An anthropology of Muslims in Europe - A modest attempt by Martijn
On 17 December 2010 Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire; an act of protest that not only ignited the revolution in Tunisia but that also inspired other uprisings throughout the Middle East. On 18 December 2011 Vaclav Havel died. What Havel and Bouazizi have in common, nevermind the obvious differences, is that they ignited a revolution that emerged out of despair and humiliation.
How and when can people adapt their knowledge and imagination? This essay by anthropologist Samuli Schielke is about Egypt, revolution, Lenin, Tahrir, Islamists, poetry, choice and destiny.
Bahrain: An island kingdom in the Arabian Gulf where the Shia Muslim majority are ruled by a family from the Sunni minority. Where people fighting for democratic rights broke the barriers of fear, only to find themselves alone and crushed. An Al Jazeera documentary.
Zihni Özdil bekritiseert Turkse Nederlanders naar aanleiding van de recente rellen tussen Koerdische en Turkse Nederlanders. Turken in Nederland worden gediscrimineerd – zeker. Maar velen van hen doen niets om de vooroordelen weg te nemen, zo stelt hij in de Volkskrant in een reactie op een eerder stuk van Tuncay Cinibulak die deze jongeren vooral als slachtoffer van de autochtone Nederlanders zou zien.
After the violent clashes in Maspiro, Egypt, that left many Copts dead or injured, anthropologlist Samuli Schielke reflects on the current situation against the background of the Egyptian revolution as part of a tradition of revolutions.
On 13 September Lux and Soeterbeeck Programme (of the Radboud University Nijmegen, the Netherlands) organized a debate with Tarek Osman on the Arab Spring. During this debate Gert Borg reflected on the idea of an ‘Arab Spring’.
Tarek Osman is een Egyptische econoom en auteur van Egypte; een geschiedenis van Nasser tot aan Mubarak. In dit boek, dat verschijnt bij uitgeverij Bulaaq, beschrijft Osman de moderne ontwikkeling van het land Egypte. Dinsdag 13 september geeft hij een lezing in Nijmegen.
A weekly round up of writings on the Internet, some relevant for my research, some political, some funny but all of them interesting (Dutch/English). (As usual to a large extent based upon suggestions from Dutch, other European, American and Middle Eastern readers. Thank you all.) This week featuring politics of food, fasting and feasting.
In 1996, during the Algerian Civil War, seven monks of the Tibhrine monastery in Algeria (belonging to the Roman Catholic Trappist Order of Cistercians of the Strict Observance) were kidnapped. The film of Gods and Men is based on that event and follows the lives of French Catholic monks in the Atlas Mountains of Algeria in the 1990s. As the country is caught into a terrible civil war between an oppressive secularist state and radical Islamists, the Trappist monks face the question of how to ‘love thy neighbour’ even when he points a gun at you.
Filmmaker Arda Nederveen and anthropologist Marina de Regt have made a short documentary about Ethiopian and Somalian women who work as domestic workers in Yemen. Many families in economically developed countries make use of migrant women as domestic workers and cleaners. But even in a relatively poor country such as Yemen, migrants and refugee women do paid domestic work. The majority of these come from the Horn of Africa. Why do these young women come to Yemen and what are their living and working conditions? Instead of portraying the women as victims, the film gives them a face and lets them show their resilience.
