Download Anth 3707.10: Anthropology of the Middle East Fall 2015 Tu/Th 2:20

Anth 3707.10: Anthropology of the Middle East
Fall 2015
Tu/Th 2:20-3:35
Monroe Hall 352
Professor Randa Kayyali
Office: Building X (2112 G St NW), Room 101
Office phone: (202) 994-7728
Office Hours: Thursdays 12:20-2:20 or by appointment
Email: [email protected]
Course Description: This course will cover a number of important themes in the anthropology
of the Middle East, including media, religion, health, gender, sex and education. Throughout the
semester we will consider a variety of cultural forms and life experiences in the Middle East,
while examining the debates and challenges that anthropologists face when they study this region.
The course is not meant as a survey and will not address every aspect of the cultures of the
Middle East but is intended to sharpen your critical thinking skills and spark interest in new
topics.
Learning Goals:
• To recognize and analyze the richness and complexity of Middle Eastern societies.
• To recognize and identify key topics and questions in the anthropology of the Middle East
• To analyze and evaluate anthropological scholarship on the Middle East
• To apply skills in anthropological thinking in discussion, exams and essays
Course Prerequisite: This is an upper-level course and requires a familiarity with anthropology.
Students should have already taken Introduction to Sociocultural Anthropology (Anth2) or an
equivalent course. Students should also be prepared to keep up with the substantial reading load.
Required Texts: The following texts are available for purchase online in Nook and/or Kindle
versions (except for the Joyriding book) and are on reserve at the Gelman library:Sherine Hamdy, Our Bodies Belong to God: Organ Transplants, Islam, and the Struggle for
Human Dignity in Egypt (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012).
Fida Adely, Gendered Paradoxes: Educating Jordanian Women in Nation, Faith, and Progress
(Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2012).
Menoret, Pascal. Joyriding in Riyadh: Oil, Urbanism and Road Revolt (Cambridge University
Press, 2014).
Additional required readings are available through the library website if they are journals or
through electronic reserves at the library. You must download these readings and bring copies
(electronic or paper) to class.
Course Expectations: The success of the course – and your individual success in the class –
requires regular attendance, participation, and preparation. Students are expected to come to
class having done the assigned readings for the day and ready to actively engage in discussion
about those readings and their connection to the broader themes of the class. You should bring
your copy of the day’s readings to each class.
Course Requirements
Attendance: My expectation is that you will attend EVERY class and be on time. I count
attendance at the start of class because your presence is crucial to your learning and to the overall
class dynamic. Nonetheless, even though class attendance is important, I recognize that life
sometimes intervenes. You may get sick or have an unavoidable conflict. In recognition of this,
and so I do not have to be a position of adjudicating the validity of reasons for missing class, you
can miss up to three sessions without penalty. If you are facing a situation that will cause you to
miss more than three sessions over the semester, please arrange a meeting with me to discuss it.
Participation: In order to foster critical learning on this topic, we will have small group
exercises, class discussions and maybe an occasional quiz – all of which will factor into the
participation grade. For the midterm exam, you will be responsible for the information presented
in the readings and in class, whether through lecture, discussion, presentation, or film.
Electronics policy: While you may bring a laptop or tablet for note-taking and readings, I expect
that you will not be checking Facebook or engaging in any other non-class related electronic
activity, including texting, during class. Infractions will affect your participation grade.
8 Blackboard Postings: Over the course of the semester, everyone is required to post – through
Blackboard – eight 200-word reflections on the readings. These are not formal papers, but rather
are an opportunity for you to react to and reflect on the readings for the week prior to class
discussions. The first posting is due (for everybody) on September 8. For the remaining 7
postings you have choices about when to post but all should be done before the midterm.
These reflections should be posted by 9:00 am the day of class and should reflect the full length
of the assigned reading for that day. Postings cannot be submitted after the fact. Late postings
will not be counted because everyone needs to be able to read through the postings before
coming to class. Raise questions the readings posed for you, think about how they relate to other
things we have read, consider how they fit into the course as a whole. These postings will help
jumpstart our discussions, so please be prepared to talk about your posting in class.
1 Book Review
This paper will require you to engage with one of the ethnographies we have read in class
(Hamdy, Adely or Menoret). You will receive an assignment sheet with further details and
instructions. This paper is due on December 3 on Blackboard. Late papers will be docked onethird of a grade for each day they are late and no paper will be accepted one week after the
deadline (i.e. December 10).
Midterm
There will be an in-class mid-term on October 20. Tests must be taken at their scheduled times.
In the case of a documented emergency that makes it impossible to sit for the exam as scheduled,
students will take a makeup exam in an alternative format. The midterm will consist of shorter
questions on parts one and two of the syllabus and will be conducted on paper and will include
map and definition identifiers as well as short answers and essays.
Final Paper
Throughout the semester I would like each of you to be researching a topic that interests you in
the field of Anthropology of the Middle East. This will culminate in a research paper of 8-10
pages and will require you to engage with at least one reading from class plus 5-10 academic
sources from outside the class – including at least 3 academic journal articles. You will receive
an assignment sheet with further details and instructions. I can meet with you to help hone a
topic of interest and a research question. This paper is due on December 10.
Academic Integrity Code: All work must be completed in accordance with The George
Washington University Code of Academic Integrity. I will pass all written assignments through
plagiarism detecting software called SafeAssign and report all infractions to the department and
Dean. To make sure that you follow the university’s Code of Academic Integrity be sure to 1)
clearly identify quotes with quotation marks and fully cite references, 2) note and properly cite
the source of ideas not your own, and 3) represent your own work in your writing. For the midterm exam this means, among other things, 1) no use of materials not explicitly permitted to take
the test, 2) no looking at your classmates’ work, and 3) no cheatsheets. For further details about
the university’s academic integrity policy, see http://www.gwu.edu/~ntegrity/code.html
Disability Support: Any student who may need an accommodation based on the potential
impact of a disability should contact the Disability Support Services office at (202) 994-8250 in
Rome Hall, Suite 102, to establish eligibility and to coordinate reasonable accommodations. For
additional information please refer to http://gwired.gwu.edu/dss/
Emergencies: In case of emergencies, we will follow the Office of Emergency Management,
advisories, viewable at http://campusadvisories.gwu.edu/
Writing Center: If you need help with writing papers or research projects, or with help with
how to phrase your ideas in preparation for the midterm, it is free and wise to make an
appointment with the Writing Center: http://www.gwu.edu/~gwriter/About.html
You are responsible for the assignments and deadlines that are detailed in this syllabus as well
as for any changes that may be announced in class or via Blackboard. Please be sure to check
your GW email for updates and changes.
Grading
Attendance: 10%
Participation: 10%
Postings: 20%
Mid-term exam: 20%
Book Review: 15%
Final paper: 25%
Grading Rubric
A grades are in the 90s (A+ reserved for 98 and above, A for 94-97, A- for 90-93),
B grades are in the 80s (B+ for 87-89, B for 84-86, and B- for 80-83),
C grades are in the 70s (C+ for 77-79, C for 74-76, and C- for 70-73),
D grades are in the 60s (D+ for 67-79, D for 64-66, and D- for 60-63), and
F is below 60
CLASS SCHEDULE
PART ONE: ORIENTATIONS AND THEMES IN ANTHROPOLOGY
Introduction to the Anthropology Middle East
September 1: Introductions & revision of the syllabus - no reading assigned
Stereotypes and Challenges of Studying Arabs and Muslims
September 3: TV/Media coverage
Alsultany, Evelyn. “Challenging the Terrorist Stereotype” in Arabs and Muslims in the
Media: Race and Representation after 9/11. (New York: New York University Press,
2012), pp. 18-38 [a PDF will be provided on Blackboard]
In-class film: Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood vilifies a people (50 mins)
September 8: Gender and military intervention
Lila Abu-Lughod, “Do Muslim Women Really Need Saving? Anthropological
Reflections on Cultural Relativism and Its Others,” American Anthropologist 104, 3
(2002): 783-790
[Available through the library website, under journals, type in the title of the journal]
*First Blackboard Posting Due
Themes in Middle East Anthropology
September 10: The Critical Turn
Lara Deeb and Jessica Winegar, “Anthropologies of Arab-Majority Societies,” Annual
Review of Anthropology Vol. 41 (2012): 537-558.
[Available through the library website, under journals, type in the title of the journal
(Annual Review of Anthropology), and then click on the “Annual Reviews” database, and
then find the volume of the journal (41), scroll down to the “International Anthropology
and Regional Studies” bar and you will be able to download the PDF of this article.]
Concepts of home and geography
September 15: The meaning of “home” (journalist account) *note three readings for this day
Shadid, Anthony. “Family Trees” and “Introduction: Bayt” in House of Stone, Houghton
Mifflin Harcourt Publishing New York, 2013. Pp. xiii-13 [PDF provided]
“Mapping the Arab World.” In The Economist
http://www.economist.com/blogs/dailychart/2011/02/arab_league_map
Wikipedia. Mashriq, Maghreb, and al-Khaleej (be able to identify each region)
September 17: Minorities and Belonging
Storm, Lise. 2008. “Ethno-national minorities in the Middle East: Berbers, Kurds, and
Palestinians,” in A Companion to the History of the Middle East. Choueiri, Y. (ed).
pp. 462-485 [PDF provided]
PART TWO: POLITICAL, SOCIAL, AND SPATIAL FORMS
Nation and State
September 22: Nation and State/Turkey
Esra Ozuryek, “Miniaturizing Atatürk: Privatization of state imagery and ideology in
Turkey” American Ethnologist 31, 3 (2004): 374-391
September 24: Nation and State/Egypt
Lila Abu-Lughod, “Ethnography of a Nation,” and “The Ambivalence of Authenticity:
National Culture in a Global World,” in Dramas of Nationhood: The Politics of
Television in Egypt (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2005). Pp. 3-27, 135-161 (2
chapters)
Mobility, Movement and Residency
September 29: Exits & returns; Nomadic life
Donald Cole “Where Have the Bedouin Gone?” Anthropological Quarterly 76, 2 (2003):
235-67
The Bedouin Way blog: http://www.thebedouinway.com/bedouin-blog/
October 1: Cities & refugee camps; Urban life
Janet Abu-Lughod, “The Islamic City – Historic Myth, Islamic Essence and
Contemporary Relevance,” International Journal of Middle Eastern Studies 19, 2,
(1987): 155-176
Michel Agier, “Between War and City: Toward an Urban Anthropology of Refugee
Camps,” Ethnography 3, 3 (2002): 317-341
On the Anthropology of Islam
October 8: Colonialism and Anthropology of Islam
Talal Asad, “Afterword: From the History of Colonial Anthropology to the Anthropology
of Western Hegemony” In Colonial Situations: Essays on the Contextualization of
Ethnographic Knowledge, George W. Stocking, ed., 1994 (Madison: University of
Wisconsin Press, pp. 314-324
October 13: Revising the anthropology of Islam
Samuli Schielke, “Second Thoughts about the Anthropology of Islam, or how to make
Sense of Grand Schemes in Everyday Life.” ZMO working papers, Vol. 2 (2010).
Available online at http://www.samuli-schielke.de/research.htm#4
October 15: Islam in the U. S. & Review class
Zareena Grewal, “Muslim Reformers and the American Media” in Islam is a Foreign
Country: American Muslims and Global Crisis of Authority (New York University Press,
2014), pp. 292-345
Alternative: Saba Mahmood. “Religious Freedom, the Minority Question, and Geopolitics in the
Middle East” Comparative Studies in Society and History Vol. 15 no. 2 (2012): 418-446
October 20: Midterm exam (in class)
PART THREE: ETHNOGRAPHIES
Practice and Ethics of Fieldwork (the readings for this section may change)
October 22: Challenges of fieldwork in the Middle East
Anita Fabos “Ethical Dilemmas of Research Among Sudanese in Egypt: Producing
Knowledge About the Public and Private” in Between Field and Text: Emerging Voices
in Egyptian Social Science, ed. Seteney Shami and Linda Herrera, pp. 98-118 (Cairo:
American University in Cairo Press, 1999).
October 27: Palestine Ethnography
Ted Swedenburg, “Occupational Hazards: Palestine Ethnography” Cultural Anthropology
Vol. 4 No. 3 (August 1989): 265-272
October 29: Tourism
Glenn Bowman “Fucking Tourists: Sexual relations and tourism in Jerusalem’s Old City”
Critique of Anthropology, Vol. 9 (October 1989): 77-93
Sherene Hamdy, Our Bodies Belong to God
November 3: Introduction, Chapters 1, and 2
November 5: Chapters 3, 4, and 5
In-class film: The Square
November 10: Chapter 6, 7 and Conclusion
Fida Adely, Gendered Paradoxes
November 12: Introduction, Chapters 1 and 2
November 17: Chapters 3, 4, and 5
In class film: A Veiled Revolution
November 19: Chapters 6 and 7
In class film: Caramel
November 24: I will be at the Middle East Studies Association conference – no class
Reading Assignment: Pascal Menoret, Joyriding in Riyadh, Chapters 1 and 2
November 26: Thanksgiving – no class
Pascal Menoret, Joyriding in Riyadh
December 1: Chapters 3 and 4
December 3: Chapters 5, 6 and Epilogue
*Book review due, on Blackboard
December 8 (designated Thursday): Wrap up and class discussion
December 10: Final Paper due!