Anthropology of the Middle East

In this issue of Anthropology of the Middle East, we present contributions that deal with museums, museology and their approaches to the new social situations through which they must navigate. Cutting a swathe very generously around the Mediterranean and the Middle East – from Tunis to Qatar, Turkey and, as an extension, to Austria – we bring together articles that look closely into some acute issues of today: the transformation from colonial to post-colonial and its reverberant impacts, from national to post-national and transnational societies both in Europe and the Middle East, and to the stringencies of material culture, cultural heritage and ‘meaningful objects’, and how to preserve, to analyse and to exhibit them. All contributors dedicate their works published here to the social, cultural and economic changes affecting societies and communities, and to the demands that increasing diversity presents as challenges to cultural institutions and their personnel.

This article presents an analysis of the evolution of ethnographic museums in Tunisia, tracing their development from the period of French colonial rule until the present. It documents and interprets the trajectory of museography in the country over nearly a century, demonstrating changes and continuities in role, setting and architecture across shifting ideological landscapes, from the colonial, to the postcolonial to the more recent revolutionary setting. It is argued that Tunisian ethnographic museums, both in their processes of conception behind the scenes and in their scenography itself, have been key sites in which to read debates about national identity. The article excavates the evolution of paradigms in which Tunisian popular identity has been expressed through the ethnographic museum, from the modernist notion of 'indigenous authenticity' to efforts at nation-building after independence, and more recent conceptions of cultural diversity. Based on a combination of archival research, participant observation and interviews with past and present protagonists in the Tunisian museum field, this research brings to light new material on an understudied area.

Heritage has a dual character whereby it can, at the same time, be celebrated for its outstanding universal value while having a special meaning and value for local and, in particular, bearer communities. Basing protection on the former notion of heritage as a universal, global value has been the dominant approach in international law-making since the second half of the twentieth century. More recently, the significance of heritage to local actors has become much better understood and recognised. The tensions associated with this duality have in recent times become evident with the adoption by UNESCO in 2003 of the International Convention for the Safeguarding of the Intangible Cultural Heritage. In this treaty, international cultural heritage law-making has shifted from a paradigm that gives value predominantly to the material heritage – monuments, sites, artefacts and other objects – to one that celebrates a living heritage that is primarily located in the skills, knowledge and know-how of contemporary human beings. This article examines the aforementioned shift from an emphasis on global to local heritage and the role museums can play in this with regard to safeguarding intangible aspects of heritage.

In the last decade or so, several projects to exhibit 'migration' were staged in Austria's capital, Vienna. They were undertaken in various contexts: in museums, as part of art shows and in art festivals. These efforts are taken under scrutiny by the author, regarding their production, their way of enabling participation and articulation, and the new perspectives they opened. It is argued that through efforts of formerly excluded groups a change came about in how the figure of the 'migrant', and the various processes of migration, are perceived.

Exhibitions ‘Tuzlu Su – Saltwater: A Theory of Thought Forms’: The 14th Edition of the Istanbul Biennial of Contemporary Arts, 5 September – 1 November 2015

Publications Ellen Amster (2013), Medicine and the Saints: Science, Islam, and the Colonial Encounter in Morocco, 1877–1956, Austin, TX: University of Texas Press. 334 pp. US$30.00, ISBN: 9780292762114.

Madawi Al-Rasheed (2013), A Most Masculine State: Gender, Politics, and Religion in Saudi Arabia. London: Cambridge University Press. 352 pages. $26.28. ISBN-10: 052112252X.

Films Iran Burger, by Mas’ud Ja’fari Jowzani (2015).

Music Cultural Representations of New Uzbeks: Society, Music, Media

Conferences Islamic Pasts: Research Workshop, 10–11 December 2014, Doha, Qatar

Ethnography of Iran: Past and Present, 2–3 October 2015, Princeton University