University of New Mexico UNM Digital Repository Anthropology ETDs Electronic Theses and Dissertations Fall 2019 A Noncoherent Governance: Tinkering with Stones in the Old City of Acre Caitlin Davis University of New Mexico - Main Campus Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/anth_etds Part of the Anthropology Commons Recommended Citation Davis, Caitlin. "A Noncoherent Governance: Tinkering with Stones in the Old City of Acre." (2019). https://digitalrepository.unm.edu/anth_etds/186 This Dissertation is brought to you for free and open access by the Electronic Theses and Dissertations at UNM Digital Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in Anthropology ETDs by an authorized administrator of UNM Digital Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected], [email protected], [email protected]. i Caitlin M. Davis Candidate Anthropology Department This dissertation is approved, and it is acceptable in quality and form for publication: Approved by the Dissertation Committee: Dr. Les Field, Chairperson Dr. Ronda Brulotte Dr. David Dinwoodie Dr. Lindsay Smith Dr. Khaldun Bshara ii A NONCOHERENT GOVERNANCE: TINKERING WITH STONES IN THE OLD CITY OF ACRE by CAITLIN M. DAVIS B.A., Anthropology/Sociology, Guilford College, 2010 M.A., Anthropology, University of New Mexico, 2014 DISSERTATION Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy Anthropology The University of New Mexico Albuquerque, New Mexico December 2019 iii A NONCOHERENT GOVERNANCE: TINKERING WITH STONES IN THE OLD CITY OF ACRE by CAITLIN M. DAVIS B.A., Sociology/Anthropology, Guilford College, 2010 M.A., Anthropology, University of New Mexico, 2014 Ph.D., Anthropology, University of New Mexico, 2019 ABSTRACT This dissertation recounts a series of episodes in the architectural conservation of the Old City of Acre in Israel. It studies the stones and mortars, residents and inspectors, papers and computers involved in the conservation of historic buildings, highlighting the moments in which the technical details of architectural conservation entangle themselves with the administrative techniques of government authorities. I describe architectural conservation as a tentative process, one that requires the coordination of various actants into precarious associations. Here, description is important. The pages that follow experiment with an anthropological practice that writes against conclusion. This is an anthropology that refuses to privilege a knowing subject and a stable world. Instead, it opts to tinker with noncoherent forms of analysis, forms that can grapple with realities that can always be done differently. iv TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF FIGURES ......................................................................................................... vi INTRODUCTION ............................................................................................................ 1 A Situated Analysis: The Literature Review .................................................................. 5 A Field in which to Work ............................................................................................. 16 Threading Together an Argument ............................................................................... 23 The Politics of Actor-Network Theory ......................................................................... 27 CHAPTER 1: PAPER BUILDINGS AND THE GAP OF REFERENCE ................ 31 Words and Things ......................................................................................................... 36 The Scope and Stability of Representationalist Thinking ........................................... 42 Enacting a Gap: The Architectural Documentation ................................................... 45 Sealing the Black Box .................................................................................................. 61 CHAPTER 2: ENGINEERING NONCOHERENCE ................................................. 65 The State of Housing in the Old City of Acre .............................................................. 68 Objects of Dispossession ............................................................................................... 70 (Obligatory) Points of Passage ..................................................................................... 78 Passage Point No. 1: Is the Building Dangerous? ..................................................... 79 Passage Point No. 2: Preserving the Old City of Acre ............................................ 100 Passage Point No. 3: An International Tourist Site ................................................. 108 Concluding Thoughts ................................................................................................. 114 CHAPTER 3: WHEN SALTS ATTACK ................................................................... 118 Cement Buildings, American Coal, and Tiny Boats ................................................. 121 Cement Repairs in the Old City of Acre ..................................................................... 126 Studying Nonhumans: Object Oriented Ontology .................................................... 127 The Movements of Moisture ....................................................................................... 140 A Sociology of Translations ....................................................................................... 150 Concluding Thoughts ................................................................................................. 159 CHAPTER 4: FLOWS OF GOVERNANCE AND THE BODIES OF LAW ........ 163 The Props of the Law .................................................................................................. 164 v Mediating Governance: How Detours Are Made Possible ....................................... 176 The Details of Translation: Who to Discipline? ........................................................ 186 Anthropology, the State, and their Parallels ............................................................. 190 The Details of Translation: How to Discipline? ........................................................ 194 Concluding Thoughts ................................................................................................. 200 CHAPTER 5: STATIONARY DISPLACEMENTS ................................................. 205 Starting Small: Building Numbers, Lists, and Dirty Hands ..................................... 208 Centers of Calculation ................................................................................................ 213 The Center of Calculation .......................................................................................... 220 A Coherent Center ...................................................................................................... 225 An Entangled Enough Center of Calculation ........................................................... 232 Concluding Thoughts ................................................................................................. 236 CHAPTER 6: MANAGING FAILURE...................................................................... 238 Investigating Failures: Typhoid ................................................................................. 245 Noncoherence: A Pinboard of Partiality ................................................................... 253 Functional Noncoherence .......................................................................................... 266 Concluding Thoughts ................................................................................................. 271 CONCLUSION ............................................................................................................. 274 Departures ................................................................................................................... 275 Experiments ................................................................................................................ 277 REFERENCES CITED ................................................................................................ 283 vi LIST OF FIGURES Figure 1: View of Khan as-Shawarda ............................................................................... 31 Figure 2: Offices of the Israel Antiquities Authority, Northern Region, Acre ................. 32 Figure 3: Interior view of the Office of Conservation Supervision .................................. 33 Figure 4: Initial architectural plan of the vault of St. Andrew's Church ........................... 48 Figure 5: Charcoal triangulation point .............................................................................. 51 Figure 6: Strings connecting triangulation points ............................................................. 53 Figure 7: Sticky corner ...................................................................................................... 54 Figure 8: Preparing architectural sketch for measurement ............................................... 55 Figure 9: Hypothetical example to demonstrate triangulation process ............................. 60 Figure 10: Engineering survey of building 18010/42 for the Custodian of Absentee Property, 1951 ............................................................................................................ 85 Figure 11: Architectural cross-section and calculations for St. John's Crypt, 1938. Electronic record number 00071706.81.D049.F0. Israel Antiquities