Rosie Bsheer

The production of history is premised on the selective erasure of certain pasts and the artifacts that stand witness to them. From the elision of archival documents to the demolition of sacred and secular spaces, each act of destruction is also an act of state building. Following the 1991 Gulf War, political elites in Saudi Arabia pursued these dual projects of historical commemoration and state formation with greater fervor to enforce their postwar vision for state, nation, and economy. Seeing Islamist movements as the leading threat to state power, they sought to de-center religion from educational, cultural, and spatial policies. With this book, Rosie Bsheer explores the increasing secularization of the postwar Saudi state and how it manifested in assembling a national archive and reordering urban space in Riyadh and Mecca. The elites' project was rife with ironies: in Riyadh, they employed world-renowned experts to fashion an imagined history, while at the same time in Mecca they were overseeing the obliteration of a thousand-year-old topography and its replacement with commercial megaprojects. Archive Wars shows how the Saudi state's response to the challenges of the Gulf War served to historicize a national space, territorialize a national history, and ultimately refract both through new modes of capital accumulation.

The Politics of History in Saudi Arabia

Archive Wars

John Warner

Theorizing the Arabian Peninsula

Ziad Abu-Rish

Bassam Haddad

The Dawn of the Arab Uprisings sheds light on the historical context and initial impact of the mass uprisings that have shaken the Arab world since December 2010. The volume documents the first nine months of the Arab uprisings and explains the backgrounds and trajectories of these popular movements and regime strategies to contain them. It provides critical analysis and at times first-hand accounts of events that have received little or superficial coverage in Western and Arab media alike. While the book focuses on those states that have been most affected by the uprisings, including Tunisia, Egypt, Bahrain, Libya, Yemen, and Syria, it also covers the impact on Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, Algeria, Palestine, Lebanon, and Iraq. As the initial phase of the uprisings subsides, counter-revolution sets in, and grand narratives crystallize, it is important to take note of the diversity of reactions that emanated from activists, scholars, and others as the uprisings were first unfolding. In this sense, the volume archives the realm of possibilities, both imaginative and practical, optimistic and pessimistic, that were opened up as people sought to make sense of the rapidly unfolding events.

End of an Old Order?

The Dawn of the Arab Uprisings

The Dawn of the Arab Uprising sheds light on the historical background and initial impact of the mass uprisings which have shaken the Arab world since December 2010. The book brings together the best writers from the online journal Jadaliyya, which has established itself as an unparalleled source of information and critical analysis on the Middle East. The authors, many of whom live in the countries affected, provide unique understanding and first-hand accounts of events that have received superficial and partial coverage in Western and Arab media alike. While the book focuses on those states that have been most affected by the uprisings it also covers the impact on Jordan, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Palestine, and Iraq. The Dawn of the Arab Uprising covers the full range of issues involved in these historic events, from political economy and the role of social media, to international politics, gender, labor, and the impact on culture, making this the ideal one-stop introduction to the events for the novice and specialist alike.

Rosie Bsheer

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