Amro Ali, “On the Need to Shape the Arab Exile Body in Berlin” in Arab Berlin: Dynamics of Transformation, Eds. Hanan Badr and Nahed Samour (Berlin: Transcript Urban Studies, 2023)
Abstract: Berlin is increasingly emerging as a hub of Arab intellectual life in Europe. In this first study of Arab culture to zoom in on the thriving metropolis, the contributors shed light on the dynamics of transformation with Arabs as agents, subjects, and objects of change in the spheres of politics, society and history, gender, demographics and migration, media and culture, and education and research. The kaleidoscopic character of the collection, embracing academic articles, essays, interviews and photos, reflects critical encounters in Berlin. It brings together authors from inter- and multidisciplinary fields and backgrounds and invites the readers into a much-needed conversation on contemporary transformations.
Amro Ali, “Bringing Philosophy and Sociology to the Egyptian Public” in The Humanities in the 21st Century: Perspectives from the Arab World and Germany, Eds. Nuha Alshaar, Beate La Sala, Jenny Oesterle, Barbara Winckler (Berlin: Forum Transregionale Studien, 2022).
This book is open-access. The Arabic version can be accessed here. For more information on the project and conference, click here.
Chapter abstract: The chapter briefly examines the conditions and method of bringing sociological-philosophy to the Egyptian public, as well as the role of agency that engages audiences.
An enthusiastic Egyptian youth exited the closing of a lecture event in late November 2017 and rushed to a coffeehouse near Tahrir Square to meet up with his friends. He told them about this woman thinker called ‘Hannah Arendt’ who he just learned about and her peculiar idea of ‘new beginnings.’ Several nearby curious patrons overheard the chatter and enquired about the philosopher. The social circle widened, and the youth continued discussing the lecture that he had just attended. It would see some of the patrons coming to the next lecture session on Walter Benjamin’s loss of aura concept.
Book abstract: The role of the humanities, their standing in the academic field and their impact on society are questions of global relevance. Why is it important to study, teach and do research in the humanities? What role do the humanities play in the Arab world and Germany—both in the academic domain and the public sphere of ‘societies in change’? Which challenges and obstacles do scholars in the humanities face across the Arab world, especially in war or postwar situations, such as in Syria, Yemen or Iraq, and which research opportunities do the students and academics have? What could be done to strengthen the humanities in the Arab world, in Germany and on a global level? And what can we learn from each other’s experiences? These and other questions were raised and discussed at the international conference ‘The Place of Humanities in Research, Education and Society: An Arab-German Dialogue’, which was held in Berlin in November 2019, as part of the activities of the Arab-German Young Academy of Sciences and Humanities (AGYA). This collection of essays, titled ‘The Humanities in the 21st Century: Perspectives from the Arab World and Germany’, which was first published as a blog series, takes up key issues that were raised and discussed during our conference.
Book: Faith Travels by Streetcar (Ed. Dr. Stefan Maneval.) Chapter: “Salvaging Sacred Time: Approaching Islamic Ritual through Byung-Chul Han” (Amro Ali)
Chapter abstract: In “Salvaging Sacred Time” the Egyptian-Australian sociologist Amro Ali discusses the importance of religious rituals for the perception of time. He draws on the work of German-Korean philosopher Byung-Chul Han who identifies a “decay of time” following the Enlightenment. Ali contradicts this thesis insofar as he shows that Islamic rituals, such as the five daily prayers obligatory for devout Muslims and the pilgrimage to Mecca, still have a structuring, life-stabilizing effect, and furthermore create a sense of community and life-giving orientation.
Book Abstract How do faith, norms, and objects of daily use relate to each other? Does faith necessarily imply a limitation of freedom? How do members of religious and non-religious communities give visibility to their beliefs, and how are they perceived from the outside?
Both religious and secular normative practices which structure and regulate public and private life often involve objects of daily use. Focusing on the rules, convictions, and conventions of the monotheistic religions – Judaism, Islam, and Christianity – as well as on secular beliefs, Faith Travels by Streetcar combines photos of such objects and texts written by scholars of various disciplines: sociology, philosophy, Arabic, Islamic and Jewish studies, as well as Protestant Theology.
The objects included in Faith Travels by Streetcar relate to norms and rules surrounding food consumption, clothing and fashion, as well as education and play. While on the one hand showing that rules and norms which limit the freedom of the individual exist in all societies, the items displayed in this volume also highlight how these norms and rules are constantly contested and subjected to negotiation, dispute, and change. The permeability and fluidity between faith, norms, and deliberate limitations of one’s freedom for the sake of the common good or a belief is mirrored in the art installation by Tim Greaves, created for an exhibition curated by the editor, Dr. Stefan Maneval.
I have uploaded my book chapter on Mo Salah that came out this year with the University of California Press. Click here for the PDF
Amro Ali, “Mo Salah, a Moral Somebody?” in Global Middle East: Into the Twenty-First Century. ed. Asef Bayat and Linda Herrera (Oakland: University of California Press, 2021). 90-102.
Amro Ali, “Kinetic Karama: Bargaining for Dignity in the Pursuit of a New Arab Social Contract” in The Modern Arab State: A Decade of Uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa, Ed. Youssef Cherif, (Berlin: Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, 2021) pp. 41-67.PDF version
“Dreams of the detainee” (1961). Painting by Egyptian artist Inji Efflatoun. Courtesy of the Barjeel Art Foundation.
Summary: The protest cries of karama (dignity) in 2011 saw the emergence of a new subjectivity in the Arab world that birthed a new citizenship paradigm and elevated the citizenry as a compelling sovereign collective. Karama developed not only as a form of bottom-up universal humanism but also independently outside the confines of academia, religious-secular debates, and even human rights organizations. For many decades, karama had been reserved for the loftiness of the nation and liberation struggles, whereas karama for the individual meant a moral virtue that constituted an apolitical being. In 2011, however, the understanding of karama made a phenomenal leap from the moral into the political realm and thus became a political force in its own right. Karama developed into a self-contained movement, a philosophy that people yearned to develop, encapsulating a story that expands the moral imagination and asks its protagonists to imbibe the rhythm of life with a higher temporal calling. It is the citizen’s inherent worthiness and inalienable right to make the social contract.
Amro Ali, “Kinetic Karama: Bargaining for Dignity in the Pursuit of a New Arab Social Contract” in The Modern Arab State: A Decade of Uprisings in the Middle East and North Africa. Eds. Youssef Cherif (Berlin: Konrad Adenauer Stiftung, 2021).
My chapter contribution looks at the triumph of karama (dignity) over sharaf (honour) as a form of ethical logic since 2011 in the Arab world. The text engages with Friedrich Nietzsche, Erich Fromm, and Frantz Fanon in exploring the idea of individual dignity as a legitimizing narrative, in which karama was not reborn as a theoretical concept or an enhanced individual virtue, but a self-contained movement and a story that expands the moral imagination.
The edited book, Global Middle East: Into the Twenty-First Century, by Asef Bayat and Linda Herrera, is out now with the University of California Press. I have a chapter that explores the positioning of Mohammed Salah and moral codes within Egypt, the Middle East, and the world. I’m honoured to be with such a great lineup of names.
ABOUT THE BOOK
Localities, countries, and regions develop through complex interactions with others. This volume highlights the global interconnectedness of the Middle East—both ‘global-in’ and ‘global-out’. It delves into the region’s scientific, artistic, economic, political, religious, and intellectual formations and traces how they have taken shape through a dynamic set of encounters and exchanges.
Written in short and accessible essays by prominent experts on the region, the volume covers topics ranging from God to Rumi, food, film, fashion, and music, sports and science, to the flow of people, goods and ideas. It tackles social and political movements from human rights, Salafism and cosmopolitanism, to radicalism and revolutions. Students will glean new and innovative perspectives about the region using the insights of global studies.
TABLE OF CONTENTS
List of Illustrations
Preface
PART ONE: INTRODUCTION
Global Middle East – Asef Bayat and Linda Herrera
PART TWO – NATIONS WITHOUT BORDERS
God – Ebrahim Moosa
Algebra, Alchemy, Astronomy – Robert Morrison
Rumi, the Bridge Builder – Fatemeh Keshavarz
On Nations without Borders – Hamid Dabashi
PART THREE: HOME AND THE WORLD
Reflections on Exile – Edward Said
Mo Salah, a Moral Somebody? – Amro Ali
Gamal Abdel Nasser – Khaled Fahmy
PART FOUR: FOOD, FILM, FASHION, MUSIC
Circuits of Food and Cuisine – Sami Zubaida
Pictures in Motion – Kamran Rastegar
Musical Journeys – Michael Frishkopf
The Kufiya – Ted Swedenburg
PART FIVE – GEOPOLITICS OF GOODS
Water of Vulnerability – Jeannie Sowers
Cycle of Oil and Arms – Timothy Mitchell
Cotton, Made in Egypt – Ahmad Shokr
Ports of the Persian Gulf – Laleh Khalili
PART SIX: HUMAN FLOWS
Touring Exotic Lands – Waleed Hazbun
Outsiders of the Oil States – Ahmed Kanna
The Levant in Latin America – John Tofik Karam
PART SEVEN: POLITICS AND MOVEMENTS
Global Tahrir – Asef Bayat
Islamizing Radicalism – Olivier Roy
Global Movement for Palestine – Ilana Feldman
Human Rights, Indigenous and Imperial – Lori Allen
Cosmopolitan Middle East? An Interview with Seyla Benhabib – Linda Herrera
Amro Ali, “Saeeds of Revolution: De-mythologizing Khaled Said” in Mediating the Arab Uprisings. Eds. Bassam Haddad, Adel Iskander (Washington DC: Tadween Publishing, 2013).
Abstract: From “Facebook revolutions” to “Al Jazeera uprisings,” the outburst of popular activism across the Arab world has either been attributed to the media, drawn up by the media, observed through the media, or decontextualized by the media. Bloggers become icons, self-proclaimed experts becoming interpreters of unfolding events, stereotypes are cultivated, and autocratic regimes continue to subdue freedom of the press. The uprisings have become the most compelling media stories in recent memory. With much at stake, the burden of relaying human narratives accurately and responsibly is a burden on all journalistic establishments worldwide.
In a unique collection of essays that covers the expanse of the Arab popular protest movements, Mediating the Arab Uprisings leaves no stone unturned by offering spirited contributions that elucidate the remarkable variation and context behind the fourth estate’s engagement with these mass protests.
So while the public debate about the coverage of the Arab uprisings remain effervescent and polarizing, the essays in this volume go beyond the cursory discussion to historicize media practice, unsettle pre-existing suppositions about the uprisings, puncture the pomposity of self-righteous expertise on the region, and shatter the naiveté that underlies the reporting of the uprisings. The volume includes essays on the tribulations of covering Syria, the contextualization and demythologizing of Facebook activism, the New York Times’ reporting rituals on Palestine, the tumult of Egypt’s media post-Mubarak, the ominous omnipresence of perennial media darling Fouad Ajami, the faltering of Al Jazeera Arabic in the wake of the uprisings, the gendered sexuality of reporting Egypt, and journalism’s damning failure on Iraq. The first volume of its kind on this pressing topic, Mediating the Arab Uprisings is a primer for the curious reader, a pedagogical tool for media studies and communication, and a provocative collection for the seasoned scholar.
This initiative was supported by the Middle East Studies Program at George Mason University.
Amro Ali and Dina El-Sharnouby, “Distorting Digital Citizenship: Khaled Said, Facebook, and Egypt’s Streets” in Wired Citizenship: Youth Learning and Activism in the Middle East. Eds. Linda Herrera (London: Routledge, 2014).
