List of Illustrations
Acknowledgements
Notes on Transliteration

Introduction: Social Anthropology in the Arab World: The Fragmented History of an Uncomfortable Discipline
Abdullah Alajmi, Daniele Cantini, Irene Maffi and Imed Melliti

Part I

Introduction
Irene Maffi and Imed Melliti

Chapter 1. Fanny Colonna and Anthropology in Algeria and the Maghreb
Loïc Le Pape

Chapter 2. Fieldwork Encounters and Reflexivity by Abdellah Hammoudi: Arab Anthropology as Alternative Episteme?
Fadma Ait Mous and Mohamed Sammouni

Chapter 3. The Trajectory of an Anthropologist at Home: Theoretical and Ethnographic Issues
Hassan Rachik

Chapter 4. Reflections on the Anthropologies of the Arab Gulf
Laure Assaf

Chapter 5. The Challenges of Anthropology in the Arab Gulf: Few Reflections on the Omani Case
Maho Sebiane

Chapter 6. Tracing Histories and Institutional Developments of Anthropology in Egypt
Amal Abdrabo and Daniele Cantini

Chapter 7. Anthropology in Tunisia: An Eventful History
Imed Melliti

Chapter 8. The History of Anthropology in Algeria – Weakly Anchored in Society
Aicha Benabed and Mohamed Mebtoul

Chapter 9. Anthropology in Morocco: The Double Absence
Zakaria Rhani

Part II

Introduction: Changes and Continuities in Research Topics
Abdullah Alajmi and Daniele Cantini

Chapter 10. ‘Narrative Sovereignty’? Anthropology, Language and the Politics of Research
Myriam Achour

Chapter 11. Anthropological Approaches to Islam
Daniele Cantini and Hassan Rachik

Chapter 12. Anthropology of Cities in the Arab Countries
Franck Mermier

Chapter 13. Anthropology and Ethnography of Migration: The Arab Gulf
Abdullah Alajmi

Chapter 14. Being Borrowed: Encounters of Collaborative and Creative Knowledge Production in Researching Migration to the Gulf
Farah Hallaba

Chapter 15. At the Margins of Cultural Memory: Obscuring Women in UAE Heritage, Historiography and Nationhood
Laila Prager

Chapter 16. The Emergence of Medicine and Health as Legitimate Objects of Research in Arab Anthropology
Irene Maffi and Saadia Radi

Chapter 17. Studying Trauma in Anthropology on the Arab World
Sarah El-Bulbeisi

Index

Social Anthropology in the Arab World

The Fragmented History of an Uncomfortable Discipline

Edited by Abdullah Alajmi, Daniele Cantini, Irene Maffi and Imed Melliti

384 pages, 9 ills., bibliog., index

ISBN 978-1-83695-103-2 Hb Published (August 2025)

Details

“This is a timely, and significant work. The chapters in this book are diverse and cover a wide geographic context.” • Yasmine Moataz Ahmed, The American University in Cairo

There are ongoing efforts in anthropology to decolonise its history and give fairer space to marginalised traditions. This book examines the history and institutionalisation of anthropology in the Maghreb, the Mashreq and the Gulf, in an open and collaborative manner and from various perspectives. Its primary focus is two-fold: first, to reorient the anthropological focus towards studies conducted in the region, particularly on the conditions conducive to the institutionalisation of anthropological knowledge; second, to shed light on anthropological studies in languages other than English. offering different theoretical and epistemological perspectives.

Abdullah Alajmi is an associate professor of anthropology at the American University of Kuwait. He has published several articles on Hadrami migration in Kuwait and beyond.

Daniele Cantini is a fellow at the Global Development Network and affiliated researcher at the Leibniz Zentrum Moderner Orient in Berlin. His most recent publication is an edited volume, Bounded Knowledge: Doctoral Studies in Egypt, (American University in Cairo Press, 2021).

Irene Maffi is Professor of Social Anthropology at the Institute of Social Sciences, University of Lausanne. She authored Abortion in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia. Medicine, Politics and Morality(Berghahn Books, 2020).

Imed Melliti is Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at the University of Tunis El-Manar and Honorary President of the Association internationale des sociologues de langue française (AISLF).

Subject: Anthropology (General) Sociology

Area:

BISAC: SOC002010 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Anthropology/Cultural & Social; SOC026000 SOCIAL SCIENCE/Sociology/General; HIS054000 HISTORY/Social History

available as open access under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-NoDerivatives 4.0 International License (CC BY-NC-ND 4.0) with support from The Volkswagen Foundation.

berghahn New York · Oxford

Contents

Social Anthropology in the Arab World

The Fragmented History of an Uncomfortable Discipline

Edited by Abdullah Alajmi, Daniele Cantini, Irene Maffi and Imed Melliti

Subject: Anthropology (General) Sociology

Area:

This title is published as Open Access

Full Text PDF Made available under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license with support from The Volkswagen Foundation.

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Contents

Social Anthropology in the Arab World

The Fragmented History of an Uncomfortable Discipline

Edited by Abdullah Alajmi, Daniele Cantini, Irene Maffi and Imed Melliti

Subject: Anthropology (General) Sociology

Area:

This title is published as Open Access

Full Text PDF Made available under a CC BY-NC-ND 4.0 license with support from The Volkswagen Foundation.