1.

Record Nr.

UNISA996247916503316

Autore

Shryock Andrew

Titolo

Nationalism and the Genealogical Imagination : Oral History and Textual Authority in Tribal Jordan / / Andrew Shryock

Pubbl/distr/stampa

Berkeley, California : , : University of California Press, , [1997]

©1997

ISBN

0-520-91638-7

0-585-12984-3

Edizione

[First edition.]

Descrizione fisica

1 online resource (376 p.) : 22 plates, 3 figs., 1 map

Collana

Comparative Studies on Muslim Societies Series ; ; Volume 23

Disciplina

956.95004927

Soggetti

Bedouins - Jordan

Bedouins - Jordan - Historiography

Oral tradition - Jordan

Jordan Genealogy

Lingua di pubblicazione

Inglese

Formato

Materiale a stampa

Livello bibliografico

Monografia

Note generali

Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph

Nota di bibliografia

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Nota di contenuto

Frontmatter -- Contents -- Illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- INTRODUCTION Ethnography as a Shared Labor of Objectification -- ONE. Writing Oral Histories -- ONE. Writing Oral Histories -- THREE. Remembering the Sword and Lance -- FOUR. Documentation and the War of Words -- FIVE. Border Crossings -- SIX. From Hearsay to Revelation -- SEVEN. Publication and the Redistribution of Power -- EIGHT. Popular Genealogical Nationalism -- APPENDIX A: Transliterations of cAbbadi and cAdwani Poems -- APPENDIX B: The Parliamentary Elections of 1989 -- Bibliography -- Index

Sommario/riassunto

This book explores the transition from oral to written history now taking place in tribal Jordan, a transition that reveals the many ways in which modernity, literate historicity, and national identity are developing in the contemporary Middle East. As traditional Bedouin storytellers and literate historians lead him through a world of hidden documents, contested photographs, and meticulously reconstructed pedigrees, Andrew Shryock describes how he becomes enmeshed in historical debates, ranging from the local to the national level.The world the Bedouin inhabit is rich in oral tradition and historical



argument, in subtle reflections on the nature of truth and its relationship to poetics, textuality, and power. Skillfully blending anthropology and history, Shryock discusses the substance of tribal history through the eyes of its creators—those who sustain an older tradition of authoritative oral history and those who have experimented with the first written accounts. His focus throughout is on the development of a "genealogical nationalism" as well as on the tensions that arise between tribe and state.Rich in both personal revelation and cultural implications, this book poses a provocative challenge to traditional assumptions about the way history is written.