Anthropology of the Middle East

Ever since the 1970s, when I attended a conference of the American Anthropological Association for the first time, a question had been with me: Why do anthropologists of the Middle East not have a common forum in the form of a journal or an anthropology association? Now, as Anthropology of the Middle East makes its debut, my belief in the need for such a publication has become even stronger.

This article revisits, after a period of thirty years, the materials of two field researches that relate to an iron-mining company in the north of Mauritania. The MIFERMA, which had inherited the colonial past, meanwhile has become the SNIM, a nationalised company, employing exclusively Mauritanian workers. The ‘mauritanisation’ of the employees is the object of the analysis. This process has social and political features, underlying the demands of the local workers, but also symbolic and identity aspects that are of anthropological interest with regard to globalisation. The culture of the sacs à dos evident in the company underlines solidarities that are close to those of tribal society, illustrating a local adaptation of modernity in the world system. The anthropologist’s memory is here crossing the workers’ memory.

This article examines the interface between modernity and traditional cultural values. It suggests that Iranian society, in spite of its Islamic theocratic regime, is on one level an open society and has shown a surprising degree of flexibility in adapting to change. Yet on another level, Iran remains a closed society with strong cultural ties that act as unifying factors controlling the boundaries of interaction between the old and the new. One of the manifestations of the deep-rooted values that determine the form and extent of the acceptance of modernity is the consideration of one’s ‘face’ in public. ‘Face’ acts as a regulating agent directing the choices people make vis-à-vis societal change. The article concludes that social interactions and decisions taken by individuals in all public aspects of their lives, regardless of class, age, ethnic origins or gender, continue to be profoundly influenced by ‘face’.

In vitro fertilisation and even newer assisted reproductive technologies are part of everyday life in the contemporary Middle East. There, IVF is practised according to local Islamic norms, which have been reinforced by fatwas from lead- ing religious authorities. As this article will show, ideological differences between dominant Sunni and minority Shi’ite forms of Islam are currently shaping the practices of test-tube baby-making in the Muslim world, particularly regarding the use of third-party gamete donation and new technologies to overcome male infertility. Such divergences have led to gender transformations within infertile marriages in the Muslim Middle East, with potentially profound implications for women’s marital security and family formation.

This article analyses the evolution in the ways of managing the event and the everyday in a gecekondu (squatter’s house) neighbourhood in Ankara, Turkey. It focuses on the sitting room as a space of reception and a space of life located at the crossing of the event and the everyday. In the village, the selamlik (the room of reception) was clearly separated from the room of intimate life (haremlik). Thus, the event and the everyday were spatially separate. In this new space configuration, how is the passage of the everyday to the event marked? In order to answer this question, it is necessary to address the genesis of the urban sitting room as a new articulation between intimacy and public representation. It is also relevant to study by which behaviours the event is distinguished from the everyday.

This article aims to analyse the evolution of âshurâ Shi’ite rituals in an Iranian village, in light of the socio-economic transformations of the last thirty years. Studying these rites as a fait social total, we show that they reflect many aspects of local life. Thus, the increasing dependence of the village on the urban regional centre, the reorganisation of the ties between neighbouring but antagonistic localities, the decreasing status of the great landowners and the increasing social homogenisation, the development of rural exodus and recent national history (the Iran-Iraq war, the establishment of the Islamic Republic and the development of religious reformism) – all have had an influence on the organisation of âshurâ ceremonies. The many functions of this ritual appear then more clearly, manifesting the manner of regional integration, reaffirming internal hierarchies and communal identity, and showing the ever-increasing dependence on the urban world.

This article presents a survey of Persian music known as ‘learned’ – or better yet, ‘literate’ – that is currently practised, but from a perspective acquired over the past three decades. e subject is approached here not from a ‘scientifically neutral’ point of view, but rather in a subjective and narrative manner, through anecdotes, observations, personal reflections and especially aesthetic judgements. These are based on the author’s familiarity with Persian musical culture and on the broad consensus that his analyses and his critical approach have received among the community of Iranian artists and amateurs. is point of view emphasises the ‘post-modern’ character of the contemporaneous musical culture, thus surpassing the ancient-modern dispute while at the same time acknowledging certain requirements for quality.

In this article, the author investigates, from an anthropological point of view, why many Iranian women (and even some men) resort to rhinoplasty – that is, surgery to alter the appearance of the nose – for cosmetic purposes. When did this phenomenon begin in Iran? Which social classes and ages are concerned? What is the relationship between this practice and Iranian society in general? Is it the result of foreign cultural influences? What comparisons can be made with other cultures? Born of a micro-sociological case, these interrogations address the anthropology of Iranian society, which, like many others, has been engaged for several decades in an ‘exchange process’ that today is commonly known as globalisation.

Afghan society represents a wide spectrum of tribal and ethnic groups with generally strong patriarchal norms. Given this patriarchal structure, coupled with the predominant tribal value system, the honour of a tribe is closely attributed to its women, and the protection of women by secluding them is thus a continued practice and norm. The division of public and private spheres is strictly adhered to as a means to maintain and preserve the honour of the family or tribe. The forced migration of Afghans has resulted in drastic changes in Afghan women’s lives and produced tensions in the tribal and social structure. Due to the absence of customary social support networks, material difficulties and cases of shattered families have become worse, and women’s mobility and freedom have been even further curtailed. At the same time, the refugee situation, extending over two decades, has brought about several changes in terms of attitudes towards health, hygiene, literacy, education, skill training and customs, due to the developmental work of various relief agencies.

Floor, Willem (2003), Agriculture in Qajar Iran (Washington, DC: Mage Publishers). 692 pp.

Scholz, Fred (2002), Nomadism and Colonialism: A Hundred Years of Baluchistan 1872–1972, trans. Hugh Van Skyhawk (Oxford: Oxford University Press). xviii–328 pages, bibliography, figures, index.

Tapper, Richard and McLachlan, Keith (2003) (eds.), Technology, Tradition and Survival: Aspects of Material Culture in the Middle East and Central Asia (London and Portland, OR: Frank Cass) (History and Society in the Islamic World Series). 256 pages, 49 pl. h.-t., illustrations, maps, index. Published with the assistance of the Islamic Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (ISESCO), the British Institute for Persian Studies (BIPS) and the Centre of Near and Middle Eastern Studies (CNMES) at the London School of Oriental and African Studies (SOAS).

BOOKS

Abdulmoati, Dr. Yousuf (2004), Kuwait in the Eyes of Others: Feathers and Characteris- tics of Kuwaiti’s Society before Oil (Kuwait: Centre for Research and Studies on Kuwait). 158 pages, black-and-white and colour pictures, index, Arabic and foreign references.

Al-Ayoub, Ayoub Hussein (2002), e Kuwaiti Heritage in the Paintings of Ayoub Hus- sein Al-Ayoub (Kuwait: Centre for Research and Studies on Kuwait). 622 pages, hard cover, mostly colour photographs of paintings with descriptions, index, introduction and preface.

Al-Hijji, Ya’qub Yusuf (2001), e Art of Dhow-building in Kuwait (Kuwait: Centre for Research and Studies on Kuwait, in association with e London Centre of Arab Studies). 164 pages, hard cover, drawings, colour and black-and-white pictures, Kuwaiti nautical glossary, bibliography and index.

Al-Hajji, Ya’qub Y. (2001), Old Kuwait: Memories in Photographs (Kuwait: Centre for Research and Studies on Kuwait). 255 pages, black-and-white pictures with descriptions in Arabic and English.

FILMS

Tehran Short Film Festival, 17–22 November 2004

CONFERENCES

‘Anthropological Perspectives on Iran: The New Millennium and Beyond’, 30 September–2 October 2004, Frankfurt, Germany

‘Gendering Urban Space in the Middle East, South Asia and Africa’ Workshop, 26–27 February 2005, Cairo, Egypt

‘Iran on the Move: Social Transformation in the Islamic Republic’, 27–28 April 2005, Leiden, Netherlands

Double Conference of the Commission on Urban Anthropology of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences (IUAES), 19–21 December 2005, Tehran, Iran