Sovereignty Without Nationalism, Islam Without God a Critical Study
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Sovereignty without Nationalism, Islam without God A Critical Study of the Works of Jalal Al-e Ahmad by Sohrab Shiravand A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy Department of sociology University of Alberta © Sohrab Shiravand, 2015 Abstract Jalal Al-e Ahmad (1923-1969) is widely perceived, particularly in Iran, as the leading social critic in Iran’s post- Mosaddeq, pre Khomayni era (1953-1978) and also as an inspirational figure for Iran’s 1978-1979 revolution. His concept of “occidentosis” (Gharbzadeghi in Persian), or “Westernization,” as the main or even the only cause of Iran’s political, economic, and social problems, seemed to many Iranians to accurately diagnose their country’s ills. More importantly, his “cure” for the “disease” of occidentosis was his ringing call for Iranians to return to their authentic (Perso-Islamic) “self” and to use a rejuvenated Islam as a defense against Western imperialism. This call galvanized many Iranians, particularly among the Leftist intellectuals and Muslim clerics, and made Al-e Ahmad a revered figure following Iran’s successful revolution. This thesis argues that a close reading of a selection of Al-e Ahmad’s fiction, Occidentosis (1961), and autobiographical writing does not support the popular perception of him. The thesis’s title -- “Sovereignty without Nationalism, Islam without God” -- refers to the double paradox at the heart of his writing and thought: he called for Iran’s sovereignty in the face of Western imperialism, but felt no sense of community with his fellow Iranians, and he called for a “return to Islam,” but had no personal faith in either this or any other religion. In this thesis, some of the principles of the New Critics’ close reading and of Jacques Derrida’s deconstructionism are used to analyze Al-e Ahmad’s texts and uncover their many internal contradictions. The analysis of five of his short stories and his two best-known novels, The School Principle (1958) and By the Pen (1961), reveals that he was relentlessly critical of Iranian society, felt no sense of empathy for or affinity with Iran’s oppressed classes, and believed that revolutions merely replace one form of tyranny with another. The analysis of Occidentosis, Al-e Ahmad’s most famous and most important work, reveals that his argument against the ‘West’ is riddled by inconsistencies, contradictions, and historical inaccuracies. Following this analysis, a comparison of the view of the intellectual in Occidentosis and that in Franz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth (1969) is used to expose Al-e Ahmad’s limitations as a political thinker and cultural critic. Finally, the concluding chapters on two of Al-e ii Ahmad’s autobiographical works, Lost in the Crowd (1964) and A Stone on a Grave(2008), show that, contrary to the popular belief that Al-e Ahmad “rediscovered Islam” during the last years of his life, he actually rejected Islam and Perso-Islamic traditions and embraced and celebrated his own nihilism. iii Preface My motivation for studying Al-e Ahmad’s work comes from my personal interest in his writing in the contexts of the “nationality question” and identity-based oppression as well as gender identities and sexual inequalities in Iran. Essentially, Iran’s “nationality question” involves the issue of to what extent Iran’s Persian majority and central government accommodate the needs and dreams (e.g., democratic equality and self-determination) of the non-Persian minorities. Similarly, the issues of gender identities and sexual inequalities involve the extent to which Iran’s patriarchal and Islamic political society recognizes and protects the democratic rights of women (in particular, the poor and marginalized women of different minorities) and homosexuals. Thus, I am investigating a number of important questions in this thesis: how Al-e Ahmad’s (1984) utopian “third way” (his alternative to either accepting Westernization or “remain[ing] fanatically in the bonds of tradition and return[ing] to the primeval means of production” (p. 78)) addresses the aspirations of Iran’s minorities; how his discourse on cultural authenticity and its emphasis on the “Islamic totality” (p. 52) might undermine mass participation in politics, free discussion, and acceptance of difference; how Al- e Ahmad’s discourse of occidentosis and anti-imperialism contributed to the emergence of Islamism and anti-imperialism and might have helped to suppress the movement for self- determination and social justice in Iran; in what ways Al-e Ahmad’s (1978 a, b; 1984) historiography, or his construction of historical events -- filtered through the dominant power relations and the dominant patriarchal conception of history -- may have helped to re-imagine iv and re-define a collective historical memory that tends to erase the struggle of the oppressed minorities for autonomy in Iran; and, finally, how engaging with and deconstructing Al-e Ahmad’s works could contribute to an alternative reading of Iranian history that incorporates the political memory of Iran’s oppressed minorities. v Acknowledgements I would like to express my gratitude to Dr. Michael Ryan for his insightful comments. I am also grateful to professors Sara Dorow, Manijeh Mannani, Khatereh Sheibani, and Tony Simmons for their useful suggestions and invaluable help. Special thanks to Dr. Catherine Kellogg for her untiring support and active contribution. Finally, I would like to thank my friend Wayne Rothschild and my companion Sumi Kim for unending support and encouragement. vi Contents Abstract ii Preface iv Acknowledgements vi Photograph xiv Introduction 1 Al-e Ahmad: The Man and the Myth 5 The Justification for this Study 14 The Significance of the Study 30 The Organization of this Study 32 1 Method of Analysis 36 New Criticism and Close Reading 36 Barthes and the “Death of the Author” 40 vii Derrida and Deconstruction 44 Conclusion 52 2 Al-e Ahmad’s Fiction 54 Five Stories 57 Genre 57 “The Pilgrimage” 60 “The China Flowerpot” and “Seh’tar” 63 “The Untimely Breaking of the Fast” and “My Sister and the Spider’’ 66 The School Principal 71 Background 71 Plot 73 Genre 75 Point of View, the Narrator, and the Author 80 The Theme of Futility 87 viii By the Pen 90 Background 90 Plot 93 Genre 96 Point of View, the Narrator, and the Author 108 The Theme of Futility and Gullibility 110 Conclusion 114 3 Occidentosis 117 Historical and Personal Contexts of Occidentosis 119 Summary and Analysis of Chapters 130 Methodological and Analytical Problems 153 The West and Technology, Iran and Its Islam 158 Conclusion 172 4 The Role of the Colonized Intellectual in Occidentosis and The Wretched of the Earth 175 ix Comparative Overview of Occidentosis and The Wretched of the Earth 179 The Colonial Contexts 179 The Authors 181 The Works’ Purposes 183 The Authors’ Views of the Social Classes 186 The Subaltern Classes 186 The Bourgeoisie 194 The Dominant Class 198 The Intellectuals 201 The Gramscian Intellectual 202 The Fanonian Intellectual 204 Al-e Ahmad and his View of Iranian Intellectuals 206 Fanon and his View of Colonized and Post-Colonized Intellectuals 213 The Role of the Intellectuals 221 x The Role of the Intellectual in Occidentosis 224 The Role of the Intellectual in The Wretched of the Earth 226 Conclusion 230 5 Lost in the Crowd 232 Background 236 The Title, the Epigraph, and the Narrative 240 Genre 244 Al-e Ahmad as a “Character” in Lost in the Crowd 250 Sense of Self and Motives for Writing 251 Sense of Place 258 Sense of History 260 Technique in Lost in the Crowd 263 The use of Details 263 The Focus on Disease, Injuries, and Bodily Functions 266 xi Themes 270 The Nastiness of Human Behavior and Non-Iranian Muslims 271 The Corruption and Incompetence of the Saudi Regime 274 The Benefits of the hajj 278 Conclusion 286 6 A Stone on a Grave 288 Background 290 Plot /Content 291 Genre 294 Character 297 Theme 308 Conclusion 312 In Place of a Conclusion 314 Summary 318 xii Main Findings 325 Suggestions for Future Research 329 End Notes 333 Bibliography 334 xiii Photograph (1969) Al-e Ahmad on the left and Mostafa Shoaiyan (a writer-activist) (Source: Salehi, 2010) xiv Introduction When Jalal Al-e Ahmad died at the age of 46 from a heart attack in September 1969, he had published around 30 volumes of fiction and non-fiction, including short stories, novels, monographs and articles, memoirs, translations, and ethnographic studies (Hillmann, 1982). As well, he had already established himself as not only one of Iran’s pre-eminent writers of fiction, but also as “the leading social critic in Iran during the post-Mosaddeq, pre-Khomayni era [1953- 1978]” (Hillmann, 1988, p. ix). Since his death, Al-e Ahmad’s reputation in Iran has continued to grow. For example, the writer and literary critic Reza Baraheni argues that Al-e Ahmad’s Occidentosis (1984), a caustic analysis of the ‘Westernization’ of Iran during the post-war historical era, “has the same significance in determining the duty of colonized nations vis-a-vis colonialist nations that the Manifesto of Marx and Engels had in defining the responsibility of the proletariat vis-a-vis capitalism, and that Franz Fanon’s The Wretched of the Earth had in defining the role of African nations vis-a-vis foreign colonialists” (as cited in Boroujerdi, 1996, p. 67). For Al-e Ahmad’s supporters, no praise of him is considered hyperbolic, and no claims on his behalf can be challenged. In studies of Al-e Ahmad and his role as an inspirational figure for Iran’s 1978-1979 revolution, these claims include the assertions that he was a sovereignist who advocated that Iran should control its own political, social, economic and cultural affairs; a nationalist who 1 promoted the return to ‘’traditional’’ Iranian values or defended local or popular cultures; and also a former Marxist who ultimately “rediscovered Islam as a matter of personal spirituality” (Preface, 2004).