How can you avoid the trap of all too easily taking modern-day conflicts as a basis for understanding the relations of the past? And how and when does a group become a minority? In the December round of the Free Humanities Competition of NWO two projects dealing with these questions were granted a subsidy. These projects were submitted by Prof. Bas ter Haar Romeny and Prof. Heleen Murre-van den Berg, both from the Institute of Religious Studies. Both projects involve collaboration with colleagues from other institutes, respectively LIAS and LUCL.

• Fitting In/Standing Out: Comparing Majority and Minority Dress Codes among Egyptian Muslims and Christians: Bas ter Haar Romeny (main applicant; LIRS), Petra Sijpesteijn (LIAS), and Maurits Berger (LIRS)
• Arabic and its Alternatives: Religious Minorities in the Formative Years of the Modern Middle East (1920-1950): Heleen Murre-van den Berg (LIRS), Karène Sanchez (LUCL)

Photo C.T. Rooijakkers

Bas ter Haar Romeny (main applicant; LIRS), Petra Sijpesteijn (LIAS), and Maurits Berger (LIRS)

Discussions about headscarves and burqas in Western countries with Islamic minorities show the importance of dress in relations between majorities and minorities. However, this research project is not only interested in these obvious cases; it seeks to understand the complete picture. It is interested in both Muslims and Christians, women and men, past and present. The case of Egypt is eminently suitable for this purpose, as here Muslims and Christians have lived side by side for centuries. Moreover, members of both groups now live as minorities in the West.

Photo C.T. Rooijakkers

The term dress includes clothing and all other additions and modifications to the body. These are signifiers of identity; they visually create distinctions. Therefore they have a function in the formation and negotiation of communal identities. The main aim of this project is to find out in what way the relative position of a group within society influences these processes: how and why do people stand out or fit in? Using actual material evidence, four researchers will study Egyptian Christians and Muslims from a comparative and diachronic perspective. For their respective periods they will analyse the dress codes and the way these function in relations between majority and minority. The focus is on the day-to-day reality of dress, and how it relates to such factors as sumptuary laws, foreign influences, or changing contexts.

We expect this interdisciplinary project to be an important stimulus not only to the field of dress studies but also a step forward in the understanding of minority and majority interactions. In addition to academic publications, the researchers will publish their experiences and preliminary findings on a weblog. Also, two open discussion events will be organized as well as an exhibition. In this way the project hopes to stimulate debate and understanding, and by focussing on the complete picture, put the issue of headscarves into context.

Heleen Murre-van den Berg (LIRS), Karène Sanchez (LUCL).

This project aims to revisit the ways in which religious minorities in the Middle East participated in, contributed to, and opposed the Arab nationalism of the post-war years, when the British and French ruled the region via the Mandates. This period of societal modernization and competing nationalisms saw the emergence of new political structures that would define the Middle East for most of the twentieth century. While Arabic nationalism, predicated as it was on the Arabic language more than on Islam, was seen as a positive development by many Arabic-speaking Jews and Christians, others showed increasing uneasiness with its ramifications. This was more specifically the case among those non-Muslims that in addition to Arabic highly valued other languages, such as Syriac, Hebrew and Armenian, but also English and French. Would participation in Arab nationalism also imply giving up the allegiances symbolized by these languages?

Three case studies, into the Jews of Baghdad, the Syriac Christians of North Iraq and the Catholic Christians of Palestine, form the starting point of an inquiry into the linguistic practices and language ideologies of these religiously-defined minorities. How and why did they choose to use Arabic, and how and why did they prefer other languages? What was the role of religious elites, both local and foreign (such as missionaries) and how were their ideas picked up by others in the respective communities? How were these choices related to the strength of competing nationalisms (e.g., Zionist, Assyrian), to theological and ecclesial considerations (e.g., Catholic universalism versus Orthodox particularism?) and to global, local and regional alliances?