal Opera House in Muscat, Oman, detailed the history of the Oman Royal Opera House; Majid al- Harthy, Assistant Professor of Music and Ethnomusicology at Sultan Qaboos University, discussed African identities and Afro-Omani music within the town of Sur; and Anne K. Rasmussen, Associate Professor of Music and Ethnomusicology and Chair of the Department of Music at the College of William and Mary presented her ethnographic research on Omani music and national identity. The event was cosponsored by the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding and the Sultan Qaboos Cultural Center.

Marina Krikorian is Public Affairs Coordinator at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

Spring 2012

Annual Symposium Please join us for the CCAS Annual Symposium, “The People Demand the Fall of the Regime: The Arab Uprisings and the Future of Arab Politics” on March 22 and 23, 2012, at Georgetown University.

The symposium will address the events of the Arab Spring, assess their historical significance, explore their underlying causes, and analyze what these dramatic developments mean for understanding Arab politics and the future of the Arab world.

Email ccasevents@georgetown.edu for more details.

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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OUTREACH

The Outreach Program Tackles Music, Revolutions, and Pedagogy The CCAS outreach program organized and participated in many exciting programs for teachers and students during the summer and fall of 2011.

By offering a variety of workshops and lectures to educators, CCAS faculty, staff, and students have assisted greatly in expanding public knowledge of the Middle East and of Islam.

By Zeina Azzam Explorations in the Music of the Middle East (June 4, 2011) Multiple ethnic and religious communities have shaped the musical identity of the Middle East. Over the centuries, each group developed its unique melody, instrumentation, and rhythm. Yet because of shared history and culture, all display many similar characteristics. This program, cosponsored

by CCAS in conjunction with Georgetown University’s Program for Jewish Civilization and the Institute for Turkish Studies, through the National Resource Center on the Middle East, brought the Chicago-based folk music band, Lamajamal, to Washington, D.C., for a day-long program that featured Arab, Jewish, and Turkish music. The workshop was attended by 41 educators, and it culminated in a rousing performance that was open to the public. Band members explained each of the three traditions and how they intersected, with live examples by the entire band and their multiple instruments: Ronnie Malley (‘u¯d [Arab stringed instrument], accordion, vocals), Eve Monzingo (clarinet, saxophone, vocals), Gary Kalar (cumbush [a Turkish stringed instrument], guitar), George Lawler (percussion), and Joseph Spilberg (bass). See www.lamajamal. com for additional information about the band.

The band Lamajamal’s name is a palindrome for the Arabic word for beauty, jamal. The play on words symbolizes the use of universal sounds and syllables found in languages of the world.

Zeina Azzam

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Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

Approaches to Teaching the Middle East (June 27–July 1, 2011) This annual summer workshop brought 29 teachers from the Washington, D.C. metropolitan area to campus, where they learned from and interacted with ten Middle East experts over five days. Topics included Islam and the Abrahamic faiths, the Arab revolutions, Arab music, Arab public opinion, Arab American literature, and the situation in Iraq. One day of the workshop was cosponsored with the World Affairs Council, which was also holding a teacher workshop the same week.

The week-long program was very successful, with attendees describing it as “fantastically insightful” and “a cornucopia of resources.”

One teacher remarked, “The opportunity to be exposed to such great scholars is unique to any conference I’ve ever attended.”

“Lessons That Work”—Teaching About the Middle East in the High School History and Social Studies Classroom (October 24, 2011) The outreach program inaugurated a new workshop series on how to teach about the Middle East. CCAS Outreach Director Zeina Azzam invited local teachers to talk about teaching strategies they thought proved successful in their classrooms. Three educators offered sessions—Elias E. George, a retired social studies teacher, spoke on “Class Activities and Projects Related to the Middle East,” and Ari Preuss and Kathy Laughlin of Sandy Spring Friends School spoke on “Lessons That Work: Tricks of the History Trade.”

All emphasized the importance of involving students in the learning process through ana-

lytical thinking, movement, and an enjoyable environment that is conducive to learning.

Two other scholars gave lectures, offering substantive material as well as modeling successful teaching strategies. The first, Osama AbiMershed (GU), gave a lecture on “The Great War and the Making of the Modern Middle East.” He cautioned against teaching this period as one of Europe acting on its own and the Middle East simply reacting, and that it is important to understand multiple causes and effects. The second speaker, Adel Iskandar (GU), discussed “Teaching Africa Through Arab Eyes: Common Colonial History and Post-colonial Misery.” He explained that Europe first colonized North Africa and the Arab world as a means toward staking out its imperial claims in the rest of Africa. He noted that ten out of 55 African countries are Arab, at least 25 percent of the population of these African Arab countries speak another language besides Arabic as their native tongue, and 61 percent of all Arabs are African.

The next “Lessons That Work” program will focus on the middle school social studies curriculum.

Contextualizing the “Arab Spring,” (November 5, 2011) Making sense of the revolutionary events in the Arab world necessitates a broad approach that takes into account historical, political, and social contexts. The Saturday Seminar on this topic was a follow-up to an earlier program on authoritarianism in the Arab world from February 2011, around the time of the revolutions that rocked Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Bahrain, and later, Yemen and Syria. 

Approaches to Teaching the Middle East Workshop Program “The Qur’an in Its Day,”

Paul Heck (GU) “Sacred Signs: Convergent and Divergent Symbols in Jewish, Christian, and Muslim Art,”

Ori Soltes (GU) “An Introduction to the Music of the Middle East,”

Laith Ulaby (GU) “Anatomy of a Revolution: Dissecting the Role of Social Media in the Arab Spring,”

Courtney Radsch (Freedom House) “Trends in Demographics, Polling and the Arab Spring,”

Susan Douglass (GU) “What Arabs Think, and Why We Should Listen,”

James Zogby (Arab American Institute) “Post-American Iraq?”

Chris Toensing Middle East Report “The Arab Awakening: How It Happened, What Next?”

Michael C. Hudson (GU and National University of Singapore)

The Working Man’s Anthem in Arabic

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“The Pedagogy of Arab American Literature,”

ith the “Arab Spring” in full motion, many in the United States are inspired by its events and want to display their support for the Arab masses. To that end, the DC Labor Chorus decided to sing the iconic international anthem of the working class, “L’Internationale,” in Arabic for their winter concert. They contacted CCAS for assistance, and Outreach Director Zeina Azzam volunteered to transliterate the Arabic lyrics into English and help the choristers with the pronunciation. The performance was a smashing success! The Washington City Paper published an article about it, written by CCAS’s former editor Mimi Kirk.

Steven Salaita (Virginia Tech) “Tools for Teaching the Middle East: An Introduction to TeachMideast.org,”

Barbara Petzen (Middle East Policy Council)

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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OUTREACH continued from page 13

Five speakers offered analyses to contextualize the dramatic developments in the Arab countries. The program began with James Collins (GU), who asked, “What precisely is a ‘revolution’?” Referring to systemic (rather than regime) change, he noted that looking back in history, revolutions that seem to have “failed” actually succeeded, if their results were considered 25 years later. In addressing the underlying grievances and causes of the Arab uprisings, Samer Shehata (GU) looked at such factors as authoritarianism and political repression, corruption, economic woes, fraudulent elections, social inequality, high unemployment and poverty, the youth bulge, and lack of dignity. He referred to the ubiquitous refrain from the Egyptian revolution: “Bread, freedom, and social justice.” Noureddine Jebnoun (GU) analyzed the situation in Libya, saying that Qadhafi had miscalculated the will and resolve of the Libyan people.

For the future of the country, he said that security issues would be the most critical challenge and that civil society needs to be

nurtured after 42 years of dictatorship. Regarding Syria, Radwan Ziadeh (Damascus Center for Human Rights Studies) likened the popular uprising there to that which unfolded in Tunisia in late 2010 and early 2011.

He said that international intervention will be necessary because of the strong possibility of civil war in Syria. The final speaker, Chris Toensing (editor of Middle East Report), characterized U.S. policy in the region as being largely unchanged since the Truman administration, whose goals focused on procuring oil, the prevention of certain powers from gaining hegemony, and the survival of Israel.

He argued that U.S. support of states that do not produce oil (such as Tunisia and Egypt) demonstrates U.S. policy makers have not been interested in supporting democracy but, rather, in containing the spread of political Islam and advancing values of free-market capitalism. He opined that in the past, the U.S. has feared that if genuinely democratic regimes developed in the Arab countries, they would stop supporting U.S. policies.

Local Outreach: GU Faculty, Staff, and Students MAAS student Edgar Martinez-Castillo visited Bethesda-Chevy Chase High School on December 13, 2011, to lecture about Islam at a comparative religions class. Zeina Azzam spoke to a group of social studies teachers in Arlington County on December 2, 2011, about resources on the Middle East.

Adel Iskandar made a presentation about the Arab Spring at Roland Park Country School on September 27, 2011, and about the colonial history of the Arab world and Africa at the African Studies Association’s teacher workshop on November 19, 2011.

At Georgetown University, Azzam taught a week-long evening class for 17 high school students from July 31-August 7, 2011, as part of GU’s School of Continuing Studies’ Arabic Language & Culture Institute. 

Zeina Azzam is Director of Educational Outreach at the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

Hidden Treasures of the Middle East in Washington, D.C. (December 1, 2011)

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Director Zeina Azzam, Barbara Petzen (Middle East Policy Council), and Christopher Rose (The University of Texas at Austin) led a workshop sponsored by the Middle East Outreach Council and held in conjunction with the annual conference of the National Council for the Social Studies. They and a group of 16 teachers from all over the United States boarded a chartered bus in downtown D.C. and toured the city for the day. They visited and learned about many local people, places, and organizations that do work involving the Middle East. Stops included the Gibran Kahlil Gibran memorial on Massachusetts Avenue (where Ms. Azzam did a presentation on Gibran’s life and works and recited some of his poetry), the embassy of the United Arab Emirates, the Freer Gallery, the Near East section of the Library of Congress, and a visit with U.S. diplomat Marjorie Ransom, who gave a presentation about the material culture of Yemen and particularly its silver jewelry. Breakfast at the U.A.E. embassy and a Palestinian lunch at Mama Ayesha’s restaurant were the gastronomic highlights of the day! 

Gibran Kahlil Gibran was a Lebanese-American poet whose book, The Prophet, has continued to be a bestseller since its publication in 1923. It has been translated into 40 languages.

Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

Neil Brandvold

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utreach

Alumni

Bringing Alumni Together MAAS alumni highlights from 2011

By Kelli Harris

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he Center for Contemporary Arab Studies has been working to reinvigorate the MAAS alumni group, and, with the help of MAAS alumnus David Jackson (’83), the Center hosted a brunch at the restaurant Mama Ayesha’s in Washington, D.C., in early December, 2011. The event was a success—about 70 alumni, ranging from the class of 1981 to the class of 2011, attended the brunch. CCAS hopes to hold similar events in the future, as well as look for other ways to encourage alumni to reconnect with the Center and with each other.

The Center is also happy to publicize the achievements of MAAS alumni in 2011.

Congratulations to each of you!

Michele Dunne (’86) was appointed Director

of the Atlantic Council’s Rafik Hariri Center for the Middle East in Washington, D.C. Charlene Gubash (’87), a producer at NBC Universal, worked on two stories that were nominated for Emmy Awards: “The World’s Most Dangerous City,” nominated for Best Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast, which took an in-depth look at Al-Qaeda’s impact in Somalia, and “Iraq: The Long Way Out,” nominated for Outstanding Coverage of a Breaking New Story in a Regularly Scheduled Newscast, in which NBC covered the withdrawal of the last U.S. combat troops from Iraq.

Jeffrey Ghannam (’88) authored the report, “Social Media in the Arab World Leading Up to the Uprisings of 2011,” published by the National Endowment for Democracy in Washington, D.C.

Kelli Harris

Mia Bloom (’91), Associate Professor of International Studies and Women’s Studies at Penn State University, and Fellow at the International Center for the Study of Terrorism, published a book: Bombshell: the Many Faces of Women Terrorists (Penguin Canada).

Adila Laidi-Hanieh (’92) achieved candida-

cy for a Ph.D. in Cultural Studies at George Mason University. She also received a one-

At the MAAS Alumni Brunch at Mama Ayesha’s : Zachary Foster (’11), Vanessa de Bruyn (’10), Julian Hadas (’10), Abel Lomax (’11), Haley Cook (’10), Andrew Bockover (’10), Matthew McLean (’11)

year fellowship from GMU’s Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies to undertake dissertation work.

Board of Directors as the Graduate Student Representative for a two-year term starting in December.

Persis Berlekamp (’94) published a book: Wonder, Image, and Cosmos in Medieval Islam

Kathleen Ridolfo (’11) was named Execu-

(Yale University Press).

Bassam Haddad (’94) published a book on Syria’s political economy: Business Networks: The Political Economy of Authoritarian Resilience in Syria (Stanford University Press).

tive Director of the Sultan Qaboos Cultural Center at the Middle East Institute in Washington, D.C.

Kelli Harris is Academic Program Coordinator at

the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies.

Shawna Bader-Blau (’00) was named Ex-

ecutive Director of the Solidarity Center in Washington, D.C. Ziad Abu-Rish (’05), a doctoral candidate in the Department of History at UCLA, was elected to the Middle Eastern Studies Association’s

What’s new with you?

CCAS would like to know! If you have any news or updates, please email Kelli Harris at georgetownmaas@gmail.com.

‫مركز الدراسات العربية املعاصرة – جامعة جورجتاون‬

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Faculty Feature Interview with

Osama abi-mershed What are you currently researching and teaching?

I did not come to work at CCAS. I was a doctoral student in Georgetown University’s Department of History, and upon completion of my degree, I was hired to teach in the department. My involvement with CCAS grew out of my specialization in Middle Eastern and North African history and began with my service on the Center’s Executive Committee. Georgetown’s Department of History was— and remains—one of the rare academic departments dedicated to the study of North Africa as distinct from the larger Middle East. I had worked on colonial North Africa and wished to pursue a doctorate in the history of the region, and John Ruedy, the preeminent scholar of modern Algeria, worked at Georgetown. I also wished to study with such distinguished Middle East North Africa (MENA) specialists as Judith Tucker and the late Hisham Sharabi. They were extraordinary mentors and colleagues.

But another undeniable ingredient in the appeal of the Georgetown program for me was the seamless relationship between the Department of History and the University’s various Arab or MENA studies centers, like CCAS or the AlWaleed Center for Muslim-Christian Understanding (ACMCU). The ability to interact with renowned academics like John Voll, Barbara Stowasser, Yvonne Haddad, Michael Hudson, and the late Hanna Batatu, made the Georgetown program extremely compelling for me.

This semester, I am teaching a graduate seminar on the historiography of North Africa, with an emphasis on recent trends in the field of imperial studies. For my research, I am continuing my investigation into the repeated appearance among the mountain communities of Kabylie (Algeria) of a succession of men claiming for themselves the holy mantle of the “Lord of the Hour” (mu¯ l es-sa¯‘a) in order to mobilize for holy war against the French. What is notable about these Lords of the Hour is the number of them who modeled their behavior on that of the selfproclaimed mahdı¯ Bou Maza. A few even assumed the persona of this popular leader, replicated his moral demeanor, and replayed fundamental episodes from his life.

To date, I have identified seven such claimants—or “faux Bou Mazas,” as they became known to the colonial authorities—operating in Kabylie between 1848 and 1851, and I have been examining their appearance as a lens through which to view the historical relations between modes of resistance and the geographic and cultural space in which they occur.

A second project involves transcribing archival material for an article on the origins of modern Arabic language instruction in France. The story begins in 1801 when approximately 400 Turks, Copts, Greeks, and Abyssinians (Ethiopians) ar-

rived in the port of Marseille, following their evacuation with the Napoleonic forces from the Levant. These “Egyptian refugees” were accorded political asylum by the French government, and the Ministry of the Interior then approved the idea of establishing a “harem-hospice” for them in the hope that in time it would serve as the nursery for bilingual agents and interpreters for the city’s commerce with Egypt and Syria.

This was the beginning of the Marseille School of Colloquial Arabic (École de langue arabe vulgaire), created by imperial decree on May 31, 1807, and run by members of the city’s community of Arabic-speaking refugees. Over the years, the School would become the flashpoint for continuous contentions between public and private conceptions of education in France, between national and municipal interests, and between institutional and colloquial expressions of culture. These tensions provide an interesting angle from which to consider the consolidation of state power at the expense of provincial variations, and to appreciate the processes of negotiation and contention between them as they delineated their respective understandings of the instrumental functions of France’s learned elites. 

Correction

In the Spring/Summer 2011 CCAS newsletter on page 12, Libyan ambassador Ali Aujali was misidentified in a group photo. The caption should read: “Libyan novelist Ibrahim al-Koni (center) is

flanked by (left to right) Dr. Ali Abdullatif Ahmida of the University of New England, Dr. Amin Bonnah of Georgetown, Dr. Elliott Colla of Georgetown, and Libyan ambassador Ali Aujali.”

An online version of this newsletter is available on CCAS’s website: http://ccas.georgetown.edu/

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Center for Contemporary Arab Studies - Georgetown University

Steven Gertz

What was it about CCAS that attracted you to work here?