Islam and Modernity: Are they Compatible?

In the book titled “Modernity, Islam and Secularism in Turkey”, Alev Cinar discussed how modernity is always studied or analyzed in a western way. “They analyzed trends, institutions, which are characteristics of Modernity in Europe” (p.3).  Cinar sees this as an inaccurate way of analyzing the modernity in the non-western countries, especially the Muslim countries (not Islamic states but countries with the population are a majority of Muslims). This is because modernity in Islamic countries is influenced by the Islamic cultures, teachings and norms. However, Cinar argued that there are aspects in analyzing modernity that is similar to the European way. Such as that “all modernization projects involve the creation of a particular sense of nationhood and the construction of the specific national identity”. The National Identity is a main factor to how one may see how modernize a country is. Cinar also emphasized that even though the Islam and Western ideologies are different in many ways, not all Islamic ideologies are anti-western. In Turkish, the word modern came to be used synonymously with secular and was evoked to indicate political alliance against Islamism. Ataturk, became the symbol of secularism as he was ‘the father of modern turkey’. Turkish Modernity has been built upon such narratives of self-defamation, be it produced by the westernist urban elites of the late 19^th century.

In the book “Arabic Thought in the Liberal Age 1798-1989”, Albert Hourani also discussed about Modernity but in Arabic countries. Although he mainly focused on Islamic scholars Jamil Al-Din Al-Afghani, Rida Rashid and Muhammad Abduh, through them he talked about Islamic modernization in countries such as Egypt and Iran. Al-Afghani for instance, who travelled throughout the Middle East, sharing his values and ideologies about Islam. Al-Afghani taught about, “The danger of European Intervention, the need for National Unity to resist it, the need for a broader unity for the Islamic peoples, (and) the need for a constitution to limit the ruler’s powers”(p.109). Relating back to Cinar’s argument about European influence to people’s way of analyzing modernity in Islamic countries, one can connect how the European intervention is a threat to Muslim’s society’s process in modernizing. Modernization in Islamic countries takes a fairly different path compared to the western way, and others have to realize it in order to see that modernization is actually happening. If European intervention is seen as the right way to modernize in Islamic countries, then nationhood would decrease from that country, as its religious and cultural norms will slowly fade.

Muhammad Abduh also has similar principles as Al-Afghani. He believed that the best way for a Muslim country to modernize is by going back to the 1^st principles of Islam, back to the “Golden Age”, and using those principles to develop a modern life. To him, Islam is a middle path between science, reasons, morality, or faith. Islamic principles from the early days, are not against reason, in fact they are compatible with each other. Just the facts that good are rewarded and bad are punished, is a logical law, similar to laws we have today made by society that also brings secular principles. My point is, both Cinar and Hourani would argue that Islam and modernization are interconnected with each other. Not everything in the Islamic principle is against the Western or shall we say the secular principles.


Rossa D.

Identities in Turkey

The book, Modernity, Islam, and Secularism in Turkey, By Alev Cinar outlines the different identities of modern day Turkey. On one hand, political Islamists relating their identity to the Ottoman Empire, and on the other, secularists constructing their own in 1923 when the republic of turkey came into being. Both groups constructed their own realities causing contentions in issues like; headscarf, public space, and even history.

Although the points of confrontation lead to the formation of new positive elements, the differences in their views led to conflicts and divisions within Turkey itself. Both identities represented themselves as modern rejecting the modernization of the other identity; the Secularists viewed Islamists to remain backward, while the Islamists viewed the Secularists to be corrupt.

An important question about Islam and modernization has been questioned frequently. While the author of the book argues that since they were able to change the public sphere, modernization is adequate, the Secularists would argue that the Islamist/Ottoman Identity regarding change was based on backward ideologies and therefore their modernization is irrelevant.

According to the author’s definition of modernization, both identities were successful in changing the public sphere. For instance, the controversy regarding the headscarf, when the republic of turkey came to existence, the leader Mustafa Kamal AtaTurk, banished many taken for granted ideologies including wearing the headscarf in public. In his point of view, the headscarf was promoting backwardness rather than modernization and therefore banned wearing it in public places. On the other hand, during the 1980s, the Islamists promoted the headscarf as a symbol of decency and tradition rather than backwardness. Moreover, while the Islamists did not like the way people viewed the headscarf and tried to change it fashionably, the Secularist saw it as a way to put Islam into context with modernization.

 Likewise, the conflict was not restricted to social ideologies but extended to ideologies concerning the appropriateness of public entertainment. The Islamists took charge of the entertainment sector and influenced its theatre greatly; they were able to blend in several customs (the secularists Jazz band and the traditional music of Turkey of the Ottoman Empire) to create traditional music that can relate well to their Ottoman context and to the Turks in general. However, the Secularists disapproved their decision and thought it represented backwardness rather than modernization.

            In my Colonialism, National, and Identity class, I had the privilege to listen to a Turkish speaker talking about her Turkish identity and what it means to be Turkish. In her speech, it was clear that she was one of the Secularists because she did not only exclude the Islamists Ottomanists’ point of view, but incorporated a history well before their existence. In regard to the book we read for this class, the author of the book includes that in order for a successful nationalist project to succeed, its history must not date back further than where their history started. And this was clearly evident in her speech where according to her the Garden of Eden was in Turkey.

-OMG

Post-Ottoman Modernity

The question of modernization within the context of an Islamic society dates back to the 17^th century.  At its height, the Ottoman Empire represented one of the most powerful political entities in world history.  Stretching from the Maghreb to the Caspian and from Hungry to Yemen, the Ottoman Empire dominated a territorially vast and diverse domain.  Especially after its conquest of Constantinople and the Balkans, the casual observer would have considered the Ottomans one of the world’s superpowers. Yet, all of this soon changed.  The small Christian kingdoms that at one time were frightened of Ottoman influenced soon eclipsed the Turks.  How did the powerful Ottoman Empire fall behind to less significant states such as Britain or France?  The answer was the European countries ability to modernize/industrialize.  The discourse on modernity in the former Ottoman Empire bears ways in which Islam can co-exist with the modern world. 

            Turkey, the direct descendant of the Ottoman Empire, occupies a unique position geographically, politically, and intellectually within the context of Islam and modernity.  Like the ideas of the Enlightenment within the context of the foundation of the United States, the foundation of Turkey was marked by ideas of modernity.  To Ataturk, the founder of modern Turkey, the Ottoman Empire collapsed because it did not modernize (or more accurately modernize quick enough).  Ataturk set out to create a modern and secularized Turkish society from the top-down.  In creating a secularized society, Ataturk attempted to relegate Islam to the private sphere.  Islamic laws and/or traditions were attributed as Turkish (fitting within a strict concept of nationalism), changed, or discouraged.  An backlash against Ataturk’s modernization reforms occurred later in the 20^th century with the rise of Islamism.  Despite the negative connotations that political Islam was within western discourse, the Islamists are also seen as modernizing agents by historians such as Alev Cinar.  In the context of Cinar’s definition of modernity, both Ataturk and Islamism represent modernizing agents.  For Cinar, modernity is defined as a need for progress and change for a better future.  This is triggered by something wrong with the present.  The heirs of Ataturk and Islamists agree that something is wrong with their present society (although they certainly would disagree on what).  The major difference is the new society they are hoping to achieve.  Turkish Islamists are certainly no less modern then their secularist counterparts.  Here is Islam and modernity cooperating together.  On face value, it is different than the more secular modernity usually attributed to the West (and Ataturk).  But, it is modernity nonetheless.  

            At its height, the Ottoman Empire united almost all of what is considered today as the Middle East.  As Ottoman/Islamic unity would not last forever, other modernists such as al-Afghani used this unity as symbolism for the decay of the Islamic civilization.  Al-Afghani advocated the unity of the Islamic world and a return to the “true” Islam which he saw as equivalent to true reason.  Despite advocating a return to an older Islam, it would be incorrect to lump al-Afghani with fundamentalism or term him as a reactionary.  Al-Afghani was concerned with the decay of Islamic society in the political, technological, and moral spheres.  Using Cinar’s previous definition of modernity, al-Afghani was trying to progress society (Islamic) towards a better future.  Al-Afghani is a modernist who looks greatly different from the Turkish modernists (even among many Islamists).  If anything, al-Afghani shows a compatibility with Islam and modernity in a completely different fashion. 

BDF

Colonizing Egypt 1

Colonizing Egypt begins by describing the first interactions of Europeans with the Egyptians. Even though the first encounters of Europeans and the outside world were encounters through exhibitions, it never the less gave them a sense of the “other” despite it not being the real thing. The Egyptians, when first learnt about these exhibitions, were furious; not only were the exhibitions degrading, but also because they portrayed Egyptians and Egypt as pieces of objects.  However, The exhibitions give us an idea of how Europeans saw the Egyptians.

When Europeans began infiltrating into Egypt they described it as chaotic.  Egypt for them seemed out of the ordinary as if it were a carnival or huge market place.  Because Egypt had come under the control of the British, they saw it necessary to change and modernize them. Unlike other colonies, Egypt was not only exploited for its resources, but people too. The British had wanted to govern them properly but could not do so with the chaos at hand. The formations of a new army, the creation of a new housing system and the allocation of new schools and agricultural system helped the British colonize Egyptians effectively.

 During the process of colonization, Egyptians were given the impression that the process of modernizing Egypt were changes that were for there own social good. However, its clear that the dramatic transformation that took place in the 1830’s were unbearable for the Egyptians. For instance, Restrictions had been put on there freedom of movement. Consequently, those who wanted to travel had to get permission. These transformations were not for their own sake, but for the sake of Britain to force them into a capitalist system. Furthermore, the transformation was aimed at disciplining and coordinating Egyptian society.  According to Foucault this was not to expand Egyptian society, but to infiltrate re-order and colonize. Because Europeans, as explained in chapter one, thought of Egyptians as a chaotic people, these new laws and structures sought in one way or another to modernize them according European style.

For instance, the new army that was formed created a community of them where they would be together during times of peace and war. This community of soldiers even over looked the production industry. While the new army did not resemble anything of that of Europeans, it was the beginning stages for order and a way to start controlling the Egyptian people.

         The British also colonized the Egyptians by introducing to them a new housing model. This model sought to put a population depending on their class. In a capitalist society there are the middle class the rich and the poor. The construction and the allocation of people to their house was a way to categorize people to a specific group. The model housing was also used for the purpose of bringing order. It divided up the people and contained them in their social ranking, but its main purpose was to introduce the people to the system of capitalism

-OMG

Mass Deception

We now depend on the media for entertainment. Whether we get that entertainment on television, the radio, or even from the Internet, they are all the same product disguised differently. The Culture Industry: Enlightenment as Mass Deception by Theodor Adorno and Max Horkheimer describe what entertainment has become.  In summary, they argue that the world is given the illusion of free decisions and choices, but in reality they do not.  It is unfortunate that it took a reading to force me to think outside the box to see the illusion I have been in. It not only made me realize how much influence these products have on us, but how these elites are gaining profit from this.

 Art is usually referred to as a product thats main purpose is to show the expression of an artist. Art comes in many forms such as music, paintings, photography and even film. While it is difficult to find true forms of art, it still exists. Nevertheless, it is still hard to find a film and categorize it as art. as Adorno and Horkheimer point out: films success these days are not measured on an artist’s expressions , but on how much technology was used to produce that movie, how many stars actresses there are, and by the amount of modern products used.

 People do not watch the movie as a form of art anymore, but for leisure time. When comparing the many films, it is hard to distinguish between them as they are aimed at either making the audience feel better, or make the audience want to be associated with that film. It no longer becomes the artists’ expression to

the world, but the audiences’ expression of the movie. In capitalist system, it becomes just another relation between the consumer and the product. And like other relationships, it becomes another illusion that the consumer has a free choice to pick his film to watch. 

Artists who are in the film industry have no choice but to continue with this non-ending cycle as it is their only means of profit. Changing the discourse is difficult, especially since when movies different to those “normal” films are categorized as not entertaining. But since when was art meant to entertain its subjects. In terms of Foucault's words, the reality of the film industry has created its own discourse, and to challenge this discourse, we must act differently. Changing the discourse however is difficult because both the consumer and the producer rely on the other.

-OMG

The Orientalist Perspective as an Enframing Discourse

In class, we discussed that orientalism is an enframing discourse. The word oriental itself comes from the word orient, which means the east, while the occident is the west. The orientalist perspective is the perspective used to depict a subject from the Eastern culture. As we focused on the Middle East we watched a movie about the book Orientalism written by Edward Said.

He used art as a means to show the West’s depiction of the Middle Eastern culture. We used the knowledge from this book to reanalyze the book we previously read, Colonizing Egypt. The movie talked about how the depiction of people who visited the middle-east made a lot of stereotypical accuses. These people made people in the Middle East look frightening. They created a representation of Arab people that does not really represent the Arab people as a whole. For example, they show through the art works how the men always have a long beard, scary eyes, and always get beaten in war.

In colonizing Egypt, Timothy Mitchell also did the same thing, when he explained how the France rebuilt Egypt in their World Exhibitions. Through the eyes of the western world, Egypt was rebuilt in an exact way how it looks in the outside, but not really in the inside. In the video, we might agree that most Arab men have a long beard but their personalities, which was depicted as scary and heartless, was wrong.

To some extent, I would agree with Said Edwards when he said that the North American perspectives of the Middle East in general are politicized by the Israel. This racism towards the Middle East people, are more and less one of the important reasons to consider when we analyze the reason for the conflicts between these two regions. Said Edwards, repeated how since the early days of film, when media started revolutionizing, the Middle East was already represented negatively.  The “threatening and demonizing figure of Middle East in the Journal, Media, and Hollywood”, showed how fanatic and extremist the region is. Not just the Middle East, Said Edwards also discussed about how Islam is seen by the western. He said that, Islam is seen to promote violence repeating the line of development. Muslims are seen as villains and they came out with the ideology that it is hard to deal with the Nulsims and make them listen, so the only way of doing it is “to give them a bloody nose”.  Islam has been depicted as the enemy, and that there is no knowledge that can confront this unless the good western people go to the Middle East and experience the culture themselves.

Mitchell also analyzed enframing. He talked about the way the new city of Cairo which is structured or built in the panoptical model, which is how the prisons are built nowadays..  This building style is where all the activities of the area can be monitored from the center.  The “new methods of order were seeking to penetrate, colonize, and multiply” (Mitchel, 4). In this way, everyone is under control, and that everyone will start adapting to feel in control, so they will not go against order. This is an example of enframing, as enframing means a creation of a fixed hierarchy of meanings with the aim of creating a systematic knowledge and/or explaining the useful potential of an object or person. I hope this essay shows how enframing is an orientalist perspective.

Rossa D.

Enframing, Said and Impressions

            As you know, the bulk of the last two class periods have revolved around Mitchell’s book, Colonising Egypt and his concept of enframing. Enframing, being the means by which colonizers created info and set up a rigid hierarchy, plays into the documentary, about Edward Said and his work at disemboweling and extensive work against orientalism, from Wednesday because orientalism is an enframing discourse. Edward Said was from Palestine (I believe); his education took place in boarding schools and western high education.  Helena asked us this would have influenced him. Personally, I find it contradicting, to a point, that the man hailed as picking apart orientalism and providing paths for ‘better’ education and learning, with reference to the Middle East, had a very, seemingly, disconnected with relation to Middle Eastern (more accurately Palestinian) life. If Said attended all of these western institutions, where he would have been ingrained with thinking from a western perspective and did not participate in the same way with his birthplace as others born there, how can he speak with such authority about the experiences of Middle Easterns as a whole. Granted he seemed, to my western view, to hold many insights, but I have to ask how his western and class privileged up bringing influenced him? I want to ask him if he was aware of these influences? Did he really make an effort to move past his, inherent, indoctrination from his schooling and privilege? And along with this its interesting that Said’s nephew is now writing where his Uncle Said left over—sort of. I wonder what privilege (if any) is acting that ‘allows’ them to be the spokes person? Though, along with these questions an equally important one to ask is, if he had lived local and gone to the local schools, would we, the west, have even listened to him?

            To place more focus on the documentary, I really wish it had been done after 9/11. I feel like Said would have so much to say about what occurred then. The relationships he pointed out, I feel like would have been heightened. I was actually surprised by the reactions in the 90s to the Oklahoma bombings. In my mind the negativity and targeting of Muslims and Middle Easterners began after 9/11. Ignorant? Yes. I think this occurred for me because I never had words to express or question the practices and also, I was only in 4^th grade when the attacks occurred.  As Said talked, I was further blown away by the common placement and abundance of on the ground Middle Eastern paranoia. I really shouldn’t have; I have taken Chuck’s America’s Middle East course, in which we read about all the ways that the US has created a slanted singular view of Middle Easterners. The thing that still strikes me is how the media images of how the ‘bad guy’ was often, supposedly/apparently, depicted as Middle Eastern, because I never made the connection. I did not the much of anything about the region until college. It was not taught much beyond geography class. We did not get to Iran as planned in my Comparative Governments class. In my World History we discussed Byzantine, but spent the most of the time on China. The one image I do know I gained was the impression that culture moved out of the ‘fertile crescent’ to the East and later to the West (it temporarily stopped in northern Africa, but not for long). Now, I do not agree with this at all, but these were the images I held through my schooling. So maybe the media coverage that Said talks about affected me more than I realized.

Orientalism and Enframing

Over the past couple weeks, the major discussion in class has been about Timothy Mitchell’s Colonizing Egypt.  A large amount of Mitchell’s book discusses the use of enframing within the context of colonial Egypt.  Enframing is the creation of a hierarchy that makes knowledge about people/things more accessible.  Those doing enframing want to “know” the inhabitants, and the implication is that enframing is used primarily for exploitive purposes.  Exploitive purposes are usually based off exerting the highest productivity for a populace.  Often in order to create the hierarchies, the organization doing the enframing, the organization needs to tear down old ideas, structures, and even spaces.  Enframing is evident throughout Mitchell’s work but especially as he describes the new model villages favored by 19^th century Egyptian planners as well as the city improvements seen in places such as Cairo.  The important thing to recognize about enframing is that it is not a specifically modern development.  It would be a mistake to attribute such a discourse as only a product of modernity.  Certainly, modern facets of technology have eased the ability of the state or other organization to implement enframing structures (see my last blog post).  However, the desire for humans to control others is perhaps older than all other political instincts.  

            In order to better understand how enframing is not a product of colonialization but rather is a basic­­­ nature born out of fundamental human desires, it is important to look at the history of enframing as a discourse.  Particularly, one can focus on perhaps the most significant discourses that can be defined as an enframing process within a post-colonial context: Orientalism.  Edward Said makes the argument that Orientalism, the study of non-Western cultures and histories, is fundamentally a hegemonic discourse designed to create a non-Western Other.  Through art, literature, and historical works, Said analyzes how the Middle East in particular was defined by the West as the Other.  Orientialism as a field of studies is a relatively modern term with its beginnings as a field usually attributed to the 18^th or 19^th centuries (perhaps the aftermath of Napoleon’s invasion of Egypt would be a good date to start with).  However, the larger process of Orientialism is much older.  Europe defining the East as the Other stretches back through at least a couple millennia.  The Ancient Greeks were especially adept at defining their Persian rivals in terms that would not be out of place in 19^th century Britain or France.  Greece itself was soon defined as the East by the new Roman Empire; ironically, the Eastern Roman Empire itself (although many would argue that by this point the Roman Empire post-Justinian was heavily divorced from its Latin origins) would be defined as the East by Western European states in the Middle Ages.  Orientalism and the enframing discourse that is an aspect of it was not a product of colonialism at this time.  In fact, Alexander the Great can be defined as the only “Western” up till the 19^th century that was able to control the “East”.  A history of Orientalism (itself an enframing discourse) shows that these ideas are much older than colonialism itself.  For a scholar studying enframing, it is important to recognize that these tendencies are not products of their time but rather products of humanity.  

BDF

Cinar vs. Mitchell

This weekend we're posting on Modernity, Islam, and Secularism in Turkey by Alev Çinar. Here are some of the thoughts I have on this book:

I noticed a couple parallel concepts between Çinar's work and Timothy Mitchell's Colonising Egypt. The first is Mitchell's concept of enframing (Mitchell, ch. 2). Part of Çinar's overall thesis is that both the secular state and the Islamist movement made "modernization interventions" that relate to public spaces. These interventions involve restructuring various public spaces, particularly the spaces of center vs. periphery. Çinar argues that this restructuring is a manifestation of the political/ideological rivalry between secularism and Islam. The idea of architecture reflecting ideology is the key concept in enframing. In Egypt, the colonizers restructured public (and even private) spaces for the purposes of enumeration and control. In Turkey, secularist construction created a new center of power and control. One distinction, though, between enframing in these two contexts is that in Turkey it created only binaries (e.g. urban/rural, Çinar p. 31), but it Egypt it created multiple tiers of socioeconomic status.

The second parallel concept between Çinar and Mitchell is the idea of the "world as an exhibition" (Mitchell, ch. 1) To summarize simply, Mitchell describes the world as an exhibition as a façade that represents something else, the reality. In chapter 1 of Turkey, Çinar describes the public sphere in a similar way: that it is a "field of appearances, visibilities, and performances" and is where national identity is negotiated. The public sphere is very much like a façade.

A theme that I noticed in Çinar's book is that, in all the three types of modernizing interventions talked about, Islam reacts to secularism. Regarding the interventions relating to bodies, secularism denounced aspects of daily life (e.g. the veil) to rescue the body from oppressive Islam. In turn, Islamism did the same thing, but in reverse (e.g. reclaiming the veil to re-rescue the body from secularism, and to try to return to an "Ottoman-Islamic" civilization. Regarding the interventions relating to places, secularism created new centers by building from scratch, whereas Islamism challenged these very constructions by inserting their Ottoman-Islamic symbols into these centers, essentially reclaiming the centers. Finally, this is true in the interventions relating to times as well. Secularism restructured time around a founding moment that rendered the state in control of the nation's history. Then Islamism regained control over time by creating a system of public commemorations of Ottoman-Islamic experiences, thus incorporating Ottoman-Islamic history back into Turkey's national identity.

In all these interventions, we see that Islamism is reactive. But is this because the Islamist interventions occurred chronologically after the secularist interventions? Or is it because Islam is inherently reactive? Or perhaps Islam is inherently reactive, but only when it has something valuable (e.g. bodies, public spaces, and national history) to defend? You can argue that secularism provoked Islamism by being the initial oppressors, thus giving Islamism a legitimate reason to react. But the question still stands: what, if anything, does Islamism's reactivity reveal about Islamism?

-GGM

"Colonising Egypt": A piece that tells us so much about modernity, control, order and the West v. the East

It is surprising how reading “Colonizing Egypt” by Mitchell went from a surprise and questioning the reading at the first sight to a big appreciation of how is relates to the context of our class as well as the contexts of the topic of modernity in the ME that we endeavor to study for the time being.

The themes such as the world exhibition and enframing are excellent themes representative to the relations between the West and the East. Let me start on my understanding of the World Exhibition. Although Mitchell did not emphasize the distinction he draws between World-as-Exhibition and World Exhibition, I believe his emphasis on the former makes a lot of sense in describing the perception of the East by the West. Mitchell argues that World-as--Exhibition is the representation of the East or the other from what they grasp and only the non-European visitor really understands the difference between the reality and representation. I would agree with this approach because it still holds true to the current time. Those who do not know the East and whose interaction with the East is through commercialism or exhibitions really do not get the real sense of what the represented is; which creates what we call now stereotypes. In addition, Mitchell stressed on the idea that representation is distinct from the original and what is out in the world is a continuation of what is in the exhibition. I understand that the exhibition means to evoke the idea that there is a reality behind it. Thus how is this supposed to be so different from the original?  This is one of the arguments that I do not believe to fully understand.

Mitchell engages himself in conversations that we already had in class such as Weber and Marx. He smartly connects one of his major themes which is exhibition to “Commodity Fetishism”. This is the separation of the object from various costs and the effort it takes to make things.  I would have liked Mitchell to touch more on this real fact that is so trendy nowadays. Yet, he briefly connects it to exhibition of the world and leaves the reader with lack of examples in order to grip the bulk of this idea.

Enframing defined as controlling the space through the creation of containers and the contained is what I enjoyed reading the most in this text. This topic not only introduces us the control, the order of appearance and appearance order that Mitchell exerts to discuss, but also I, as a middle eastern can draw some real comparison and contrast between the West and the East. In other terms, his lengthy effort to describe the Kabyle house not only serves the purpose of his arguments but also highlights the differences between the colonizer and the colonized. The West was known to draw real boundaries between the interior and the exterior. This was definitely not the case in the East, at least in the old orders. One could hardly know what was happening inside in the latter. Family or women for example were privacy not exposed to the outside. Instead of the boundaries between the inside and the outside, the East was characterized by fullness, emptiness and therefore continuity; as he draws and example from the Kabyle house. In such a cultural context, the idea of control was hard to persist and that is why the colonization started enframing or the codification of space. Space in the old order has so much meaning (i.e., fullness and emptiness) but the new order controlled it and divorced it from its individuals.  The introduction of this invasion of space was to serve purposes such as controlling the population and productivity as well.

Overall, Mitchell’s touches on our course (IMG) relevance in many ways. Although complicated, in his writing style and possibility of being over all the places, this piece of writing tells so much of what is really happening especially in terms of the Wes and the East, and how it all started.  

                                                                                                                               S.A.A

Egypt in the Eyes of the Western World- From Colonizing Egypt by Timothy Mitchell

In the book, Colonizing Egypt, Timothy Mitchell analyzed the results of western domination on three separate stages, the world-at-exhibition, the Egyptian City, and the west. I am particularly interested in his arguments about the response of the Egyptian visitors when they saw a replica of their home country in a western land. Mitchell talked about the world-at-exhibition and analyzed how the French exhibit Egypt.  It is interesting to me to read the idea that I never really came about, looking at my own country through the eyes of a foreigner.

This is what Mitchell was explaining when he talked about the shocking response the Egyptians had when they see an exhibition of their country that seemed to be “real”. He said, “Part of the shock of the Egyptians came from just how 'real' the street claimed to be. Not simply that the paint was made dirty, that the donkeys were from Cairo, and that the Egyptian pastries on sale claimed to taste like the real thing. But that one paid for them, as we say, with real money” (10). The fact that the Egyptian sees this replica very similar to the real thing surprised me as there are many aspects of a country that is not really seen by foreigners. However, I would feel that power has a big role in making this happen as these foreigners visit Egypt not only for the purpose that foreigners have when they visit Egypt today.

This was in 1889, the time of colonialism when they have the power to see Egypt inside out. The representations that were created by these French scholars and architects would not be as real if Egypt was never under colonization, as Egypt would not be open to the western world. The fact that Egypt was colonized pushed Egypt towards modernization and created a new Egypt, where trade and culture there was brought to the next level. This is proven by Mitchell’s argument of how, “these symbolic representations of the world's cultural and colonial order, continually encountered and described by visitors to Europe, were the mark of a great historical confidence “(7). He explained how even the most small aspects of the culture was shown, such as “the commercialism of the donkey rides, the bazaar stalls and the dancing girls was no different from the commercialism of the world outside” (10).

It is interesting how Mitchell connected this exhibition of the world to commercialism and how he explained that they symbolize the political and economic transformation that equally effected Egypt. He related the new world of Facades and exhibits, models and stimulations, to the capitalist transformation. In other words, the replica that the French created of the Egypt explains how Egypt is becoming a new world, where commodity becomes an important aspect of their trading system. The exhibits of Egypt that the French create made it more valuable than it actually is. The remarkable realism of such displays made a strange civilization into an object the visitor could almost touch. Yet to the observing eye, surrounded by the display but distinguished from it by the status of visitor, it remained a mere representation, the picture of some strange reality (9).

The exhibition shows how Egypt is becoming civilized and closer to be like the modern world. However, a question that confuses me throughout reading this book is that, “didn’t Egypt civilize before Europe? Why does this explanation seem like saying that Egypt is a new modern world, while it was Egypt that first advanced in trading systems?

Rossa D.

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Commentary on Power

One of the cornerstones of post-colonialist historical critique has been the work of French philosopher Michel Foucault.  Foucault’s philosophical ideas are some of the cornerstones of a wide range of post-colonialist scholars including Edward Said and more relevantly to this class Timothy Mitchell.  In fact, Mitchell makes it quite clear in Colonizing Egypt that he is borrowing quite heavily from Foucault and post-structuralism.  At the heart of Mitchell’s argument about the colonization of Egypt is his discussion of how influenced by western ideals, Egyptian authorities attempted to exert greater control on the countryside.  Mitchell refers to this process as enframing where upon Egyptian authorities tried to create new “spaces” for people and things especially in the countryside.  As illustrated by the new model villages planned/adopted by the government with western assistance, the Egyptian government hoped to divide and conquer the countryside.  With a greater (and defined by Mitchell as “modern”) hold on the countryside, the new villages could allow a maximization for resource extraction by increasing productivity and efficiency.  Control is linked towards resource extraction.  Model villages theoretically allowed the government greater ability to extract more resources (for exportation to Europe) for two reasons.  First off, the new model village allowed for the breaking of older barriers and greater access to information (about persons in a household, property, etc. etc.).  The axiom that knowledge is power is particularly apt for the model village scenario.  Second, a standardization of the village leads to the creation of visible hierarchies which could further enforce power relationships.  Through these new, “modern” reforms, Egyptian powerbrokers were given the opportunity to increase their hold on the people for means of increased production. The implication is that these examples of disciplinary mechanisms are a modern practice in all senses of the term (using the example of the panopticon originally a symbol of colonialism). 

The important distinction is not when these processes of control were first manifested within society (colonial or otherwise) but when did their implementation become practical.  Desire for control by authority is as old as organized government itself.  However, the important distinction that needs to be made is that the revolutionary process was not the process itself but the new ease of implementation brought about by technology.  On a smaller scale, control can be easily exerted and maintained.  It is not particularly hard to think of examples within a personal sphere of relationships between friends, loved ones, or family as having rudimentary facets of disciplinary mechanisms.  However, the reason that control is often exerted easily on smaller scales is because of close contact.  It is difficult to control persons when they do not perceive you as being a part of their everyday lives.  Modern technology simplifies the ability for large bodies (usually but not always the state) to exert greater control on everyday life.  Perhaps the best illustration of the importance of technology within is in Orwell’s novel Nineteen Eighty-Four.  Daily life is supervised and controlled by “telescreens” which control society through their ever-present state.  The colonial Egyptian equivalents of the telescreens were the new army barracked around the country.    In business terms, technology allowed the state to cut out the middle man in power relationships.  Previously, the state would have to rely on an ever-increasing series of agents (either direct or indirect) to implement its policy.  Using the Egyptian model, the attempt for centralized control was exerted by levies or obligations.  The responsibility for the implementation of these levies was left in the hands of the less powerful who turn were to rely on the even less powerful (and so on).  It is not surprising given the many leveled vertical structure that implementation was inconsistent at best.  One can take the Egyptian example and apply the principles it reveals throughout world history.  The desire to control existed has always existed. However, the important fact is that modern control processes were in origin not modern, but rather were typical desires whose implementation was eased by technology.  

BDF

Colonising Egypt Chapter 3

Chapter 3 of Colonising Egypt by Timothy Mitchell talks about several Egyptian schools that had been established in Western nations in the mid-19th century – for example, Joseph Lancaster's Central School in London and a school in Paris. I don't have anything profound to say, but I'll just try to connect this chapter back to earlier parts of the book and to the discussion we had in class last Wednesday.

I don't really see how commodity fetishism is related to the Egyptian schools talked about in ch 3, unless the schools somehow gained a reputation that was grander than deserved. But Mitchell makes no indication of this either way. However, it's possible that Egyptian education in general may have taken on a flavor of commodity fetishism. The division of schooling into primary, preparatory, and final schooling – with increasing rarity and elitism as you go higher up in education – may have rendered education as a kind of commodity. I personally would argue that we see this in contemporary US culture with higher education (private institution and Ivy League degrees, anyone?).

The Egyptian schools had many strict rules and regulations, often (Mitchell argues) for the purpose of creating order and control itself rather than simply for giving students constructive boundaries (for example: in the school in England during a particular exercise, students had to walk in a line at a regular distance from each other. The line may be helpful for reducing chaos, but the regular distance serves no purpose but to create an additional measure of control (p. 70). The implication is that these schools engage in enframing, talked about in ch 2. By having all these rules, and by having rigid seating and classroom organization, the powerful entity divides up the non-powerful entity for the purposes of enumeration and control, which is clearly seen in the example just given. Enframing is also obviously related to the idea of disciplinary order that we talked about in class.

Mitchell argues that the concept of the "world as an exhibition" is necessarily colonial (p. 13). I wonder if the converse is true: that colonialism necessarily entails the concept of the world as an exhibition. If it is true, then the Egyptian schools (among other things) should somehow demonstrate the concept. So, do they? I think yes, for these reasons (the reasons correspond with the 3 features of the "world as an exhibition" emphasized by Mitchell, p. 13):

-  The schools had "apparent certainty" of ordering and organizing things. Besides the rigid seating, Mitchell lists 22 regulations of the school in Paris and shows us their daily structure, which managed every minute of the students' lives from opening their eyes in the morning to turning the lights out at night (interestingly, there is no free or resting time in this schedule, although Regulation #11 does allow students to venture out into the town during certain hours).

-  The "real world" of the school consisted of further representations of the exhibition. We've already established that the schools' enframing generated power. Mitchell writes that this power was not only a "microphysical" power over the body, but also a "meta-physical" power over the non-physical world (p. 93). So even the meta-physical construct was kind of a façade.

There are probably other reasons/examples too. So if the Egyptian schools in the Western nations demonstrate the "world as an exhibition," then does colonialism necessarily entail the concept? I know that I'm asking a question of backwards logic, but what do you think?

-GGM

Schools in Mitchell's "Colonising Egypt"

            I feel like there is something I am missing in this book, Colonising Egypt by Mitchell. Reading the additional section from Mitchell, the main thing I am taking away is just how eerily organized absolutely everything is. Look (remember):

As well as student monitors who instructed and supervised, there were monitors who promoted students up or down in the order of seating, monitors who inspected the slates, monitors who supplied and sharpened pens, monitors who checked on students who were not in their position, and a monitor-general who checked on the monitors.

There are around ~5 layers of monitors monitoring each other. I feel like there is no trust in these systems. These schools conjure a very grey color in my mind. But beyond that, its really interesting to ponder on what things they thought were of value, like:

All instruction was received standing, which was said to be better for the health

Of course these schools were structured in a very particular way, which is why Mitchell is telling us about them. Egypt wanted to people modern. The time frame was during the Industrial Revolutions of America and Britain. So, with this mindset, people desired everything to be overly structured, because the belief was that structure produced more and better quality objects. Thus specific views about education were popping up ‘cross the Britain and, then, Egypt like:

learning is a process of discipline, inspection and continuous obedience; order and discipline of modern schooling were to be the hallmark and the method of a new form of political power

Add to these views the admitted reason for structuring Egypt this way, because Egyptian leaders wanted to create a modern people; seeing schools like this in London and Paris, of course copying is the way to progress. This is the problem though, times like the Industrial Revolution put countries ahead not because they copied each other, but because they created new ideas themselves. If all someone does is copy their neighbor, they will never have a chance at being ahead. Now though I feel like copying is a waste of time, I thought it was really smart to choose education as the way and place to implement desired changes long term:

        To change the tastes and habits of an entire people, politics had to seize upon the individual, and by the new means of education make him or her into a modern political subject - frugal, innocent and, above all, busy.

After the ‘modern’ schools had been implemented, the fellow critiques about it were clear about the changing views within the country. It becomes very clear that as Egypt attempts to modernize, it relates ‘order’ with ‘modern and relates ‘disorder, “chaos”’ with ‘old Egypt.’ This association is a blatant example of western colonization, because the west is directing Egypt in what is deemed to be true ‘order’ vs. ‘Egyptian disorder.’ Mitchell sums this up here:

Just as the model schools offered the model of a modern system of power, this image of the old style of teaching was also the image of existing Egyptian society. Movement is haphazard and undisciplined, space is cramped, communication is uncertain, the presence of authority is intermittent, individuals are all unalike and uncoordinated, disorder threatens to break in at any point, and order can be reestablished only by the swift and physical demonstration of power.

This excerpt really speaks for itself. There is one other short quote that I feel represents the point of this chapter. It describes power and power relations in Egypt and the effect on how/why these schools were chosen and on why schools were added to mixture. Schools were added because just adjusting the layout of the city wasn’t enough. ‘Updating’ the city layout did not have enough of an effect here. Because:

Power now sought to work not only upon the exterior of the body but also 'from the inside out' - by shaping the individual mind

And this is where I’ll bow out, because I’m past the limit. But I do really enjoy this quote. I think it represents colonization in general really well.

-W.H.B.