Mabry / the Levantine Review Volume 2 Number 1 (Spring 2013)
Mabry / The Levantine Review Volume 2 Number 1 (Spring 2013) ARAB DI-NATIONALISM Tristan Mabry* Abstract This paper presents a new conception of “Arab nationalism,” which conventionally means pan-Arab nationalism and defines an Arab as an Arabic speaker. Yet the term “Arabic” is elusive, as is the generic “Arabic speaker.” Modern Standard Arabic (MSA), derived from the Koran, is the official language of Arab League states, but is nobody’s mother tongue, or spoken language for that matter. Arabic vernaculars are deemed low status and are distinct from MSA. The division of “High” and “Low” languages between formal and informal spheres is called diglossia (“divided tongues”). This renders an ethnolinguistic situation in Arab states with unique social and political consequences. Arab-defined citizens are born into unique ethnolinguistic communities that are not state-supported, and are indoctrinated instead with a pan-Arab “national” identity shared by many states. I call this phenomenon Arab dinationalism. Without school or book, the making of a nation is in modern times inconceivable. George Antonius, The Arab Awakening, 1938 The literature on Arab nationalism, however defined, is very broad, very deep, and very muddy. Much of it is dedicated to the singular problem of defining “Arab” and consequently “Arab nationalism.” Some of this work developed from the study of nationalism and some of this work developed from the study of Arabs, yet the two tracks do not frequently converge. Terminology is a principal reason why much of the research on Arab nationalism is muddled. What are the precise distinctions separating Arab nationalism, pan-Arab nationalism (qawmiyya), and Arab patriotism (wataniyya)? In the context of specific countries, what is the difference, for example, between Egyptian nationalism and Egyptian patriotism? Or Egyptian nationalism and pan-Arab nationalism? From the perspective of nations and nationalism scholarship, Ernest Gellner offers the most influential answer to this set of questions.
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