Art of Minorities

Virginie Rey is Research Associate at the Samuel Jordan Center for Persian Studies at the University of California, Irvine. She is co-editor (with Stephen Pascoe and Paul James) of Making Modernity in the Middle East: From the Mashriq to the Maghreb (Arena Publications, 2015) and is author of Mediating Museums: Tunisian Ethnographic Museums (1881-2016) (Brill, 2019).

This book applies the cutting-edge issues in museum studies today – questions of representation, inclusivity and ethics – to the study of cultural institutions in the Middle East and North Africa. Timely, innovative, probing and provocative, this volume makes a novel and long-overdue contribution. An essential book for those concerned with global museum studies, cultural rights, and the history of marginalised groups.

• Introduction1. Engaging with ‘Minority’ Voices: Cultural Representation in Museums of the Middle East and North AfricaVirginie ReyExhibiting Minorities2. The Ethnographisation of Syrian Society at the Azem Palace of Damascus: From Compact Minorities to Toponymical IdentityVirginie Rey and Stephen Pascoe3. 'The Performance of Servitude': Negotiating Citizenship, Race, and Gender in Local and National Museums in Bahrain and the UAEJohn Thabiti Willis4. When the Local Population is a Minority: The Case of the Oudaya Museum in Rabat as a Key to Understand Elitism in Moroccan MuseumsFrancesca de Micheli5. Past Lodges, Present Prayers: Sufism and Museums in Konya and HacıbektaşLucía Cirianni SalazarMinorities Exhibiting6. Museums, Migrant Labourers and Ethnic Spatiality in the United Arab EmiratesSarina Wakefield7. Paving the Way to a Lebanese National Narrative: Empathy at the Armenian Genocide orphans' Aram Bezikian Museum in LebanonRita Kalindjian and Rhéa Dagher8. Imperilled Objects and Unsafe Ideas: The Palestinian Museum, BirzeitZoe Holman9. Egypt’s Coptic Museum: From Patriarchal to NationalDina Bakhoum10. Branding Convivencia: Jewish Museums and the Reinvention of a Moroccan Andalus in EssaouiraAomar BoumImagined Museums11. Is Tunisia Ready for a Jewish Museum? Perspectives on the Current Debates Surrounding the Status of Jewish Heritage in my CountryHabib Kazdaghli12. Do I Even Exist? Kurdish Diaspora Artists Reflect on Imaginary Exhibits in a Kurdistan MuseumVera Eccarius-Kelly13. Islamic State’s Archive of the Digital Infinite: Imagined Museums, New Media and Conflict CapitalismAmanda Rogers14. Afterword: Minoritised Memory and Affect in a Museology of DisasterKatazyna Pieprzak.