Tribes and Tribalism in the Modern Middle East
Tribes and Tribalism in the Modern Middle East
Dr Yoav Alon
Until recently, Middle Eastern tribalism was thought of as a dying phenomenon retreating before the sweeping forces of modernity. Conventional wisdom had it that the post-colonial nation-state erodes tribal forms of identity. Historians and socials scientists viewed citizenship, nationalism, religious beliefs and class identities as the main forms for social and political organization and subjected them to scholarly inquiry, downplaying the role of the tribes. Contrary to these predictions, however, tribal values and forms of organization have not only survived modernism and statehood but in some ways also enjoyed a revival. Tribes in Iraq, Jordan, Saudi Arabia, the Gulf states, Yemen and Libya became the sought after allies of the regimes. Following the regional turmoil commonly known as the Arab Spring, tribes play the role of critical powerbrokers and are in a position to shape the future direction of their countries.
The seminar offers a close analysis of the historical as well as current role of tribes and tribal values in the Middle East. It demonstrates the significance of this phenomenon as one of the main features of Middle Eastern politics, society and culture. After a short introduction that draws on the theoretical literature on tribes and state in the Middle East, the rest of the course is dedicated to examining particular case studies. The syllabus draws on cutting-edge scholarship in the disciplines of history, anthropology, sociology and political science. This literature will be supplied with a variety of primary sources. The course will also include several sessions dedicated to help the students improve their research and writing skills.
Course requirements: Students are expected to read the assigned material and come to class well prepared. At the end of the course they should submit a research paper (around 20-25 pages doubled spaced for seminar, 10-12 pages for students who take the course as an elective).
Grading: The paper constitutes 70% of the final grade. Informed participation in class discussions and one or two short written assignments make up 30%.
* Students are more than welcome to contact me. Please write to yalon@post.tau.ac.il An official office hour will be held on Sundays, between 1100-1200 (room 451, Gilman Building). To make an appointment for this time or others please email me.
Part One: By way of Introduction: General discussion, Definitions, Concepts, Theory
Week 1: Introduction and Preliminary Discussion
Week 2: Where It All Begins: Ibn Khaldun
Ibn Khaldun, The Muqaddimah: An introduction to History, translated from the Arabic by Franz Rosenthal (London: Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1958), pp. 91-122, 132-141.
Week 3: Anthropological Concepts of Tribes
Clifford Geertz, The Interpretations of Cultures (New York: Basic Books, 1973), chapter 1.
Dale F. Eickelman, The Middle East and Central Asia: An Anthropological Approach, 4th edn. (Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2004), pp. 19-20.
Eickelman, “What is a Tribe,” in idem, The Middle East.
Part Two: Historical Case Studies
Week 4: The Ottoman Period
Norman N. Lewis, Nomads and Settlers in Syria and Jordan, 1800-1980 (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1987), pp. 1-7, 12-15, 21-24.
Eugene Rogan, “Asiret Mektebi: Abdulhamid II’s School for Tribes (1892-1907),” International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 28 no. (1996), pp. 83-107.
H.B. Tristram, The Land of Israel: A Journal of travels in Palestine (London: Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, 1865).
Week 5: Western Perceptions of Arab Tribal Societies/The Arab Revolt
Film: Lawrence of Arabia (1962)
*Short written assignment based on the film and:
Joseph Kostiner, “The Hashemite ‘Tribal Confederacy’ of the Arab Revolt, 1916-1917,” in E. Ingram (ed.), National and International Politics in the Middle East: Essays in Honor of Elie Kedourie (London: Frank Cass, 1986), pp. 126-143.
Week 6: The Colonial State: French Syria, British Jordan
Philip S. Khoury, “The Tribal Shaykh, French Tribal Policy, and the Nationalist Movement in Syria between Two World Wars,” Middle East Studies, vol. 18 (April 1982), pp. 180-193.
Yoav Alon, “The Tribal System in Face of State Formation Process: Mandatory Transjordan, 1921-1946,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 37 no. 2 (May 2005), pp. 213-240.
Part Three: Tribalism Today
Week 7: The Bedouin in the Modern World - Are They Really Bedouin? Case studies from Egypt and the Negev
Lila Abu-Lughod, Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society, paperback edn. (Berkeley and Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1988), pp. 41-49, 70-77.
Emanuel Marx, “The Political Economy of Middle Eastern and North African Pastoral Nomads,” in Dawn Chatty (ed.) Nomadic Societies in the Middle East and North Africa: Entering the 21st Century (Leiden : Brill, 2006), pp. 79-97.
Week 8: Iraq’s Past, Present and Future
Toby Dodge, Inventing Iraq (NY: Columbia University Press, 2003), pp. 63-100.
Amatzia Baram. “Neo-Tribalism in Iraq: Saddam Hussein’s Tribal Policies, 1991-6,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 29 no. 1 (1997), pp. 1-31.
Week 9: Tribalism and Nationalism in Jordan
Linda Layne, “Tribesmen as Citizens: ‘Primordial Tie’ and Democracy in Rural Jordan,” in idem (ed.), Elections in the Middle East (Boulder and London: Westview Press, 1987), pp. 113, 118-122, 124-136.
Andrew Shryock and Sally Howell, “‘Ever a Guest in our House’: The Amir Abdullah, Shaykh Majid al-Adwan and the Practice of Jordanian House Politics, Remembered by Umm Sultan, the Widow of Majid,” International Journal of Middle East Studies, vol. 33 no. 2 (May 2001), pp. 247-269.
Yoav Alon, The Making of Jordan: Tribes, Colonialism and the Modern State (London: I.B. Tauris, 2007), pp. 148-158.
Week 10: (By Way of) Conclusion
Film – People of the Wind (1976) [Nomads in Iran]
