Category Archives: News & Current Events

• Pro-Democracy Movements in the Middle East, Archives, Culture, Egypt, Freedom of Speech. Arab Countries, Freedom of the Press. Arab Countries, Islam, News & Current Events, Primary Sources, Revolution in the Arab world, Revolution in the Middle East

Media of the Masses: Cassette Culture in Modern Egypt / Andrew (Andrew G.) Simon

“Media of the Masses” investigates the social life of an everyday technology—the cassette tape—to offer a multisensory history of modern Egypt. Over the 1970s and 1980s, cassettes became a ubiquitous presence in Egyptian homes and stores. Audiocassette technology gave an opening to ordinary individuals, from singers to smugglers, to challenge state-controlled Egyptian media. Enabling an unprecedented number of people to participate in the creation of culture and circulation of content, cassette players and tapes soon informed broader cultural, political, and economic developments and defined “modern” Egyptian households.

Drawing on a wide array of audio, visual, and textual sources that exist outside the Egyptian National Archives, Andrew Simon provides a new entry point into understanding everyday life and culture. Cassettes and cassette players, he demonstrates, did not simply join other twentieth century mass media, like records and radio; they were the media of the masses. Comprised of little more than magnetic reels in plastic cases, cassettes empowered cultural consumers to become cultural producers long before the advent of the Internet. Positioned at the productive crossroads of social history, cultural anthropology, and media and sound studies, “Media of the Masses” ultimately shows how the most ordinary things may yield the most surprising insights.

  • Andrew Simon received his Ph.D. in the field of Near Eastern studies from Cornell’s Graduate School in 2017. He is Lecturer and Research Associate in Middle Eastern Studies at Dartmouth College.
  • Publisher ‏ : ‎ Stanford University Press; 1st edition (April 19, 2022)
  • Language ‏ : ‎ English
  • Hardcover ‏ : ‎ 304 pages
  • ISBN-10 ‏ : ‎ 1503629430
  • ISBN-13 ‏ : ‎ 978-1503629431
Archives, Bibliography, Databases & Database Trials, Koran, News & Current Events, Primary Sources, Quran, Reference, Salafis, Salafists, Timbuktu

Timbuktu’s Manuscripts, Archives and Patrimony Under Threat

Citizens of Timbuktu, Mali’s historic city and the legendary UNESCO World Heritage Site, are rallying to protect ancient documents dating back to the Golden Age of the 12th and 15th centuries that officials fear may be looted or trafficked under the current occupation by Tuareg groups. United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organisation (UNESCO) Director-General Irina Bokova on Tuesday (April 17th) appealed to Mali’s neighbours to help prevent any looting or destruction of Timbuktu’s centuries-old cultural heritage:  “Reports about the rebel takeover of Timbuktu’s Ahmed Baba Institute of Higher Islamic Studies and Research (IHERI-AB) and other cultural institutions are cause for great alarm.”  “These centres contain ancient documents, written or copied locally, and others written in Morocco, Andalusia or some African countries, or sent to Timbuktu by pilgrims from distant Islamic lands hundreds of years ago,” Bokova added.  These documents, she said, date back to “Timbuktu’s golden period of glory between the 12th and 15th centuries” and cover subjects “from religious studies to mathematics, medicine, astronomy, and music”.

Moussa Ag Hamta, owner of a private library, told Magharebia that the concerns of the UNESCO Director-General were shared by the residents of Timbuktu who link their history to these historical centres.

“I’m proud of the documents I own because they contain many sciences,” he said. “However, the takeover of the city by the extremist Islamic groups has put an end to the arrival of European tourists and made me hide these documents lest I should be forced to destroy or turn them in to them.”  “They consider these documents to be a heresy and believe that preserving them is some sort of worship, which contradicts the Islamic Sharia in their opinion,” he concluded.

Local resident Ibrahim Ag Nita described the scene: “Two days ago, some Ansar al-Din and al-Qaeda elements entered the Documents Centre at Ahmed Baba Institute and told the attendees that the Islamic Sharia only approves of Islamic religious books because they help boost doctrine, and that books of other sciences, such as math, astronomy and other sciences, are not useful to Muslims and must be removed.”

“After that, they took away rubber bags containing some documents and went to an unknown place,” he said.

“People here fear a repetition of what the Taliban did when it destroyed some Buddha statues as idols worshipped by people,” he added. “This is the same view that these extremists have of human heritage, as they say that this entire heritage is nothing but a heresy that must be disposed of.”

Timbuktu has been a destination for cultural tourism in recent years, as it contains between 60,000 and 100,000 manuscripts. This is in addition to mosques and shrines of the kings of Sudanese empires that inhabited the Sahara and West Africa, together with buildings dating back to several centuries.

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Mali – Ancient Books Stolen – NYTimes.com

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Even people who have never heard of Mali have usually heard of Timbuktu, or at least have heard phrases like “from here to Timbuktu.” Founded between the 5th and 11th centuries by Tuareg desert nomads, Timbuktu became a meeting point between north, south and west Africa and a melting pot of black Africans, Berber, Arab and Tuareg desert nomads. The trade of gold, salt, ivory and books made it the richest region in west Africa and it attracted scholars, engineers and architects from around Africa, growing into a major centre of Islamic culture by the 14th century. Timbuktu is home to nearly 100,000 ancient manuscripts, some dating to the 12th century, written in Arabic or Africanized versions of the Arabic alphabets, and preserved in family homes and private libraries under the care of religious scholars. However, the city is poor now, and is at the center of attacks by Tuareg rebels and al-Qaeda linked jihadists, while Mali itself is being governed by the head of a botched military coup. It’s feared that the violence will lead to the destruction of the manuscripts and Timbuktu’s great earthen architectural wonders.

Source:AFP

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More about the Timbuktu manuscripts [with different figures: “700,000 medieval African documents”] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Timbuktu_Manuscripts

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The Tombouctou Manuscripts Project

The Tombouctou Manuscripts Project at the University of Cape Town (UCT) is dedicated to research various aspects of writing and reading the handwritten works of Timbuktu and beyond. Training young researchers is an integral part of its work.

Sauvegarde et Valorisation des Manuscrits pour la Défense de la Culture Islamique

NEWS:

– TF1 News (12 avril 2012) : http://lci.tf1.fr/filnews/monde/nord-mali-les-islamistes-controlent-le-plus-grand-centre-de-manuscrits-7129513.html

– Jeune Afrique (11 avril 2012) :http://www.jeuneafrique.com/Article/ARTJAWEB20120411115235/culture-rebelle-tombouctou-manuscritmali-d-importants-manuscrits-anciens-de-tombouctou-sauves-de-la-destruction.html

– Rue89 (Le Nouvel observateur) (10 avril 2012) http://www.rue89.com/2012/04/10/tombouctou-un-tresor-culturel-de-lhumanite-en-peril-231031

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Tuareg rebellion (2012) – Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Interest in ancient books could restore Timbuktu

http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/04/AR2010010403161.html?hpid=artslot

By Karin Brulliard
Washington Post Foreign Service
Tuesday, January 5, 2010; A07

TIMBUKTU, MALI — From a dented metal trunk, Abdoul Wahim Abdarahim Tahar pulled out something sure to make a preservationist’s heart race — or break: a leather-bound book written by hand in the 14th century, containing key verses of the prophet Muhammad, and crumbling at the edge of each yellowed page.

“Every time I touch it, it falls apart,” he said, paging through the book. “Little by little.”

But Tahar saw promise in the brittle volume — for himself, his family and this legendary but now tumbledown town. He is not the only one. A sort of ancient-book fever has gripped Timbuktu in recent years, and residents hope to lure the world to a place known as the end of the Earth by establishing libraries for visitors to see their centuries-old collections of manuscripts.

In a West African town where nomads and traders eke out livings, a revival of world attention to hundreds of thousands of privately held manuscripts — which survived fire, rain, sand and termites — represents an economic opportunity. But researchers and residents say the restoration of the books, most written in Arabic on fragile paper or lambskin, is also vital to showcasing Timbuktu’s — and, by extension, sub-Saharan Africa’s — more glorious past as a vibrant hub of scholarship.

—

[MORE] … http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/01/04/AR2010010403161.html?hpid=artslot

 

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On Apr 10, 2012, at 9:42 PM, “Jennifer Yanco” <1989.wara@gmail.com> wrote:

I am writing to alert you to the situation in Mali, which is increasingly volatile. The conflict has spread to Timbuktu, home of thousands of manuscripts documenting the rich heritage of West Africa through the ages.

I write as a member of the scholarly community, which is concerned for the safety of this cultural and intellectual heritage housed in the many libraries and private collections in Timbuktu. I know that this will be of concern to your institution. Our West African colleagues, Drs. Habib Sy and Ibrahima Lo prepared a petition, urging the parties to the conflict to be mindful of the value of the heritage in these manuscripts and to spare them. We were sent a copy of the petition and were able to make an online petition, which you can now find on the WARA website home page (www.bu.edu/wara) and at the link copied below.

We are pleased to be able to work in solidarity with our West African colleagues on this and hope that you will be able to post the link to the petition or otherwise pass it along to your colleagues. A major treasure of the world is at stake.

http://bit.ly/TIMBUKTU
thanking you in advance for joining this effort.

Jennifer

—

 

Jennifer J. Yanco, PhD

US Director

West African Research Association

232 Bay State Road

Boston, MA  02215

617-353-8902

www.bu.edu/wara

• Arab Awakening, Archives, Bibliography, eBooks, Freedom of the Press. Arab Countries, News & Current Events, Translated News from the Middle East

World Book and Copyright Day Celebrations in Arab Countries

23 April is a symbolic date for world literature, since 23 April 1616 was the date of death of Cervantes, Shakespeare and Inca Garcilaso de la Vega. 23 April is also the date of birth or death of other prominent authors such as Maurice Druon, K.Laxness, Vladimir Nabokov, Josep Pla and Manuel Mejía Vallejo.This year, Tunis lit the candle for UNESCO’s World Book Day.

The theme of this year’s book day is translation. Since 1979, UNESCO member states have logged more than 2 million translations in their translation index, which is available online.

Five days before the annual UNESCO-sponsored World Book and Copyright Day, hundreds of Tunisian readers took over iconic Habib Bourguiba Avenue with an event called “L’avenue taqra” or “The avenue reads.” Children and adults sat in cafes, on steps, and on the sidewalks to read a variety of books. As the day wore on, many held candles in order to continue reading into the night.

The invitation to the April 18th event in Tunis explained that everyone would bring their own books or magazines to cafés or other public places where they would sit and read silently together for an hour.”  Nas Décaméron, an artistic and literary group based at Ibn Khaldoun Cultural Centre in Tunis called for the initiative. It also organises a salon every week to discuss a world novel. The group’s Kamel Riyahi headed the “Read” initiative.  According to a 2010 Tunisian reading survey, more than 20% of respondents hadn’t read a book in their entire life and of those who did read, 60% read fewer than five books per year.

In Cairo, Shorouk Bookstores is offering the best WB & CD discount, at 20%, but other stores (BookSpot), chains (Alef), and government entities (GEBO) are also offering money-off deals. The Cervantes Institute in Dokki (Cairo) today offers readings of Cervantes’ “Don Quixote” in its original Spanish and in Arabic translation. The novel will be read continuously from noon until 7:45 pm.

In Sharjah or Dubai, the children’s reading festival opened today. Moroccans are going to read books before the parliament. The theme is: “Culture in the face of absurdity.” If you’re in Lebanon, Antoine Bookstore is having an exhibition of Spanish books and books about Spain in collaboration with Cervantes Institute in Downtown Beirut.

2003-2011, Iraq, Iraq War, News & Current Events, Reference

Iraq War: 2003-2011

U.S. Marks End to a Long War for an Uncertain Iraq

By TIM ARANGO; Reporting was contributed by Jack Healy, Michael S. Schmidt, Andrew E. Kramer, Duraid Adnan, Omar al-Jawoshy and an employee of  The New York Times.
2103 words
16 December 2011
NYTF
Late Edition – Final
1
English
Copyright 2011 The New York Times Company. All Rights Reserved.

BAGHDAD — At a crowded market in the city center here, the flotsam of the war is for sale. Ripped Fuel workout supplement. Ready-to-eat meals, macaroni and cheese ”Mexican style.” Pistol holsters. Nothing seems off limits to the merchants out for a quick dinar, not even a bottle of prescription pills from a pharmacy in Waco, Tex., probably tossed out by a departing soldier.

The concrete blast walls that shielded the shopping stalls have lately come down. Since then, three explosions have struck the market, killing several people.

”This will be an easy target for car bombs,” said Muhammad Ali, a merchant who lost two brothers during the cruelest times of the conflict. ”People will die here.”

After nearly nine years, about 4,500 American fatalities and $1 trillion, America’s war in Iraq is about to end. Officials marked the finish on Thursday with a modest ceremony at the airport days before the last troops take the southern highway to Kuwait, going out as they came in, to conclude the United States’ most ambitious and bloodiest military campaign since Vietnam.

For the United States, the war leaves an uncertain legacy as Americans weigh what may have been accomplished against the price paid, with so many dead and wounded. The Iraqi dictator, Saddam Hussein, was vanquished, but the failure to find illicit weapons undermined the original rationale, leaving a bitter taste as casualties mounted. The lengthy conflict and repeated deployments strained the country and its resources, raising questions about America’s willingness to undertake future wars on such a grand scale.

Iraqis will be left with a country that is not exactly at war, and not exactly at peace. It has improved in many ways since the 2007 troop ”surge,” but it is still a shattered country marred by violence and political dysfunction, a land defined on sectarian lines whose future, for better or worse, is now in the hands of its people. …

—[MORE] Leaving Iraq / The New York Times

SEE ALSO:

Multilateral and bilateral SOFAs — Provisions of Status of Forces Agreements — Security arrangements and SOFAs — Bilateral SOFAs : historical practice — Prospective SOFA with Iraq — Survey of the current Status of Forces Agreements.

The United States has been party to multilateral and bilateral agreements addressing the status of U.S. armed forces while present in a foreign country. These agreements, commonly referred to as Status of Forces Agreements (SOFAs), generally establish the framework under which U.S. military personnel operate in a foreign country, addressing how the domestic laws of the foreign jurisdiction shall be applied toward U.S. personnel while in that country. In light of the Declaration of Principles, signed by U.S. President George W. Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Kamel Al-Maliki on November 26, 2007, and the possibility that the United States will enter into a SOFA with the Government of Iraq, there is considerable interest in Congress in SOFAs, what they may cover, and how they have been concluded in the past. Formal requirements concerning form, content, length, or title of a SOFA do not exist. A SOFA may be written for a specific purpose or activity, or it may anticipate a longer-term relationship and provide for maximum flexibility and applicability. It is generally a stand-alone document concluded as an executive agreement. A SOFA may include many provisions, but the most common issue addressed is which country may exercise criminal jurisdiction over U.S. personnel. Other provisions that may be found in a SOFA include, but are not limited to, the wearing of uniforms, taxes and fees, carrying of weapons, use of radio frequencies, licenses, and customs regulations. SOFAs are often included, along with other types of military agreements, as part of a comprehensive security arrangement with a particular country. A SOFA itself does not constitute a security arrangement; rather, it establishes the rights and privileges of U.S. personnel present in a country in support of the larger security arrangement. SOFAs may be entered based on authority found in previous treaties and congressional actions or as sole executive agreements.

On November 26, 2007, President Bush and Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri al Maliki co-signed the Declaration of Principles for a Long-Term Relationship of Cooperation and Friendship Between the Republic of Iraq and the United States of America, which set out a number of issues concerning, among other things, a security agreement between the United States and Iraq. Since the announcement, the Administration has announced that there will be two agreements negotiated, a Status of Forces Agreement (SOFA) providing the legal basis between the two countries for the continued presence and operation of U.S. armed forces in Iraq once the U.N. Security Council mandate expires on December 31, 2008, and a Strategic Framework agreement (together with the SOFA, the Iraq Agreements or Agreements) to cover the overall bilateral relationship between the two countries. Several Members of Congress responded with demands that Congress be involved in creating the planned Agreements, from negotiation to implementation, and took action to ensure such involvement. Congress has proposed numerous pieces of legislation that would increase its role in creating these Agreements, from calling for executive-branch consultation and reporting to requiring formal congressional approval. It has also conducted multiple hearings that have concerned the proposed Agreements, receiving clarification on many important issues from Administration officials and experts. This has also equipped Congress with information pertinent to deciding what further action can be taken to involve Congress more in the agreement-making process. Several options remain available to Congress regarding the Iraq Agreements.

 

• Arab Awakening, • Pro-Democracy Movements in the Middle East, Arab Spring, Constituent Assembly - Tunisia, Elections in Tunisia, News & Current Events, Revolution in the Arab world, Revolution in the Middle East, Tunisia, Tunisian revolution

Tunisia Elects New Interim President

On Monday December 12, 2011, Tunisia’s new assembly elected a leading human rights activist as the country’s first democratically elected president. Moncef Marzouki became the country’s first interim president in the country that sparked the “Arab Spring” nearly one-year ago this week.

(Former doctor and human rights campaigner Moncef Marzouki waves to the media at the constituent assembly in Tunis December 12, 2011)

Marzouki, of the Congress for the Republic Party, won 153 out of 217 votes in the country’s new parliament, with three votes against, two abstentions and 44 blank ballots in protest.

The election of the interim president follows the weekend approval of temporary bylaws to guide the nation until the assembly finishes a constitution.

It also comes less than two months since elections and nearly one-year after Tunisians overthrew their longtime dictator Ben Ali – an uprising that sparked similar movements in other Arab states.

كلمة المرزوقي عقب أدائه اليمين