Syrian Studies Association Bulletin The Bulletin is the regular publication of the Syrian Studies Association, an international association created to promote research on and scholarly understanding of .

Andrea L. Stanton, Editor; Benjamin Smuin, Book Review Editor

Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016)

Table of Contents

Letter from the President Hilary Kalmbach

Syrian Studies Association News Syrian Studies Association Annual Meeting at MESA 2016 Andrea L Stanton

Syrian Studies Association-Sponsored Panels at MESA 2016 Andrea L Stanton

Syrian Studies Association 2016 Officer Elections Andrea L Stanton

Syrian Studies Association 2015 Book and Article Prizes Charles Wilkins

Feature Articles Non-Alignment Movement Networks in the Global South: The Hoover Institute Archive Lily Balloffet

Book Reviews Sharon Halevi and Fruma Zachs, Gendering Culture in Greater Syria: Intellectuals and Ideology in the Late Ottoman Period Johanna L. Peterson

Habib Malik, Islamism and the Furture of the Christians of the Middle East Maya El- John McHugo, Syria: A History of the Last Hundred Years Mary C. Wilson

Keith D. Watenpaugh, Bread From Stones: The Middle East and the Making of Modern Humanitarianism Gershon Shafir

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 2

Letter from the President crucial for improving the situations faced by Syria and today. 13 November 2016 Please join us on Thursday 17 November in It is difficult to imagine how the situation the New Hampshire Room on Floor 5 of the confronting Syria and Syrians could become MESA conference hotel to consider this worse. Five years into civil war, reports important topic. We will hold our business estimate over 400,000 Syrians are dead and meeting (open to all SSA members) from 5- 11 million displaced, yet repeated efforts to 6pm and then this conversation (open to all stop the fighting and negotiate for peace conference attendees) from 6-7:30pm. have failed. Since the start of the war, the Syrian Studies Association has organised At the start of 2016, we welcomed former events at the MESA Annual Meeting about secretary-treasurer Stacy Fahrenthold back the conflict. Our speakers have discussed on the board as our junior member-at-large the political, social, cultural, and human and Graham Pitts as our graduate student dimensions of the conflict, and raised representative. Now, at the close of the awareness of the ways in which academics year, it falls on me to thank five departing and their institutions can help. officers for their service to the association. Andrea Stanton has made an especially This year, we have decided to turn our significant contribution over the past focus inward and ask whether there is a decade, serving as Book Review Editor from future for the academic study of Syria in 2007-2010 and Co-Chair of the Prize the coming years. We face a conundrum: Committee from 2008-2010, and then at a time when knowledge and public Editor of the Bulletin for the past six years. awareness of Syria is crucial, there are Benjamin Smuin has been on the board for significant barriers to producing new five years, first as Student Member in 2012 research on Syria, past and present. Access and 2013, and then as Book Review Editor to sources is challenging and our ranks are for the past three years. We are also thinning, as doctoral students and grateful for the service of Charles Wilkins established scholars turn their attention to and Melanie Schulze Tanielian, and other countries in the region. We will Geoffrey Schad over the past two years, as confront this conundrum through a Prize Committee Chair, Member-at-Large, conversation led by a panel of academic and Secretary-Treasurer, respectively. experts and focused on two related topics: Results of the elections to replace them will research and impact. We will explore the be announced at the MESA meeting later sources that are available for research on this week. Syria, including archival and library materials held outside of Syria, and through Best wishes, connecting with Syrians abroad, including Hilary Kalmbach refugees. We will also discuss strategies for contributing effectively to the policy making Dr Hilary Kalmbach holds a tenured position and awareness raising initiatives that are in the History Department at the University of Sussex in the United Kingdom. Her research focuses on in the modern

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 3

Middle East, with particular attention to Andrea L. Stanton authority, knowledge, education, and gender. She is the founding director of The Syrian Studies Association is sponsoring MENACS, the Middle East and North African two panels at the 2016 Middle East Studies Centre at Sussex, and is the current Association Annual Meeting. We are President of the Syrian Studies Association. pleased to support these fine panels and encourage SSA members to attend.

P4298 Text and Technology: Exploring the Syrian Studies Association News Materiality of Early Periodicals: Friday, November 18, 8:00am Syrian Studies Association Annual Meeting: Thursday, November 17 This session examines how the materiality of Arabic periodicals impacted political Andrea L. Stanton ideas, identity, and language in the late Ottoman world. The papers focus on The Syrian Studies Association will hold its periodicals produced in the cities of Cairo annual business meeting on November 17, and Beirut (between 1851 and 1885) and 2016, at the Middle East Studies Association examine them as objects, artifacts, and Annual Meeting at the Boston Marriott carriers of knowledge whose physical and Copley Place in Boston. We look forward to material dimensions lend additional layers seeing SSA members at the business to the understanding of their broader socio- meeting and all interested in Syrian studies political and cultural significance. The at the panel discussion. session offers a multi-disciplinary “reading” of these dimensions and examines crucial Executive Board Meeting: 3:30-4:30pm: questions of politics and identity. How can Connecticut (5) we describe the relationship between sensual experience and epistemology in Business Meeting (open to all SSA Arabic? How did periodicals function as members): 5:00-6:00pm: New Hampshire aesthetic objects or disseminators of (5) knowledge? How did these publications’ visual aspects impact textual content and Panel Discussion (open to all MESA vice-versa? How did affordable news impact attendees): 6-7:30pm: New Hampshire (5) the public use of Arabic language or the very way language was instrumentalized? Andrea L Stanton is Editor of the Syrian Studies Association Bulletin. Addressing these questions by offering new interpretations about the transnational world of (Ottoman) Arab modernity, the papers selected for this session present new Syrian Studies Association-Sponsored research that examines the ways in which Panels at MESA 2016 materiality can be historicized in order to provide alternative readings of knowledge production and historical transformation.

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 4

The first paper explores the production and understudied. This panel addresses key language of Majmu‘ Fawayid (Beirut, 1851- questions in the research agenda for 1856), an early Arabic-language missionary geographical Syria (Bilad al-Sham), ranging periodical printed at the press of the across political, social and cultural history Protestant mission in Syria. The second and adopting a variety of sources and examines the dissemination of military methods. knowledge and visual aspects in the largely overlooked first Arabic military periodical, The first two papers investigate major Jaridat Arkan Harb al-Jaysh al-Misri (Cairo, challenges that authorities faced in 1873-1877) as an extension and promotion the extension of their power over Syrian of the ideologies of Euro-Egyptian society following the conquest in 1516 of imperialist expansionism. Another paper the . Making use of considers the interplay between Ottoman official correspondence in the illustrations and textual content of the 1530s, the first paper identifies and medical journal al-Tabib (Beirut, 1874-1885) evaluates major problems in the early as important markers of the multifaceted management of Syrian military cadres, perceptions of medical practice and their many of whom were former soldiers in the intersection with the views on society, Mamluk regime. The paper also investigates identity, and technology. The final paper the changed relationship between Syria and explores the relationship of Arabic print Egypt; now separated from its former technology to the mediation of knowledge capital, Cairo, Syria enjoyed a shift in its via standardized Arabic as a protocol of imperial status relative to Egypt. Turning control. This session thus considers crucial from the macro- to the micro-historical, the problems of modern Middle Eastern history second paper follows the career of a Syrian through a deep engagement with print Kurdish notable in Ottoman state service materiality and its impact on ideas and and in so doing evaluates the capacity of identity. the Ottoman system to recruit and retain local elites. It illustrates a discretionary Chair: Dana Sajdi, Boston College Ottoman practice whereby chiefly lineages, Discussant: Nadia al-Bagdadi, Central with their regional knowledge and influence, European University were brought into Ottoman state service Presenters: Adam Mestyan, Harvard with regional appointments but not wholly University; Hala Auji, American University of integrated into a system of regular, rotating Beirut; Antoine Edwards, Washington and appointments empire-wide. Lee University; Rana Issa, University of Oslo Affecting interactions between the P4522 Imperial State Practices and Local Ottoman capital and Syrian provinces were Perspectives in Early : subjective perceptions of the other, Saturday, November 19, 8:00am articulated in writing by individuals possessing social and cultural authority and Despite great strides by scholars over the reaching a broad audience. The third paper last half-century, the history of the Arab examines the travelogue of Syrian Arab lands under the first centuries of Ottoman Badr al-Din al-Ghazzi (1499-1577) describing rule (1500s-1700s) remains greatly his journey through Anatolia to the

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 5

Ottoman capital in 1530, less than two Member at Large, Prize Committee Chair, decades after the Ottoman conquest. Bulletin Editor, Webmaster, and Secretary- Penned by a member of a prominent Treasurer Positions. Candidates for each scholarly family with historic connections to position are listed below. The Syrian Studies the former Mamluk state, the text sheds Association thanks each person who light on the receptivity of those newly volunteered to serve as a candidate for conquered populations to a new political these officer positions, and encourages all master and the limits of their appreciation members to consider running for office in of cultural difference. The fourth and final 2017. paper also examines Damascene attitudes about the Ottoman but refines its Member at Large: participates in all inquiry to consider only views of Suleyman business of the board and acts as the the Magnificent (r. 1520-66) that emerge Elections Officer in the first year of his or from histories, poems, and other texts over her term. Duties of the Elections Officer a longer temporal span, the sixteenth include soliciting nominations for board through eighteenth centuries. What positions and preparing a ballot to circulate emerges is an embrace of Suleyman not so to the membership in advance of the MESA much as warrior-hero but as founder of annual meeting. In their second year, the imperial institutions that they regarded as Member at Large manages some of the just and protective of their welfare. secretarial duties for the organization (in concert with the secretary-treasurer). This Chair: Abdul-Karim Rafeq, College of office carries two-year term. William and Mary Discussant: Stefan Winter, Universite du Candidates for Member at Large: Quebec a Montreal Reem Bailony: Reem Bailony received her Presenters: Linda Darling, University of Ph.D. in Middle East history from UCLA. Her Arizona; Charles Wilkins, Wake Forest research focuses on the engagement of University; Abdulrahim Abu-Husayn, Syrian-Lebanese migrant communities in American University of Beirut; Malissa the Syrian Revolt of 1925-1927. She is Taylor, University of Massachusetts- currently the ADF Postdoctoral Fellow at Amherst Georgetown University's Center for Contemporary Arab Studies. As an SSA Andrea L Stanton is Editor of the Syrian Board member, Reem hopes to bring Studies Association Bulletin. discussions about migration to Syrian studies.

Hadi Abdalhadi Alijla: Abdalhadi is the Syrian Studies Association 2016 Officer Executive Director for The Institute for the Elections Middle East Studies Canada (IMESC). He has a PhD in Political Studies (comparative Andrea L Stanton politics and public policy) from State University of Milan, Italy and holds an M.A. In 2016, Syrian Studies Association degree in Public Policy and Governance members will elect new officers for the from Zeppelin University- Friedrichshafen,

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 6

Germany. He is the Regional Manager for and social practice in Ottoman Syria. She MENA at the Varieties of Democracy has previously served as a member of the Institute in Sweden. He worked the advisor SSA prize committee and is now eager for and program manager on religion and the opportunity to serve as chair. public affairs at Adyan foundation in Beirut. Currently, he is conducting research on Geoffrey Schad: Geoffrey Schad is a Syria’s refugees livelihood in and Lecturer in the College of Liberal . and Professional Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and the Syrian Studies Marwa Daoudy: Marwa Daoudy is Association's Secretary-Treasurer. He has an Assistant Professor in International been involved in Middle East studies Relations at the Center for Contemporary his entire adult life, having traveled to the Arab Studies (CCAS) and the Edmund A. region immediately after college as a Walsh School of Foreign Service at Thomas J. Watson Foundation Fellow Georgetown University. Her research and studying Sufi music. After obtaining his A.M. teaching focus is on international and in Regional Studies-Middle East at Harvard, regional security, international relations, he worked in the non-profit sector in the environment, and Middle East and Washington, D.C. for nearly a decade before Syrian politics. Her current research is on going to Penn for his Ph.D. in history. He the environmental and socio-economic has taught at a number of institutions, roots of the Syrian Uprising. In these including the University of Texas at Austin, particularly difficult times for Syrians, she is Franklin and Marshall College, and Albright interested in joining efforts to contribute to College. His major interest is in the social the SSA's activities and diffusion of scholarly during the French Mandate work on Syria, its politics, history, and and the first decade or so of independence, people. his most recent paper being “The figure of the native expert: Léon Mourad in the Prize Committee Chair: publicizes the SSA's service of the High Commission for Syria annual book, article, and dissertation prizes and Lebanon,” delivered to the conference and supervises the awarding of prizes. Each “Experts and Expertise in the League of year, the chair solicits at least two Nations Mandates: Figures, Fields and volunteers from the SSA membership to Tools/Experts et expertises dans les serve on the prize committee to select the mandats de la Société des Nations: best new work on Syria. The Prize figures, champs et outils” held at INALCO in Committee Chair position carries a two-year Paris in March 2015. He has served the term which can be renewed through Syrian Studies Association as newsletter reelection. editor, member at large, and secretary- treasurer, and is a cofounder and past Candidates for Prize Committee Chair: editor of H-. Malissa Taylor: Malissa Taylor is an Assistant Professor of Middle Eastern Bulletin Editor: edits and publishes the Studies at the University of Massachusetts biannual Syrian Studies Bulletin. The editor Amherst. Her research also works with and appoints a Book Review connects intellectual history with political Editor. When necessary the Bulletin Editor

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 7 may seek assistance from the Board and Please contact Stacy Fahrenthold, Member membership with article ideas, editing, and at Large and Elections Officer, with any proofreading. The Bulletin Editor serves a questions. renewable three-year term. Andrea L Stanton is Editor of the Syrian Edith Szanto: Edith Szanto is an Assistant Studies Association Bulletin. Professor at the American University of , Sulaimani. She received her PhD in Religious Studies from theUniversity of Toronto in 2012. Her dissertation examined SSA Book and Article Prizes 2015 Shi'i practices and discourses in the Syrian shrine town of Sayyida Zaynab. Edith Charles Wilkins has been a regular contributor to the Syrian Studies Association Bulletin. She has The Prize Committee of the Syrian Studies published several articles on Syria and is Association is pleased to announce the currently finishing her manuscript prizes of the most outstanding book and tentatively entitled Transgressive article for 2015. The committee considered Traditions: Twelver Shi'ism in Modern Syria. books published between 1 July 2013 and 30 Jun 2015 and articles or book chapters Webmaster: serves a renewable three-year published between 1 July 2014 and 30 June term. The Webmaster's duties are to 2015. The committee was made up of maintain the SSA website and keep the Charles Wilkins (chair), Antoint Borrut, website up to date. Laura Ruiz de Elvira Carrascal, Elyse Semerdjian, Malissa Taylor, and Tina Zintl. Dara Conduit: Dara Conduit is a final year Ph.D candidate working on the Syrian We had eleven books and seven articles to Muslim Brotherhood at Monash University evaluate, ranging in discipline from and a researcher at the Middle East Studies archaeology, history and art history to Forum at Deakin University. She is political science, anthropology and literary, interested in contemporary Syria, conflict, theatre, and gender studies. The subjects Islamism, and violence. Ms. Conduit would covered included, in the medieval period, like to join the board because Syrian studies Umayyad and Ayyubid monumental is a rapidly expanding field, and she believes architecture; in the Ottoman period, that the SSA has an important role to play in popular religion, the urban representations supporting and connecting scholars, and of nomads, the history of the Jewish promoting the development of the field. community and rabbinate, the administration of Syria during the First Secretary-Treasurer: World, and the rise of Western none. humanitarianism in that conflict; and in the late twentieth and twenty-first centuries, This election closes on November 15, 2016. the gentrification of Old , theatre The results of the voting for each officer as a site of political dissent, feminism in the position will be announced at the Middle academic establishment, and the practice of East Studies Association annual meeting. Islamic law in the ongoing .

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 8

Stephennie Mulder, The Shrines of the ‘Alids The committee commends the winners and in Medieval Syria: Sunnis, Shi’is and the expresses its appreciation to the Architecture of Coexistence (Edinburgh: participants for contributing to this closely Edinburgh University Press, 2014). fought competition. In this highly original book, Stephennie Book Prize Mulder offers a fresh look at medieval The committee named two co-winners of shrines and reveal how Alid monuments can the 2015 book prize: unveil an architecture of coexistence that challenges long-established views of James Grehan, Twilight of the Saints: sectarian divisions. Looking particularly at Everyday Religion in Ottoman Syria and Balis, , and Damascus’ many shrines, Palestine (Oxford: Oxford University Press, Mulder offers the first systematic analysis 2014). of the construction of an ecumenical religious landscape in medieval Syria. She This book is a bold and provocative study successfully demonstrates that Shiite that explores and re-evaluates the architecture surprisingly flourished during phenomenon of popular religion in Greater the “Sunni revival” (11th-13th centuries), Syria from the 17th to the 19th centuries. largely under the patronage of Sunni The author argues that the mass of the benefactors. Mulder notably shows how, in population, both urban and rural, engaged the aftermath of the Karbala drama, the in forms of everyday worship that were itinerary of Husayn’s head (real or shaped decisively not by their respective imagined) created an Alid topography that confessional religious identities, but rather became meaningful for Sunnis as well. by a single, vast social ethos that Along the way, she also demonstrates how transcended the conventional religious the built environment needs to be establishments. Working as a historical understood in terms of lived experiences ethnographer and using an impressive and ritual practices. The book is a major range of sources, Grehan describes a contribution at the intersection of art massive sphere of popular culture history, archaeology, and socio-cultural characterized by the use of propitiatory history, with insights that will interest magic, reverence for miracle-workers and specialists in anthropology, archeological for nature cults and spirit cults, and various ritual, and landscape studies. forms of ancestor veneration. While Grehan’s study focuses on Ottoman Syria Article Prize and Palestine from the late 17th century to Lorenzo Trombetta, “Beyond the Party: The the early 20th century, his analysis is rich Shifting Structure of Syria’s Power,” in with comparisons to other societies and Informal Power in the Greater Middle East: cultures; and his conclusions will challenge Hidden Geographies, edited by Luca scholars working on other parts of the Anceschi, Gennaro Gervasio and Andrea Middle East and elsewhere across Afro- Teti (London and New York: Routledge, Eurasia, from late antiquity into modernity. 2014), pp. 24-40.

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 9

In this book chapter, Trombetta provides a Cold War age of area studies. Academic much needed analysis of the shifting power studies of these communities in Latin structures during the rule of Hafiz al-Asad America, while lagging in quantity behind and his son Bashar al-Asad. The author their North American counterparts, are also casts new light not only on the functioning beginning to proliferate. While this growing of Syria’s authoritarian system but also on body of scholarship is successfully the catalysts of the Syrian uprising. The documenting the early twentieth century analysis hinges on two conceptual migratory flows that connected the Mashriq distinctions -- between formal and informal to the Americas, the World War II and power, and between exposed and hidden postwar era remain much less studied power. Trombetta argues that the periods. authoritarian system was destabilized by a rupture in the delicate and complex balance In the case of the South American region of between these multiple forms of power. this diaspora, the dearth of Cold War era The author finely combines empirical Mahjar historiography is acute even in research with secondary sources to regions with large populations who can elaborate an original theoretical framework, trace their roots back to the Levant – such the relevance of which will be significant as Argentina, Brazil, and Mexico. In the both to the literature on authoritarianism process of finishing my doctoral dissertation, and power in general and to that on the this gap in the literature began to stand out political systems in the MENA region and in to me, and spurred me to formulate a Syria in particular. second project that would be temporally grounded in this era. As a Silas Palmer Charles Wilkins is Associate Professor of Fellow at Stanford University’s Hoover Middle Eastern History at Wake Forest Institute, I was able to initiate the research University. for this project in May 2015.

Through working with archival materials housed at the Hoover Institute collections, I Research Notes have begun to develop a project that addresses the relationships between Non-Alignment Movement Networks in Levantine states and prominent Latin the Global South: The Hoover Institute American military governments in the post- Archive World War II era. My current manuscript project on Argentine Mahjar communities Lily Balloffet from the late nineteenth century through WWII inspired me to expand upon my The formation of diasporic communities previous work on Middle Eastern-Latin with heritage roots in the Arabic-speaking American networks, but with an additional Eastern Mediterranean is garnering comparative dimension. Using Peru and increasing attention from scholars across a Argentina as case studies, I have begun to number of disciplines who are pushing the track “South-South” relationships between tired geographic boundaries leftover from a Peru, Argentina, and the Mashriq during an era marked by the non-alignment

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 10 movements that proliferated in the Global Those who are interested can also apply for south. My preliminary research has already a range of funding opportunities that cater uncovered instances of Syrians living in the to scholars at varying stages of their diaspora in South America who acted as academic career. Grants for U.S. interlocutors, unofficial citizen diplomats, undergraduate and graduate students, and couriers of correspondence between faculty, postdocs, and independent scholars prominent political figures in Latin America can all apply for research support in the and the Mashriq. form of either a Silas Palmer Fellowship, or the U.S. Scholar Research Support Program. I have also located unpublished academic International students, faculty, and texts, and personal correspondence, that independent scholars have the option of speak to the backlash of fear that these applying for a grant from the International potential “South-South” relationships Scholar Research Support Program. evoked, in particular, in the writings of U.S. academics and government officials, who For more information, visit the Hoover especially worried about the possibility of a Institution homepage at: “Latin American Nasser” during the years of http://www.hoover.org Syria and Egypt’s union as the United Arab To access the Hoover catalogue, visit the Republic. The rise in charismatic, Online Archive of California: personalistic leaders in both Latin America http://www.oac.cdlib.org and the Arabic-speaking Eastern Mediterranean in the wake of WWII was an Lily Balloffet is Assistant Professor of Global important factor that led U.S. academics Migration at Western Carolina University, and policy-makers to be concerned that and was the 2015-2016 Postdoctoral these figureheads would spark a wave of Research Scholar in Middle East Diaspora anti-U.S. sentiment among general Studies at North Carolina State University’s populations ranging from Latin Americans Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora to people in the Middle East and North Studies. She completed her PhD in History Africa. at the University of California Davis in 2015, and is currently working on a book Syrian Studies scholars interested in manuscript entitled Mahjar Maps: conducting research at the Hoover Institute Argentina in the Global Arab Diaspora. Archives have the option of accessing a digital catalogue of the Institute’s archival holdings, including a number of searchable digitized indices within specific document Book Reviews collections. One particularly interesting collection is the “Hoover Institution Library Gendering Culture in Greater Syria: Pamphlet Collection,” which includes close Intellectuals and Ideology in the Late to 60,000 pamphlets relating to twentieth- Ottoman Period. Fruma Zachs and Sharon century political, social, and economic Halevi. New York: I.B. Tauris, 2015. issues around the world. Reviewed by Johanna L Peterson

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 11

examination of the ways in which notions of Students of the late in the gender were discussed, debated, and Arab lands are familiar with the , a negotiated in the literary productions of the revival of Arabic language and literature Nahda. They begin by looking at Asma that began in the early nineteenth century. (1873), one of Salim al-Bustani’s early In Greater Syria, this cultural and linguistic novels. They examine it for its place in the flowering can be seen in the growth of development of the modern Arabic novel, novel-writing and magazine, newspaper, as well as how its plot illustrated al- and journal production as early as the Bustani’s thinking about social issues in the 1830s. In Fruma Zachs’ and Sharon Halevi’s face of a rapidly modernizing society. At the Gendering Culture in Greater Syria, the center were women and their role in the authors challenge the existing contention in creation of the modern Arab family. Zachs studies on gender in the Nahda which and Halevi next examine the emergence of suggest that it failed women. Through an a modern idea of masculinity in Greater examination of the novels, poems, Syria, a conceptualization that utilized the magazines, and newspapers that were pre-Islamic notion of muru’a (manly virtue) produced during the Nahda, Zachs and in a very modern context. They use novels Halevi suggest that it was a time of intense that ostensibly focus on the question of the debate over the question of gender as new “new woman” as a vehicle for discussing conceptions of masculinity were created, this shift to modern notions of masculinity and women’s place in Greater Syrian society and manly virtue. was actively discussed. They further suggest that the Nahda can be divided into two Zachs and Halevi then turn to the discourse facets – the cultural, in which one sees the on domesticity that appeared on the pages resurgence of linguistic, journalistic, and of novels, journals, newspapers, and the literary activity in the early nineteenth like in Greater Syria in the second half of century and continuing into the twentieth; the nineteenth century. In this discussion, and the political, seen in the emergence of the authors use the term “glocalization” to ideas related to political identity and define the ways in which global processes nationhood that developed in the last become incorporated into local practices, decades of the nineteenth century. In both, understanding, and structures. In examining questions of gender were at the center. this hybrid idea of domesticity, Zachs and Thus, rather than the Nahda failing women Halevi first focus on the ideal woman as and women’s progress in the Middle East, it promoted in early lectures of cultural served as an early step in debates about societies, and then on a thematic analysis of republican motherhood seen during the domestic advice columns found in several mandate period, as well as questions of Beirut and Cairo-based newspapers. In women’s citizenship in the first years looking at discourses on domestic health following independence. and hygiene, the spatial reorganization of the home, and Western fashion, the After providing a basic outline of the authors show that though women were evolution of the “woman question” in the encouraged to “expand their social horizons press of Greater Syria from the mid-1800s through a variety of communal and familial to 1900, Zachs and Halevi turn to their activities,” this expansion did not include

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 12

“the crafting of independent identities or agendas” (p. 86). While the discourse of much of the late nineteenth century on the “woman The movement in the focus of women’s question” focused on women’s role as writings from the domestic to the political mothers and wives and their successful sphere was accompanied by a shift in the management of the domestic sphere, discourse on the domestic sphere. The final beginning in the mid-1890s and continuing chapter looks at this shift and its impact on into the first decades of the twentieth the “woman question.” Here, the authors century, one sees a shift, in both male and examine the depiction of marriage and female-authored works, toward social and sexuality in turn-of-the century Arabic political commentaries. Here, one sees a novels. They focus on the theoretical idea of transformation in the discourse of “outlaw emotions,” those feelings domesticity from a construct of the expressed in literature, art, etc., that emerging middle classes to one that had subvert social and political norms and increasingly nationalist and anti-colonialist practices, making the works, in and of purposes. Zachs and Halevi here suggest themselves, expressions of attempted that the women who authored these novels subversion. Zachs and Halevi examine a set serve as a link between the Nahda’s cultural of novels, novellas, and short stories from and political facets. This analysis, in the late Nahda period that sought to particular, offers an important addition to challenge existing social and sexual norms. the many studies that overlook the first The fact that these fictions were serialized couple decades of the twentieth century in in newspapers allowed readers to respond looking at women’s work and activism in to and debate about these ideas. They Greater Syria. In examining late nineteenth suggest that, in “providing a discursive or century women novelists, Zachs and Halevi ‘rehearsal space’ in which to voice and show how women used their novels to pose share ‘outlaw emotions,’” the authors “laid questions and critiques about the existing the foundation for a subculture opposing social, cultural, legal, economic, and the prevailing gender norms” (p. 128). political structures, especially in regard to Though this experiment was rather short- those that affected women. To highlight the lived, coming to an abrupt halt with the ways in which these questions and critiques imposition of the mandate, Zachs and were presented, and to get at their content, Halevi suggest that the themes dealt with in the authors look at debates related to these works were again taken up by women women’s right to paid work and political beginning in the late 1940s and early 1950s. rights, as well as at those women who emerged as activists and political writers In their examination of the ways in which during this period. Zachs and Halevi the “woman question” was approached, conclude that this period was not a minor from the earliest days of the Nahda in the transitional phase, but was instead a time in early nineteenth century through to the which the feminist and intellectual agendas beginning of French mandate rule in Syria raised by women in conceptions of the and Lebanon in 1920, Zachs and Halevi nationalist projects of mandate Syria and show the central role it played in emerging Lebanon were begun. notions of Arab and middle class modernity.

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 13

Indeed, discourses of domesticity, proto- Malik, Habib C. Islamism and the Future of nationalism, and political rights placed Christians of the Middle East. Stanford: women at the center. Not only was Arab Hoover Institution Press, 2010. 80p. modernity tied to the creation of educated wives and mothers heading scientifically- Reviewed by Maya El-Darzi organized middle class households, it also came to be linked to changing notions of Islamism and the Future of the Christians of masculinity in light of the “new woman,” as the Middle East by Habib C. Malik is a well as, for those in the later years of the straight forward piece capturing the tragic Nahda, women’s full participation in decline of the indigenous Christian political life. community in the region. Since the September 11 attacks, much of the Zachs and Halevi provide an engaging, scholarship has focused mainly on Islamic thoughtful, and innovative examination of trends in Egypt, Turkey, and Saudi Arabia, in the Nahda period. Using novels, short hopes of clarifying the misunderstandings stories, newspaper and periodical literature between East and West. But Malik’s work (which includes transcribed public lectures, sheds light on an often a neglected aspect scientific articles, household advice columns, of this relationship – the “relic status” of and advertisements), biographies, memoirs, indigenous Christians. Jerusalem, for and personal correspondence, they provide instance, was twenty percent Christian in a compelling analysis of discourses on 1948, but is currently less than two-percent women in the Nahda, the ways in which (p. 7). Likewise, half of Iraq’s 1.4 million Nahda literature can be seen reflected in Christians have fled the country since the the works of the late mandate and early American invasion in 2003 (p. 8). In light of independence periods, and the benefits of these alarming statistics, Malik tells the interdisciplinarity in rethinking earlier story of Christians in the Middle East, “the assumptions. For students of Greater Syria trials they face, their options, and their in the late Ottoman Empire, this work prospects” (p. 9). provides a cultural and gendered analysis of a region and period often examined Although four chapters long, the book can through the lens of political history. For be divided into three main parts, with those who examine the mandate, Zachs’ chapters one and two describing the history and Halevi’s analysis provides useful and current state of indigenous Christians. background for understanding the trends Despite originating in the Middle East, and changes in the women’s press and Christianity never took root in the region. women’s activism over the course of the With the coming of Islam, along with mandate period. various other political events – ranging from the Arab-Israeli conflict to the invasion of Johanna L Peterson is a PhD student at the Iraq – many Christians have emigrated to University of California, San Diego. the west, or even converted to Islam, to avoid becoming scapegoats. Furthermore, Christians in the region have often exercised a degree of passivity in the midst of Islamic extremism. Malik then focuses on

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 14 the two biggest Christian communities in dhimmnitude actually subjugated Christians the region – the Coptics in Egypt and the under Islamic legal and political rule. Maronites in Lebanon. While the former, Marginalizing Christians as strangers in their characterized as protected peoples or ancestral homelands, dhimmnitude reduced “dhimmi,” have struggled to safeguard their such demographic to second class citizenry. community, the later have dominated the Another significant element was Malik’s political system, and carved a free standing explanation of Christian attitudes towards for themselves in the midst of a Muslim Sunni Salafism and Shiite followers of majority. Wilayat al-Faqih. If an Islamic state were to be established, several Christians would In the third chapter, Malik explores the prefer Shiite rule, since Christian many factors resulting in a decreasing communities still exist in , whereas any Christian population. Perhaps the most such traces have been eradicated in Saudi significant factor is the fact that many Arabia. Christian communities in the Middle East lack a proper protection against rising In the future, Malik may consider expanding religious fanaticism, which discourages his study by examining opinions and Christians from returning to their homes. perspectives of at the “Arab street” Malik then discusses the rise of Sunni and level, by interviewing common Muslim Shiite Islamic fanaticism, which in general is lawmakers, and even mixed families to see rousing much popular support due to the how each sect views the other, and to see if failure of Arab secular governments at there is any potential for such outlook to improving the standard of living for their change. Malik may also want to study other people and the nation in general. In the last predominantly Islamic countries – like chapter, Malik poses his thoughts on the Indonesia – and compare the treatment of future of Middle Eastern Christians. minorities to that of the Middle East. In this Although Europe has shown occasional way, scholars may not only learn more sensitivity, US policy focuses more on repair about Islam, but also try to determine the the relationship between East and West. degree in which culture plays a role. However, in places like Lebanon, there is an increase in number of priests, exemplifying Islamism and the Future of the Christians of that several Christian communities are the Middle East is an excellent starting solidifying their identity as “Christians.” point for Middle Eastern scholars in general Ultimately, Malik concludes that the same striving to comprehend the current rights Muslims demand in the West should livelihood of minority communities in the be granted to the Christians living under region. It is also a valuable contribution for Islamic majority rule in the East. Levantine scholars, specifically those analyzing the political divide in the The most interesting aspect of Malik’s piece Lebanese Christian community between the is the way he interprets the infamous Saudi influenced March 14 alliance and the dhimmi concept. Meaning “protected Shiite led March 8 alliance. With various peoples,” scholars have often applauded threats, such as the Islamic State of Iraq and the policy of dhimmnitude, marking it a sign Syria (ISIS), the ever decreasing trend in of tolerance in Islam. Yet Malik argues that Middle Eastern minorities is alarming. The

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 15 region will lose the richness and diversity topography, which he describes well. that marked it for centuries. Readers need to be weaned from the essentialism that so often clouds our view Maya El-Darzi is a graduate of California of the Middle East. We always need to be State University, Northridge with a B.A. in reminded that people move around, learn both, Political Science and History, and is and forget languages, and change religions. currently an M.A. student in the same Readers also need to get over an institution. excessively sectarian view of Syrian society; here a few examples of shared holy sites and rituals would have helped. That said, McHugo does a good job of situating John McHugo, Syria a History of the Last today’s Syria in the context of what Arabs Hundred Years (The New Press, New York called Bilad al-Sham. and London: 2014), pp. 291 including index and bibliography. The first two chapters follow familiar storylines: the decline of the Ottoman Reviewed by Mary C. Wilson Empire, modernization, imperialism and nationalism. Perhaps the more accurate The general public and professors who wish than decline is devolution, which in the to assign a survey of modern Syria will Ottoman Empire had the misfortune to welcome John McHugo’s Syria a History of coincide with growing European military the Last Hundred Years. It is short and and economic power. By the mid- organized into chronological chapters, nineteenth century a revolution in power according to standard periodization: ancient and communications allowed the Ottoman civilizations to World War I, the French Empire to initiate a process of centralization mandate, independent Syria until 1970, at the same time as it increased European Hafiz al-Asad’s 30-year rule (divided into interest and interference in Ottoman affairs, two chapters), and Bashar al-Asad up to the two pulling in opposite directions. Still, 2013. Since it is a synthesis of English the Ottoman Empire fought on four fronts language secondary sources, however, the during the First World War and survived, if book adds little to scholarship on Syria. not for very long. Modernization theory has been given the bum’s rush by its many Every author who aims at a general critics of the past forty years, but its evil audience has to choose what to tell and twin modernization lives on. It is far too what details to provide as evidence. To his general a term to carry much meaning credit McHugo has neither dumbed down beyond its Eurocentrist beginnings. his presentation nor overwhelmed it with Considering specific components of extraneous details. That said, I think there ‘modernization’ might have helped: for are points that he has missed. For example example integration into a global economy in chapter one, which necessarily skims and extension of the state into all aspects of over ten centuries to get to the last one life. Lacking culturally neutral criteria for hundred that are the focus of his book, he what constitutes modernity, American should have explained the evolution of the students will all too readily fall back on an cultural in addition to its

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 16 easy dichotomy: we are modern, they are comprehensible. It was not and is not not. obvious in what ways peoples inside Syrian borders differed from those on the outside The French mandate and the rising tide of or in what ways the inhabitants of Syria nationalism in response provide the central themselves could identify as a single narrative of Chapter 2, with the Great political unit. The political elites of post Syrian Revolt serving as the meat grinder mandate Syria faced the formidable task of that turned the peoples of Syria into Syrian making the state more tangible than simply nationalists. Along with Michael Provence I a morass of resentment against the French. would argue differently: the Great Syrian How did they do so without easily Revolt, along with the battle of Maysalun manipulated differences like language or became the foundation tales of Syrian religion to separate Syrians from Iraqis, nationalism, but many, especially urban Palestinians, Lebanese, or Jordanians? notables and , did not take part. Second, as McHugo explains, a new ruling They wrote themselves into the nationalist elite composed of the sons of peasants narrative later. Far from detesting the replaced the old urban notables. I think he French (p. 79), many urban notables spoke could have stressed that although it may French and admired French culture and have taken twenty-five years, by the time political organization. Of course, one can Hafiz al-Asad came to power in 1970 a shift both admire France and lead a nationalist in the social location of power, a revolution, party so the more useful line of inquiry had taken place. Despite the ever changing concerns the uses of nationalism in building governments and their inconsistent, political support and the process of building unfinished programs, how did this shift take consciousness and loyalty to a particular place? state. France worked against this component of state formation by playing on Chapters 4 and 5 cover Hafiz al-Asad’s rise difference to challenge the appeal of either to and exercise of power, four covers Arab nationalism or . foreign policy and five internal affairs. Granted the thirty years of Hafiz al-Asad’s The third chapter takes on the difficult task rule is the longest period a single ruler has of making the rapid changes of government survived in Syria’s twentieth century history between 1946 and 1970 into a coherent and short chapters give readers much- narrative. McHugo begins with the creation needed resting places in surveys. Yet by of new parties based on new ideologies and separating the two, McHugo loses how the men that led them: the Ba`ath Party, closely the external and the internal are the Syrian Socialist Nationalist Party, the intertwined. For example Asad’s Syrian Communist Party, and the Muslim intervention in Lebanon on the side of the Brotherhood, followed by the series of Phalanges in 1976 served to coalesce coups, the creation of the United Arab militant Sunni Islamist opposition against Republic and its demise, and the first Ba`ath him. And a look around the region in the government. To his credit he follows this late 1970s and early 1980s, when the story without confusing the reader. Still, a Iranian revolution took place, Juhyman al- shift of focus from the particular to the `Utaybah took over the Great mosque in general might have made the period more Mecca, and a militant Islamist group

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 17 assassinated Anwar Sadat would have Progressive National Front as a Ba`th shown that Islamist opposition hardly dominated umbrella for all leftist, needed to be sharpened by presumed nationalist political parties in the country, sectarian spite. In Syria the Islamist the parties that shared the political end of opposition certainly played the sectarian the spectrum with the Ba`th split into two card, but did Asad’s support of Iran in the broad groups. One part of each such party Iraq-Iran war necessarily inspire Islamist or joined the Front and so maintained formal Arab nationalist opposition back home? existence at the cost of actual influence or The Iranian revolution may have been even credibility; the other part of each carried out by “Persians” (p.177) and Shi`a, party remained outside and was forced to but to many in the , irrespective disband or go underground. Similarly after of ethnic or sectarian tags, the success of a the ‘time of troubles’ that ended with the largely unarmed people in overthrowing an destruction of central Hama, Asad co-opted authoritarian ruler supported by the United some of the Muslim Brotherhood who then States was positively inspiring. Perhaps made their peace with the regime and even Asad was shielded from an Iranian-style won seats in the Syrian parliament running mass uprising owing to the distance he as independents. The rest disappeared or maintained from the United States, another were disappeared, creating a well of close connection of the external and the resentment that is feeding the opposition internal. In keeping his distance, Asad to Bashar al-Asad today. stood alone in the Arab world, except for Qaddafi, and thus Iran became and remains Chapter 6 covers the years since Hafiz al- a very important regional ally for both Asad’s death. This must have been the father and son. most difficult chapter to write owing to the relative lack of secondary sources much less In McHugo’s telling, Asad’s rise to power primary ones. McHugo tells us about the appears to be more an outcome of hopes Bashar al-Asad raised early on for character than the result of political less state control of economic activity and strategy. Asad was a pragmatic, disciplined, political expression, but says little about the cautious, cool-headed workaholic according impact of the Syrian withdrawal from to this book and everything else I have read, Lebanon. What happened to all those but I would have appreciated examples of soldiers and migrant workers whose his strategies in building and maintaining earnings in Lebanon arguably staved off support. Asad seems very generally to have unrest at home? Are they and their followed a system of redundancy in the impoverished families feeding the many military and the bureaucracy. Every military faces of Syrian opposition today? Also since or police command was balanced by journalists like to demonstrate the another command, and every command magnitude of Syrian refugees by reference had an accompanying intelligence service. to the displaced persons crisis after World In the bureaucracy, competition for posts War II, perhaps greater attention should and higher salaries created an insidious have been accorded Syria’s generous of gossip and tattling; efficiency reception of Palestinian, Lebanese and Iraqi sacrificed for security. Divide and rule also refugees since World War II. served Asad well. When he created the

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 18

In the conclusion McHugo aims, as he says Modern Humanitarianism, Berkeley, in the title of the chapter, to “draw… the University of California Press, 2015, 251p. threads together”. Some of his threads do not work for me, or are two simplistic to be Reviewed by Gershon Shafir meaningful. That the French bombed civilians and the Ba`th does the same does Bread from Stones is very well thought out, not make them similar. That both the written, and put together book, all the way urban notables and the Ba`th tried to limit from the evocative title, through the vast the political organization and expression of amount of original data collected in half a other groups does not make them similar dozen languages in rarely tapped archives, either. Other threads he draws out are to its eloquent and nuanced argumentation, more useful, the politicization of religion, all of it animated by the revulsion from the for example, and the politics of fear, neither morally reprehensible genocide at its center uniquely Syrian. but always from within the historian’s discerning perspective. To sum up, this book makes the last one hundred years of Syrian history accessible Professor Watenpaugh gives us a new to general readers. This necessarily chronology, the interwar period, a novel involves choices of what to include and geographical focus, the shattered Ottoman what not. What I most miss from this Empire, and a new focus on the old victims, account is a sense of warm-blooded people the Armenians. The Ottoman Empire living the material realities of their times. already in the second half of the 19th By not using primary sources, and there are century served as the site where Western some in English, or even a very complete list humanitarian intervention, frequently in of English language secondary sources the service of imperial interests, was (where for example is Malcolm Kerr’s The practiced. The book’s focus is on the Arab Cold War, Elizabeth Thompson’s intensification, as well as redefinition of Colonial Citizens, Keith Watenpaugh’s Being humanitarian intervention as assistance to Modern in the Middle East, or Lisa the genocide’s surviving trafficked and Wedeen’s Ambiguities of Domination?) the kidnapped Armenian women and children. sense of lived history is lost. And it is this This books also accomplishes what is widely sense, the sense of real people rather than urged but rarely accomplished – the joint victims or monsters, which is missing from study of East and West. By focusing on the our understandings of Syria and the Middle Eastern Mediterranean as a region of East today. interaction between the Ottomans, their subjects, and the Western Great Powers, he Mary C. Wilson is Professor of History at shows it to be a site of cultural and UMass Amherst. humanitarian innovation. Finally, Professor Watenpaugh not only suggests an eye- opening parallel between the origins of humanitarianism and human rights, the Keith David Watenpaugh, Bread from former in response to the Armenian Stones: The Middle East and the Making of genocide, the letter in reaction to the Jewish Holocaust, but also connects them

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 19 by pinpointing the mutual influence of shaped, and used and consequently humanitarianism and human rights. Though concludes that it was “a minor force,” both partake in a common conception of mostly one of resistance. Though interwar shared humanity, eventually they diverged humanitarianism sought to be apolitical and as to the proper way to address the neutral, a substitute for politics, it was systematic mass abuses of victim groups. shaped by the major political forces of the age, and remained a bone of contention In Bread from Stones, Professor between western promises of universalism Watenpaugh has established a new and and the nationalist claims of the newly- rigorous standard for the study of one of formed Turkish state that it was unjustly the defining moral economies and social singled out. Highlighting this tangled web, imaginaries of our time, modern allows Professor Watenpaugh to shed light humanitarianism. To start with, he carefully on the present day entrapments of separates the thread of humanitarianism as humanitarianism by militarization and a phenomenon on its own right from corporatization of humanitarian actions and nationalism and colonialism. He is also part intervention. of the new scholarly approach which refocuses the origins of human rights by Watenpaugh not only disentangles emphasizing its relative novelty but gives humanitarianism from colonialism; he is at additional depth to this view by highlighting his best when he disentangles the connection between the failures of humanitarianism itself. Humanitarianism, as humanitarianism and the growing attraction he demonstrates, is played out between the of human rights. Finally, he seeks to remove poles of universal compassion for the from the objects of humanitarian assistance sufferer and the more selective, frequently the bland bureaucratic labels of refugee, sectarian, humanitarian imagination which sufferer, orphan, and, whenever possible, allows the self-same sufferers either to be recognize their distinct voice and agency. drawn into the circle of care or be denied care and even exposed to barbarism In particular, I appreciated his efforts to beyond imagination. Modern “disentangle –but not disconnect— humanitarianism is, therefore, the humanitarianism from colonialism” and unexpected offspring of genocide, an nationalism (p. 3). Throughout the volume attempt to correct the inhumanity inflicted Watenpaugh demonstrates the emergence on genocide victims by repairing their of humanitarianism as one strand of the humanity and communities. But the other secular, management-oriented, scientific, pole of humanitarianism, its universalism is apolitical, bureaucratic, and professional hardly simple compassion for the distant ethos of Western liberalism. He, stranger; in fact, to view a group as consequently, distinguishes between the deserving compassion, and therefore care, dynamics and logics of colonialism and it first has to be ‘unstrangered.’ humanitarianism but remains sensitive to their manifold connections. While In sum, Bread from Stones offers a rich recognizing the novelty and distinctness of social and cultural overview in the service of humanitarianism, he never overlooks the a historical and intellectual genealogy of many forces by which it was buffeted, modern humanitarianism. The book serves

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 20 up a complex narrative with many parts, each component articulated both on its own terms and as part of a larger picture.

Gershon Shafir is Professor of Sociology at the University of California, San Diego

Syrian Studies Association Bulletin Volume 21, Number 1 (Fall 2016) 21