Artists and the Arab Uprisings

Artists and the Arab Uprisings
Author: Lowell H. Schwartz
Publisher: Rand Corporation
Total Pages: 101
Release: 2013-05-28
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0833080423

After decades of authoritarianism, a wave of political change and unrest began to sweep across the Middle East and North Africa in early 2011. Successful democratic transitions will not be easy and will require change in multiple spheres. This report focuses on one sphere whose power and importance is often underestimated: the artistic arena. Regional artists have the potential to positively contribute to democratic transition by shaping public debate in ways that support tolerance and nonviolence. But Arab artists are often squeezed between the bounds of acceptable discourse, set by rulers who fear freedom of expression and conservative societal groups that seek to control acceptable behavior. Although the Arab uprisings lifted some previous barriers to artistic expression, new limitations and challenges have emerged. Moreover, artists continue to lack sound funding models to support their work and face limited markets and distribution mechanisms. This research explores the challenges posed by both the state and society in the region, as well as the policy shifts that may be necessary to better support regional artists. It also suggests new strategies in which regional actors and nongovernmental organizations take leading roles in supporting these artists and their work.

Art and the Arab Spring

Art and the Arab Spring
Author: Siobhan Shilton
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 263
Release: 2021-07-08
Genre: History
ISBN: 1108842526

Examines art by over twenty-five artists to enable a greater understanding of the 'Arab Uprisings' and of the term 'revolution'.

Jordan and the Arab Uprisings

Jordan and the Arab Uprisings
Author: Curtis R. Ryan
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 292
Release: 2018-06-26
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231546564

In 2011, as the Arab uprisings spread across the Middle East, Jordan remained more stable than any of its neighbors. Despite strife at its borders and an influx of refugees connected to the Syrian civil war and the rise of ISIS, as well as its own version of the Arab Spring with protests and popular mobilization demanding change, Jordan managed to avoid political upheaval. How did the regime survive in the face of the pressures unleashed by the Arab uprisings? What does its resilience tell us about the prospects for reform or revolutionary change? In Jordan and the Arab Uprisings, Curtis R. Ryan explains how Jordan weathered the turmoil of the Arab Spring. Crossing divides between state and society, government and opposition, Ryan analyzes key features of Jordanian politics, including Islamist and leftist opposition parties, youth movements, and other forms of activism, as well as struggles over elections, reform, and identity. He details regime survival strategies, laying out how the monarchy has held out the possibility of reform while also seeking to coopt and contain its opponents. Ryan demonstrates how domestic politics were affected by both regional unrest and international support for the regime, and how regime survival and security concerns trumped hopes for greater change. While the Arab Spring may be over, Ryan shows that political activism in Jordan is not, and that struggles for reform and change will continue. Drawing on extensive fieldwork and interviews with a vast range of people, from grassroots activists to King Abdullah II, Jordan and the Arab Uprisings is a definitive analysis of Jordanian politics before, during, and beyond the Arab uprisings.

Artists and the Arab Uprisings

Artists and the Arab Uprisings
Author: Lowell H. Schwartz
Publisher: Rand Corporation
Total Pages: 117
Release: 2013-05-28
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0833080407

Regional artists can play a positive role in shaping public debate and supporting democratic transition in the Middle East. This report explores the challenges artists have faced since the Arab uprisings, U.S. government programs to support arts in the region, and the wide array of nongovernmental activities to engage Arab artists, offering recommendations to improve support for these artists.

Creative Resistance

Creative Resistance
Author: Sabine Damir-Geilsdor
Publisher: Transcript Verlag, Roswitha Gost, Sigrid Nokel u. Dr. Karin Werner
Total Pages: 200
Release: 2020-03
Genre:
ISBN: 9783837640694

During the uprisings of the Arab Spring, oppositional movements used political humor to criticize political leaders or to expose the absurdities of sociopolitical conditions. This comprehensive study of political humor in the uprisings explores the varieties and functions of humor as a creative tool for resistance.

After the Arab Uprisings

After the Arab Uprisings
Author: Shamiran Mako
Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Total Pages: 307
Release: 2021-07-22
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 1108429831

A holistic and cross-disciplinary approach to understanding why a regional democratic transition did not occur after the Arab Spring protests, this accessible study highlights the salience of regime type, civil society, women's mobilizations, and external intervention across seven countries for undergraduate and postgraduate students and scholars.

Islam and Popular Culture

Islam and Popular Culture
Author: Karin van Nieuwkerk
Publisher: University of Texas Press
Total Pages: 405
Release: 2016-04-12
Genre: Religion
ISBN: 1477309047

Popular culture serves as a fresh and revealing window on contemporary developments in the Muslim world because it is a site where many important and controversial issues are explored and debated. Aesthetic expression has become intertwined with politics and religion due to the uprisings of the “Arab Spring,” while, at the same time, Islamist authorities are showing increasingly accommodating and populist attitudes toward popular culture. Not simply a “westernizing” or “secularizing” force, as some have asserted, popular culture now plays a growing role in defining what it means to be Muslim. With well-structured chapters that explain key concepts clearly, Islam and Popular Culture addresses new trends and developments that merge popular arts and Islam. Its eighteen case studies by eminent scholars cover a wide range of topics, such as lifestyle, dress, revolutionary street theater, graffiti, popular music, poetry, television drama, visual culture, and dance throughout the Muslim world from Indonesia, Africa, and the Middle East to Europe. The first comprehensive overview of this important subject, Islam and Popular Culture offers essential new ways of understanding the diverse religious discourses and pious ethics expressed in popular art productions, the cultural politics of states and movements, and the global flows of popular culture in the Muslim world.

The Naked Blogger of Cairo

The Naked Blogger of Cairo
Author: Marwan M. Kraidy
Publisher: Harvard University Press
Total Pages: 304
Release: 2016-06-06
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 0674969502

A Times Higher Education Book of the Year Uprisings spread like wildfire across the Arab world from 2010 to 2012, fueled by a desire for popular sovereignty. In Tunisia, Egypt, Syria, and elsewhere, protesters flooded the streets and the media, voicing dissent through slogans, graffiti, puppetry, videos, and satire that called for the overthrow of dictators and the regimes that sustained them. Investigating what drives people to risk everything to express themselves in rebellious art, The Naked Blogger of Cairo uncovers the creative insurgency at the heart of the Arab uprisings. “A deep dive into the cultural politics of the Arab uprisings...Kraidy’s sharp insights and rich descriptions of a new Arab generation’s irrepressible creative urges will amply reward the effort. Reading Kraidy’s accounts of the politically charted cultural gambits of wired Arab youth rekindles some of the seemingly lost spirit of the early days of the Arab uprisings and offers hope for the future.” —Marc Lynch, Washington Post “The Naked Blogger of Cairo is a superb and important work not just for scholars but for anyone who cares about the relationships between art, the body, and revolution.” —Hans Rollman, PopMatters

Women Rising

Women Rising
Author: Rita Stephan
Publisher: NYU Press
Total Pages: 422
Release: 2020-06-09
Genre: Social Science
ISBN: 1479883034

Groundbreaking essays by female activists and scholars documenting women’s resistance before, during, and after the Arab Spring Images of women protesting in the Arab Spring, from Tahrir Square to the streets of Tunisia and Syria, have become emblematic of the political upheaval sweeping the Middle East and North Africa. In Women Rising, Rita Stephan and Mounira M. Charrad bring together a provocative group of scholars, activists, artists, and more, highlighting the first-hand experiences of these remarkable women. In this relevant and timely volume, Stephan and Charrad paint a picture of women’s political resistance in sixteen countries before, during, and since the Arab Spring protests first began in 2011. Contributors provide insight into a diverse range of perspectives across the entire movement, focusing on often-marginalized voices, including rural women, housewives, students, and artists. Women Rising offers an on-the-ground understanding of an important twenty-first century movement, telling the story of Arab women’s activism.

Voices of the Arab Spring

Voices of the Arab Spring
Author: Asaad Alsaleh
Publisher: Columbia University Press
Total Pages: 271
Release: 2015-03-03
Genre: Political Science
ISBN: 0231538588

Narrated by dozens of activists and everyday individuals, this book documents the unprecedented events that led to the collapse of dictatorial regimes in Tunisia, Egypt, Libya, and Yemen. Beginning in 2011, these stories offer unique access to the message that inspired citizens to act, their experiences during revolt, and the lessons they learned from some of the most dramatic changes and appalling events to occur in the history of the Arab world. The riveting, revealing, and sometimes heartbreaking stories in this volume also include voices from Syria. Featuring participants from a variety of social and educational backgrounds and political commitments, these personal stories of action represent the Arab Spring's united and broad social movements, collective identities, and youthful character. For years, the volume's participants lived under regimes that brutally suppressed free expression and protest. Their testimony speaks to the multifaceted emotional, psychological, and cultural factors that motivated citizens to join together to struggle against their oppressors.