Durham E-Theses Intimate Bodies, Violent Struggles: The poetics and politics of nuptiality in Syria KASTRINOU, A. MARIA A. How to cite: KASTRINOU, A. MARIA A. (2012) Intimate Bodies, Violent Struggles: The poetics and politics of nuptiality in Syria , Durham theses, Durham University. Available at Durham E-Theses Online: http://etheses.dur.ac.uk/4923/ Use policy The full-text may be used and/or reproduced, and given to third parties in any format or medium, without prior permission or charge, for personal research or study, educational, or not-for-prot purposes provided that: • a full bibliographic reference is made to the original source • a link is made to the metadata record in Durham E-Theses • the full-text is not changed in any way The full-text must not be sold in any format or medium without the formal permission of the copyright holders. Please consult the full Durham E-Theses policy for further details. Academic Support Oce, Durham University, University Oce, Old Elvet, Durham DH1 3HP e-mail: [email protected] Tel: +44 0191 334 6107 http://etheses.dur.ac.uk 2 Intimate Bodies, Violent Struggles The poetics and politics of nuptiality in Syria A. Maria A. Kastrinou Thesis submitted for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy in Anthropology Durham University 2012 Abstract Intimate bodies, violent struggles: The poetics and politics of nuptiality in Syria Caught between conflicting historical fantasies of an exotic Orient and images of the oppressive and threatening Other, Syria embodies both the colonial attraction of Arabesque par excellance simultaneously along with fears of civilization clashes. In anthropology the road to Damascus is a road less travelled, a road perilously understudied. Venturing on such a road, this ethnography is one of few contemporary anthropological accounts of Syria, and the first to situate itself among the Druze community as well as the transient spaces of/between the communal, the national and the global. Undertaken in the years immediately preceding the so-called Arab Spring, and caught amidst the personal familial relations and ruptures of a close-knit sectarian community, the relationship between the intimate and the violent became central in framing the empirical and theoretical endeavour. The fine and fragile line between intimacy and violence was pervasive and raised questions such as: How are relations formed, performed, and challenged within the Syrian context? How are power relations of intimacy and violence embodied and to what extent are such relations constitutive of social reality within the contexts of the Syrian polity? Encountering issues of class, gender, sect, state, capitalist globalisation and Western governmentality, this thesis is based on fourteen months of ethnographic fieldwork within the Druze community and dance research inside Syria. Specifically, this ethnography takes the nuptial body as the epicentre of historical, social, political and economic power relations, as a practical embattled territory, and traces the choreographies of power through Syrian bodies in (a) dances and transformative rituals within the Druze community, (b) on the state-funded stages of folklore festivals, and (c) through the European Union’s sponsoring and investing in Syrian professional dances. Choreographing power relations and clashes between/within empires, the thesis develops the concept of nuptiality as the relational idiomatic frame of violent intimacies that produce the body as an arena of contestations and struggles, a fragmented plane upon which power relations emerge. But bodies move in elusive, subversive and powerful rhythms, simultaneously performing, defying and crystallising their own subjugations and transformations – it is these moving bodies, in intimate spaces that this ethnography is about. This theoretical approach, and its own intimate methodological forbearer, is used to challenge regnant theories of power and relationality in contemporary Syria, as well as essential purveyances of Arab bodies. Instead, the concept of nuptiality is used simultaneously to explain hegemonic quests for bodies, and the captivating force and fluidity of embodied everyday struggles. 2 Contents Abstract --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 2 Contents -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 3 List of figures and tables ------------------------------------------------------------------ 6 Note on Arabic transliteration ----------------------------------------------------------- 7 Glossary --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 8 Statement of copyright --------------------------------------------------------------------- 9 Acknowledgements ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 10 Chapter One Intimate bodies, violent struggles: The poetics and politics of nuptiality in Syria ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 15 Becoming an anthropologist: Photograph of a little girl in the desert -------------15 On navigation -------------------------------------------------------------------------------17 Anthropology as epistemology -----------------------------------------------------------17 Scope and theoretical framework of thesis ---------------------------------------------20 Synopsis of thesis ---------------------------------------------------------------------------22 Anthropology and Events -----------------------------------------------------------------26 Chapter Two Emplacing research: History, anthropology and methods ----------------------- 37 Introduction: Middle East and anthropology ------------------------------------------37 Emplacing the Druze: History and contemporary regional realities ---------------40 Syria: French Mandate, Independence, United Arab Republic and the Ba’th Party’s rise to power ------------------------------------------------------------------------46 Emplacing anthropology in Syria since 1970 ------------------------------------------49 Emplacing research practice --------------------------------------------------------------60 Intersubjective research praxis: Practice into theory ---------------------------------65 Chapter Three Two houses in Jaramana ---------------------------------------------------------------- 75 Introduction: On houses ------------------------------------------------------------------75 Jaramana --------------------------------------------------------------------------------------80 Two houses in Jaramana -------------------------------------------------------------------87 3 Bayt Abud-Haddad--------------------------------------------------------------------------89 Bayt Ouward ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 103 Conclusion: Two bayts in Jaramana ---------------------------------------------------- 110 Chapter Four Of bodies, souls and transformations: Birthing and dying in Jaramana ------ 115 Enthusing bodies: Reflections ---------------------------------------------------------- 115 Encountering life and death in Jaramana --------------------------------------------- 116 The Body and Druze theosophy ------------------------------------------------------- 117 Dying in Jaramana ------------------------------------------------------------------------ 123 Birthing in Jaramana ---------------------------------------------------------------------- 140 Conclusion: Life-cycle transformations and the embodied struggles of Druze becomings ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 150 Chapter Five Nuptiality or, a wedding in Jaramana ----------------------------------------------- 152 Introduction: The problematic framework of endogamy -------------------------- 152 Talking of marriage ----------------------------------------------------------------------- 156 Nuptial bodies, intimate boundaries --------------------------------------------------- 171 Procrustean bodies of the margins: Intimate and volatile struggles ------------- 178 Procrustean bodies of the martyrs ----------------------------------------------------- 182 Chapter Six Poetics of an empire: Folklore festivals, nuptials and the Syrian state -------- 186 Introduction ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 186 Part 1: Theorising the state -------------------------------------------------------------- 186 Part 2: Choreographies of empire: Spaces for the realisation of intimacy ------ 205 The finale: The intimate discord of empire ------------------------------------------ 212 Conclusion: Requiem for a marriage or, nuptial intimacy in the state-of-empire ----------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 216 Chapter Seven Arab youth politics in Syria: Becoming young in the Middle East ------------ 223 Introduction ------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 223 Of uprisings, backgrounds and theoretical frameworks --------------------------- 224 Singing Jowlan: Performing identities, reforming histories and embodying politics -------------------------------------------------------------------------------------- 229 4 On inventiveness and (in) dependence: The political economy of networking in Damascus University and beyond ----------------------------------------------------- 235 Love and other crimes: Desires and discourses of resistance