Grief and rage: Collective emotions in the politics of peace and the politics of gender in Israel

Collective emotions of rage and grief dominate Israeli political discourses regarding the Middle East conflict. The weekly peace vigils of the Women in Black who protest the state's occupation of the West Bank and Gaza and the opposition which the vigils encounter, publicly display politicized collective emotions. In these weekly confrontations, grief and rage articulate intense contestations regarding the politics of peace as well as the politics of gender in Israel. Rage and grief unravel two drastically different visions of transcending national vulnerabilities and two disparate constructions of gender identity.     

Dispossession and empowerment in the ethnography of Palestinians in the occupied territories

This article is a review of two recent ethnographies on Palestinians in the West Bank: Resistance, Repression, and Gender Politics in Occupied Palestine and Jordan, by Frances Hasso (2005), and Law, Violence and Sovereignty Among West Bank Palestinian by Tobias Kelly (2006). Hasso examines the significant and unique role of women in organizing the Democratic Front for the Liberation of Palestine in the Occupied Territories, as compared to Jordan, while Kelly examines the jurisdictional and practical problems of labor disputes for male workers in a West Bank village. The two books exemplify how ethnographies of Palestinians in the Occupied Territories oscillate between documenting dispossession and empowerment.     

The human dynamics of migrant transnationalism

Abstract

How is migrant transnationalism shaped by the human dynamics of relationships between migrants and non-migrants? This question is addressed through an analysis of asymmetries between migrants and non-migrants in three spheres of transnational life: the moralities of transnationalism, information and imagination in transnational relations, and transnational resource inequalities. Understanding transnational practices such as sending remittances and facilitating migration, it is argued, requires attention to the dynamics of the relationships between individuals. Fieldwork material from Cape Verde and the Netherlands is combined with secondary literature from other parts of the world in order to develop an analytical framework for comparative research.     

Under the cover of the kippah: on Jewish settlers,performance, and belonging in Israel/Palestine

What can a kippah – the Jewish head cover – reveal about settlers’ politics of belonging in the Israeli-Palestinian space? During fieldwork among settlers and Palestinians in the West Bank, I selectively put on and took off the kippah, using it to control social identity and interactions, sometimes successfully, sometimes not. This article interrogates my use of the kippah as a reflexive means of highlighting its powerful meanings and effects within the Israeli-Palestinian space. In showing how the wearing and removal of the kippah bears upon the social construction of Jewish identity, this article offers new insights into the sociopolitical significance of sartorial practices in Israel/Palestine. These insights contribute more broadly to debates at the intersection of studies of settler colonialism, material culture, identity, and performativity.     

In-betweenness and crumbled hopes in Palestine: the global in the local of the occupied territories

Critical discussions among some in Palestinian studies describe foreign involvement in NGO development in the Occupied Territories since the 1990s as having been detrimental to Palestinian collective aspirations, and even a tool of imperialism. In the 1970s and 1980s, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip mobilized their own civilian organizations to build an infrastructure of resistance to the Israeli Occupation that gave birth to the Intifada Uprising in December 1987. Foreign governments and organizations were drawn to their struggle and in the 1990s billions of dollars of foreign aid from more than 40 nations and over two dozen multilateral organizations flowed through hundreds of local and foreign NGOs. But this investment in the “peace process” did not stop a worsening occupation, and a second al Aqsa Intifada began in the fall 2000. Palestinian civil society suffered crippling blows and foreign actors were reduced to disaster relief and harm reduction. This article presents three ethnographic portraits from 1992, 1995 and 2002, that examine these changes in Palestinian civil society and the scholarly criticisms of foreign involvement. This article argues that such involvement could put Palestinian participants in a dangerous in-between social position, but that these positions of contradiction are often preferable to the destruction of militarism.     

Beyond ‘transnationalism’: Mexican hometown politics at an American labour union

The controversial notion of “transnationalism” has generated new insights into international migrants’ on-going ties with their communities of origin, but its problematic conceptualization and vague usage in empirical studies needlessly inhibit the transnational perspective’s utility. Understanding the political and economic incorporation of migrants in both their communities of origin and destination is facilitated by disaggregating the types of political borders, types of nationalism, and levels of identification that have been conflated in the framework of “transnationalism”. I demonstrate the analytic value of these distinctions by using them to interpret evidence from a six-month ethnographic case study of an immigrant labour union in Southern California. A theoretically coherent typology applicable to both the case study and other migration settings provides a framework for explaining how institutions assimilate migrants into U.S. and local politics while simultaneously promoting cross-border ties.     

The idea is to change the state,not the 'conceptual' terminology

'Transnationalism', 'globalization', etc. have been adopted by the postmodern anthropologists as providing conceptual evidence for a world that defies understanding in historical, political economy, or structural, terms. Thus, for Dan Rabinowitz (2001) ERS 24(1) 'subjectivity' reigns, transnationalism displaces the state in analysis, and the Palestinian citizens of Israel are discussed as 'a trapped minority'. I critique Rabinowitz's essentialist subjectivity which denies the Palestinian citizens rational, objective, comprehension of their situation, while emphasizing the key role of Israeli statism, alongside the state's welfare and citizens' rights components, and show that our common future lies in our joint, Jewish-Arab, active opposition to Israeli external and internal militaristic-nationalistic policies.     

Changing forms of transnationalism

This paper looks at second-generation immigrants and the effects of ‘inevitable’ assimilation on their transnational ties. The dominant concept of transnationalism is strongly influenced by the experience of transmigrants moving back and forth between the sending and receiving countries or by immigrants involved in transnational activities. Research on second-generation Hindustanis in the Netherlands shows that their transnational ties are strong due to the ethnification of their community. However, their transnational ties are changing. The second-generation Hindustanis have a source culture and are developing new ties, while loosening relations with their parents’ country. Thus, transnationalism is assuming new forms, calling for a typology of different forms of transnational relations.     

Growing old in a transnational social field: belonging,mobility and identity among Italian migrants

This article focuses on ageing in transnationalism. Drawing on the experiences of Italians in the UK as a paradigmatic example of settled European migrants, it explores the lived experiences of this group of older migrants. Using Levitt and Glick Schiller's framework, it concentrates first on migrants' ways of being and then on their ways of belonging. The article argues that a transnational lens is necessary to understand the experiences of older migrants and that a focus on older people needs to be incorporated into studies of transnationalism. Through a discussion of their narratives and experiences, the article offers a long view on the migration process and brings attention to the significance of gender, time and the life course to understand both migrants' transnationalism and their integration.     

Palestinians in film: Representing and being represented in the cinematic struggle for national identity

The Israeli‐Palestinian conflict has frequently been the focus of Western‐produced documentary films, which seek to explain the core of the problem. Claims to a truthful representation of reality have traditionally been linked to a parallel assumption of ethnographic authority over Palestinians who, unlike Israelis, had until recently little access to filmic means of representation. Through a number of documentaries, produced by both Palestinians and non‐Palestinians, the paper analyzes the crucial impact of the Intifadah on the development of local media in the Occupied Territories. The paper argues that by taking up film and ethnographic techniques as they had been developed in the West, documentaries produced by Palestinians have successfully generated alternative views of the conflict.     

N30 + 10: global civil society,a decade after the battle of Seattle

Critical discussions among some in Palestinian studies describe foreign involvement in NGO development in the Occupied Territories since the 1990s as having been detrimental to Palestinian collective aspirations, and even a tool of imperialism. In the 1970s and 1980s, Palestinians in the West Bank and Gaza Strip mobilized their own civilian organizations to build an infrastructure of resistance to the Israeli Occupation that gave birth to the Intifada Uprising in December 1987. Foreign governments and organizations were drawn to their struggle and in the 1990s billions of dollars of foreign aid from more than 40 nations and over two dozen multilateral organizations flowed through hundreds of local and foreign NGOs. But this investment in the “peace process” did not stop a worsening occupation, and a second al Aqsa Intifada began in the fall 2000. Palestinian civil society suffered crippling blows and foreign actors were reduced to disaster relief and harm reduction. This article presents three ethnographic portraits from 1992, 1995 and 2002, that examine these changes in Palestinian civil society and the scholarly criticisms of foreign involvement. This article argues that such involvement could put Palestinian participants in a dangerous in-between social position, but that these positions of contradiction are often preferable to the destruction of militarism.     

Transnational social spaces

This book sets out to challenge what it calls ‘transnationalism’ by pointing out the crucial role of national states, introduces a bipolar model of emigration and immigration contexts, and raises interesting and worthwhile questions about societal overlap between states – giving particular attention to conflicts between migrants and those left behind in the countries of emigration. As such, the book is a welcome addition to the by now voluminous literature on transnationalism. It is doubtful, however, whether the author has sufficiently engaged with the existing transnationally oriented literature to reorient transnational studies. Ultimately, it remains to be seen whether this reorientation will yield new insights in future studies.     

“I should not forget!”: qualitative evidence of social and cultural transnationalism among refugees who are disconnected from home

Adding to the growing body of literature exploring the ways in which forced migrant populations engage in transnationalism, we operationalize transnational cultural reference points within a refugee community in an agricultural US mountain-west town. We present qualitative evidence of ways in which refugees retain strong symbolic ties to their homeland while also integrating into the new host culture. Data drawn from interviews and field observations with recently resettled Karen and Karenni refugees yield evidence of cultural transnationalism in self-identification, native language use, clothing, and other symbolic ties to home. The transnational optic as applied in this study reveals the broadening application of the theory to include transnational cultural reference points among migrants who are disconnected from their origin cultures.     

Rethinking transnationalism through the second generation

The concept of transnationalism was developed to describe the ties maintained by migrants with their homelands and, until recently, little attention was given to the question of whether these ties would be continued by the migrants’ children, the ‘second generation’. This article discusses the transnational practices of second‐generation Tongans in Australia, using the research findings to reconsider some of the existing assumptions about what constitutes transnationalism. To fully understand second‐generation transnationalism, three forms of transnationalism are described: intradiasporic, indirect and forced transnationalism. Taking these forms into account reveals a more complex picture of the transnational ties maintained by migrants and their children than has been drawn in previous accounts.     

Flexible kinship: shaping transnational families among the Chinese in Tahiti

This article examines the practices of ‘flexible kinship’ used by Chinese migrants in colonial Tahiti. ‘Flexible kinship’ draws attention to the strategic uses that are made of kinship in the context of migration and diaspora: the adjustments to cultural, political, and legal borders that lead to changes in family forms and in the relations between kin. Using a multi‐generational perspective, I examine how families were shaped by successive changes and reversals in legal‐political and economic events and conjunctures over the long twentieth century. I argue for the importance of addressing transnational border‐crossing practices that involve not just a spatial extension of networks but also legal strategies within the host locality. I further show that if it is true that the Confucian hierarchical order has conditioned transnational practices of flexible kinship, then this hierarchy has not only bent to the circumstances, it has to a great extent been weakened. Finally, I argue that the history of familial adjustments has shaped a habitus that maximizes economic and legal security, especially among women.     

Homeland origins and political identities among Chinese in Southern California

Abstract

This research project seeks to understand the scope and sources of ethnic and other political identities among US residents of Chinese descent whose families originated from the Chinese mainland, Taiwan, Hong Kong and elsewhere in Asia. In what ways, to which extent and why do these individuals from various homeland origins identify themselves politically in the United States? Informed by past research on ethnic identity formation and political transnationalism, this research analyses a large-scale public opinion survey of Chinese in Southern California to report the contours and sources of political identities and their relationship to homeland origins, transnational ties and adaptation experiences in the Unites States, while controlling for the influence of sociodemographic factors. By separating out socialization contexts and types of transnational practices, the findings provide important modification to the scholarship on immigrant assimilation and transnationalism.     

Two states for three peoples: the ‘Palestinian-Israeli’ in the Future Vision Documents of the Palestinians in Israel

This article focuses on the Vision Documents of the Arab civil society organizations in Israel as an act of citizenship and an expression of the politics of contention used by the Palestinians in Israel. We argue that these documents challenge both the political inclusiveness of the identity of Israel as a ‘Jewish and democratic’ state, and the political continuity of collective identity of the Palestinian people. With these documents, the Arab civil society organizations reclaim responsibility over their political future by clinging to the Israeli citizenship framework, but at the same time attempt to change its nature from within, by re-associating the Palestinians in Israel with the core issues of the stumbling peace process, especially in regard to the ‘Right of Return’. The paper contends that for the Palestinians in Israel, the national and the civic frameworks do not circulate in separate orbits, but constitute and reframe each other.     

The limits to 'transnationalism': Bosnian and Eritrean refugees in Europe as emerging transnational communities

This article explores limitations on the concept of transnationalism, through examination of two empirical case studies of communities characterized by emerging transnational practices. Mirroring recent shifts of attention in studies of transnational migration away from US-based examples of established migrant workers, the article focuses on Bosnian refugees in the UK and The Netherlands, and Eritrean refugees in the UK and Germany. It stresses the importance of historical context, and the interconnection of social, political and institutional factors in producing highly uneven patterns of transnational activities both within and between these two groups.     

‘There are no chickens in suicide vests’: the decoupling of human rights and animal rights in Israel

In this article, I consider the shifting politics of animal rights activism in Israel in relation to human rights activism. I find that whereas in the past, human and animal rights activism were tightly linked, today they have become decoupled, for reasons I explore in this article. Although human and animal rights activism once shared social and ideological foundations in Israeli society, today much of the current animal rights activism is assertive and explicit in its disregard for human rights issues, such as the ongoing occupation of Palestine and the treatment of Palestinians. This decoupling has been heightened by the appropriation of animal rights politics by a right‐wing state for the purposes of ethical legitimation. This article considers the dilemmas of ethical responsibilities towards humans and animals as it plays out in one of the most vexed political environments in the world. I consider the shifting politics of human and animal rights activism, and demonstrate how they implicate and entangle each other in the context of the ongoing Israeli‐Palestinian conflict. I further consider what the decoupling of the human and animal rights movements might suggest regarding the ongoing academic critique of human rights and humanism.     

Contradictions and Complexities—Current Perspectives on Pacific Islander Mobilities

From the first movements of people towards the Pacific Islands millennia ago to recent transnational migration in a globalised world, translocal mobility has been a central aspect of the social lives, cultures and histories of many Pacific Islanders. While Oceania has always been an area of migration as well as cultural and economic exchange, current transnational Pacific movements are deeply embedded in a twentieth- and twenty-first-century global phenomenon, which Castles and Miller [2009. The Age of Migration. International Population Movements in the Modern World. Houndsmill: MacMillan Press. (1993 1st edition)] have called the ‘age of migration’. This essay gives an overview of Pacific Islander migration and its patterns and motives as presented in previous studies. It shows how useful cultural categories can be for a deeper understanding of notions of moving and staying, two pluralistic and not contradictorily perceived concepts for Pacific Islanders that are crucial in transnational migration. With its focus on transnational migration and the challenges experienced by Fijians in the UK and Japan, and Micronesian Chuukese in Guam, Hawai'i, and the US mainland, this introduction concludes by analysing how the case studies presented in this special issue contribute to and complement current anthropological perspectives on Pacific Islanders’ multiple and complex forms of transnationalism.