The Arab Spring for Women? Representations of Women in Middle East Politics in 2011

This article explores the complex, liminal, and difficult space in which stories of women in “the Arab Spring” were wielded as parts of political narratives of gender, race, class, religion, democracy, and Westernization in Western media as the Arab Spring unfolded. It examines those stories by using the tools of postcolonial feminism. After briefly describing what is meant by (gender and) the Arab Spring, the article outlines a method for evaluating the significations of the media narratives surrounding it. We find two dissonant narratives (of gender as emancipatory and of gender as problematic) and ask what assumptions about gender (and sex and race and culture) have to be made to produce these particular representations. We argue that the dissonant narratives have in common using the situation of women as a barometer for the success of Westernization, liberalization, and democratization. The article concludes by exploring the implications of these findings.     

Working on the Revolution in Bahrain: From the Mass Strike to Everyday Forms of Medical Provision

The 2011 Arab Spring uprising with the highest levels of popular support took place in Bahrain. This level of mobilization was due in part to the organizational capacity of trade unions and professional associations, and yet their role in the ‘near-revolution’ has received very little scholarly attention. In contrast to Egypt and Tunisia, where the official trade union federations played an ambiguous or even hostile role as workers began to organize strikes during the protests against Ben Ali and Mubarak, the official General Federation of Bahrain Trade Unions not only supported the protests against the Al Khalifa regime, but called for two general strikes. As significant as the strikes were, the work of unpaid volunteers constituted another less recognized, but equally important form of labor activism. Understanding the mass mobilization in Bahrain, and elsewhere, requires an encompassing approach to labor: one that can conceptualize equally the ability of collectivities to stop working, but also the ability to collectively continue to work, even on an unpaid basis. I will illustrate the contradictory role of the labor movement with examples from the Bahrain Teachers’ Association and the Bahrain Nursing Society. The majority of members of both associations were women. Finally, the Bahraini regime punished both forms of labor activism – both the teachers who went on strike, and the nurses who declared they would not strike but continue to work and care for the injured protesters.     

应以语用学理论指导新闻语言的教学与研究

语言是新闻传播的主要工具。新闻专业应重视新闻语言的教学与研究。新闻语言学属于应用语言学的范畴,应以语用学的理论来研究新闻语言。重视新闻语言的教学,有望提高新闻写作能力。     

Citizens' Perceptions of the Neighborhood Council

Abstract

The paper presents the findings of a study that explored an attempt to establish neighborhood councils in the Arab neighborhoods of Jerusalem. The Arab residents participating in the study recognized the importance of the neighborhood council, but expressed reservations about the extent to which the model is suited to a traditional society such as theirs. The obstacles encountered in the attempt to establish neighborhood councils derive from the residents' perception of themselves as being incapable of managing their lives autonomously. Moreover, the residents are resistant about having the neighborhood council model imposed on them by a foreign government, to which they have not given political legitimation. In this connection, it is particularly interesting to consider the responses and perceptions of Arab residents with higher education, who have expressed skepticism about the model and about the processes of participatory democracy that it represents. [Article copies available for a fee from The Haworth Document Delivery Service: 1-800-HAWORTH. E-mail     

Facebook Bras and #digitalharems: Fantasies of Mimesis and the Transgressions of Aliaa Elmahdy and Amina Sboui

Abstract

This article presents a horizontal reading of Aliaa Elmahdy's and Amina Sboui's corporeal interventions alongside the efficacy of digital platforms in order to consider how algorithmic and normative protocols related to content filtering on social media amplify certain forms of political communication while prohibiting others. I argue that readings of Elmahdy's and Sboui's bodily politics through the lens of liberal feminism rely on what I call discourses of mimetic networking, where particular mediated events become reterritorialized as part of an archival knowledge of ‘Arabness’. This is done through the organization of data via hashtagging and content moderation, and through rhetorics of techno-optimism that mirror ‘first contact’ narratives which gender, racialize, and flatten complex and fluid engagements with new media in non-US/European contexts. The article concludes with a consideration of how the persistence of their corporeality relays with both normative and programmatic parameters online to make alternative visions of communication possible.     

Multi-level governance and migration politics in the Arab world: the case of Syria’s displacement

ABSTRACT

In the context of Syria’s displacement, supranational ‘migration governors’ in the Arab region have sought – in different forms and capacities – to devise initiatives for responsibility sharing and to reinforce the capacity of Syria’s Arab neighbours to deal with refugee inflows. While the case of Syria’s displacement has witnessed the proliferation of collaborative networks, institutional complexity has yielded low effectiveness for the governance of such large-scale displacement in Syria’s neighbourhood. Supranational bodies have formulated dissonant frameworks and agendas. In the context of securitised responses to displacement, the discourse has not reflected the realities of refugee assistance and protection. Multi-level policy frameworks need to be embedded in the region’s geopolitical field of migration governance and refugee protection. While colliding policy arenas are to be grounded within the region’s historical trajectory of migration politics, an understanding of their effects requires gaining an insight into how they have interacted with the various refugee-hosting Arab states, influenced their refugee discourse, and impacted the issue of refugee assistance and protection on the ground.     

试论伊斯兰教在西夏的流传

西夏时期,境内活动有不少阿拉伯人,西夏和阿拉伯世界有正常的政治、经贸交往。阿拉伯人将伊斯兰教传入西夏,马可波罗所见西夏末期伊斯兰教的流传情况,正是最好的说明,只不过伊斯兰教在西夏的影响远远不及佛、道二教。     

Mohamed Bouazizis in the Arab World —— The Influence and Inspiration of the Youth in the Arab Upheaval

自2011年初阿拉伯剧变发生以来，关于此次剧变原因和影响的讨论莫衷一是，但不可否认的是，占人口多数、受过较高教育的青年一代在其中发挥了重要影响。该文聚焦于阿拉伯青年这一群体，分析其在此次剧变中的影响和作用。对高物价和高失业率等民生问题以及政治制度和现代化进程的不满、对新媒体的娴熟运用使阿拉伯青年成为了抗议民众中的主力。与此同时，这一群体也成为了剧变发生后影响阿拉伯国家政治、社会、经济改革和发展以及未来政局走向的重要因素、此次阿拉伯剧变中青年的角色行为对我国有一定的启示，可以从中吸取教训，未雨绸缪．     

新形势下中东热点问题与大国中东政策

中东局势依然紧张：伊拉克局势并未得到根本好转；巴以重启和谈，但和平基础非常脆弱；美国与伊朗对抗加剧；黎巴嫩局势不稳；库尔德工人党袭击土耳其；阿拉伯国家极力自保。因此，布什政府虽被迫调整了其中东政策，但拒不承认失败，欧俄等世界大国和大国集团也积极介入中东事务。     

Social resources and Arab women’s perinatal mental health: A systematic review

Background

Women’s mental health in the perinatal period is understudied worldwide and in Arab countries especially.