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My Independent Concentration

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I recently found out that my proposal for an independent concentration in Critical Thought and Global Social Inquiry has been approved! Just what does this mean, and why am I so happy about it?

First of all, a few words on what an independent concentration is (at Brown). Apart from the standard concentrations (majors) we offer, every student has the opportunity to design their own course of study. This concentration proposal must be reviewed and approved by a subcommittee of the College Curriculum Council, the same body that approves regular concentrations. The process of proposing an IC is supervised by the Curricular Resource Center, which has multiple peer student staffers who meet regularly with students who want to create an IC. The actual proposal is long and rigorous. Furthermore, the committee almost as a rule rejects first-time applications; there is a heavy emphasis on the process of proposing an IC as a conversation between the committee and the student with the aim being to create a well-articulated, coherent, and rigorous course of study that aligns with Brown’s wider educational goals. I personally found this process extremely rewarding: it helped me process my interests and a few thoughts that had been rolling around in my head (many because of courses I had taken). I am now much more articulate about these interests and I have a much better idea of how they align with my broader life goals. Although the process of creating an IC is arduous, for me it was well worth it.

To explain what my Independent Concentration is about, here’s an excerpt from my proposal (which you can find in full here):

What is Critical Thought and Global Social Inquiry? It is the study of global social phenomena such as postcolonialism, nationalism, and global justice through the philosophical lens of critical theory. I think dialectically about both the institutions derived from the Enlightenment and the practices, communities, and identities developed and deployed in resistance to these institutions. I am thus equally invested in studying the universal and metropolitan on the one hand and the particular and peripheral on the other. As a field of study, I imagine my Independent Concentration as a conversation with a number of figures invested in this dialectic – chief among them Edward Said, Hannah Arendt, and Cornel West. In many ways, this field of study is constituted by its intellectual genealogy: while investigating questions about how societies cohere, how politics functions, and how the past shapes our present (and drawing on sources from many times and places), what distinguishes Critical Thought and Global Social Inquiry is its distinctive perspective. This reflexive, provisional approach is gathered from the theoretical consciousness developed through the philosophical tradition of critique. Given my commitment to provisionality and reflexivity, I do not intend through this concentration to provide conclusive answers to the questions I described above. The fundamental aim of Critical Thought and Global Social Inquiry is instead to develop concrete questions, modes of interpretation, and resources for action that resonate across different commitments and backgrounds. Through my concentration, I develop a map – a way to navigate the incredible diversity of thought and experience our world has to offer.

Review: Topographies of Memories by Anita Bakshi

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Source.

Topographies of Memories: A New Poetics of Commemoration. By Anita Bakshi. London: Palgrave Macmillan, 2017. Pp. xvii + 340. ISBN 9783319634616.

Anita Bakshi’s first book is compelling reading that makes important interventions in several areas. Drawing on memory studies and her training as an architect, Bakshi adopts insightful methodological approaches including collaborative mapmaking, ethnography, and archival research to explore issues around the Buffer Zone separating Greek and Turkish communities in Nicosia, Cyprus. Topographies of Memories is important not only because it provides fresh, thoughtful analysis of intercommunal conflict in Cyprus and beyond, but also because its insights undergird intriguing contributions to the study of heritage and the practice of commemoration. Rather than presenting another narrative of Cypriot history, Bakshi suggests strategies for architects and designers to approach memory through embodied, emotional, and multivalent experience. Throughout her work, Bakshi’s perspective is stimulating and her presentation articulate. Topographies of Memories is relevant to anyone interested in heritage, conflict, materiality, and commemoration. Continue reading “Review: Topographies of Memories by Anita Bakshi” →

Baybayin and nationalism

Aliosha Bielenberg16 Comments

I begin by giving a short introduction to baybayin, followed by a brief history; both these sections mostly summarize previously published material. I then consider variation in baybayin before ending with contemporary concerns of identity and ideology, considering especially how baybayin is implicated in Filipino nationalism. Please feel free to browse to any of these sections — I hope my writing is useful to you!

Overview

A portion of the Tagalog catechism from the Doctrina Christiana. Source: Paul Morrow.

Baybayin is a writing system native to the Philippines, attested from before Spanish colonization through to at least the eighteenth century.1 The word baybay means “to spell” in Tagalog, which was the language most frequently written with the baybayin script. Apart from Tagalog, baybayin (with some necessary changes) was used to write Ilocano (Iloko), Kapampangan, Pangasinan, Bisaya, and Bikol. The identification of baybayin with languages other than Tagalog is a contested subject, as I describe below. Continue reading “Baybayin and nationalism” →

Toponyms at Koutroulou Magoula

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Neo Monastiri

Our trusted friend Wikipedia tells us that prior to 1927 the name of the modern village of Neo Monastiri was Τσιόμπα (Tsioba). This name appears to be the Turkish, based on the word çoban (Felipe Rojas, email correspondence, 2018) meaning shepherd, which is a fairly common component of Turkish place names. This name is also linked to a popular Turkish producer of Greek yogurt, Chobani.

In 1927 there was a deliberate name change to Neo Monastiri. Where things get a little foggy is the progression of names prior to this change. The use and existence of Tsioba is documented below, but another name is noted in this source: Biclerer (Μπικλερέρ), also Turkish. There is also mention of the village being called Malamidohori in honor of the Fthiotida representative Efstathios Malamidas, who founded the village, though this name didn’t stick (1925). One reference was found to the toponym Hajoba as the name of the village prior to the arrival of the Bulgarian immigrants. As we know, the village was rebuilt after a 1955 earthquake, and now the former location is referred to as the “old village” (Paliohori). The toponym Neo Monastiri was directly transferred between places.

Figure 1. A map from The Wars of the Nineties, courtesy of the Anne SK Brown Military Collection at the John Hay Library.

The oldest known reference to a village toponym is from an 1897 map (figure 1) in the book The Wars of the Nineties, published in 1899 in London. This map shows the town of Tsioba in the correct location for Neo Monastiri based on comparison with the surrounding towns. From this, it’s obvious that there was a small village, as it was described in sources contemporary to the map, at the location prior to the establishment of the current community living there. One source writes that that itinerant shepherds or vlachs lived in the village for fifty years prior to their own arrival . There is a note that these names applied to older ‘settlements’, not villages, although no distinction is made between what that means, exactly. There’s no record of a Greek toponym in use prior to 1927, which is interesting given the array of possible Turkish names used prior to this time. Continue reading “Toponyms at Koutroulou Magoula” →

Turkish Language Reform

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I want this post to be shorter than usual, since I’m mostly just interested in presenting two images I find fascinating. They are both related to the Turkish Language Reform. In 1929, Mustafa Kemal Atatürk decreed that Turkish would from then on be written in the Latin alphabet (as opposed to the Ottoman Arabic script used previously).2

This first image is of an Ottoman calendar published in Thessaloniki in 1911. It demonstrates a remarkable diversity of scripts and languages. These include Arabic and Turkish (in the Arabic script) using the Islamic calendar; Bulgarian (in Cyrillic); Greek (with the Julian calendar); French (with the Gregorian); Armenian; and Ladino (in the Hebrew script), with the Jewish calendar. Some discussion is available here. Isn’t this just incredible!

This second photo is of Atatürk supposedly teaching the Latin alphabet. The photo is clearly propagandistic, but still a fascinating historical document.

Some background on Baybayin, a pre-Hispanic Filipino Script

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Update: a more recent, more detailed, and better-informed version of this project is available here.

A page from the Doctrina Christiana, with Baybayin (Tagalog) on top and Latin (Spanish) below.

In this post I focus on Baybayin, a writing system native to the Philippines. Baybayin is a Brahmic script used to write Tagalog through to the period of Spanish colonization.3 There are few academic studies of Baybayin.4 What we know about this script mostly comes from Spanish missionaries who learned, documented, and translated Baybayin texts in the 16th century. The earliest known book published in Tagalog is the Doctrina Cristiana from 1593, which includes both Latin and Baybayin transcriptions as well as a translation into Spanish. At this time, literacy in the Philippines was fairly widespread, though it seems literature remained primarily oral. The Boxer Codex of 1590 reported that native inhabitants “have neither books nor histories nor do they write anything of length but only letters and reminders to one another.”5 This claim may have been used to cover up mass destruction by Spanish priests of Baybayin writings. In 1921, Otley Beyer, an American scholar of the Philippines, wrote: Continue reading “Some background on Baybayin, a pre-Hispanic Filipino Script” →

Engaged Archaeology: Sonya Atalay’s Work at Çatalhöyük

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In this post, I wanted to talk a bit about an archaeologist I admire, Sonya Atalay. I saw her speak two weeks ago here at Brown and her work will continue to inspire and problematize my research projects.

Overview and context

Sonya Atalay is currently Associate Professor of Anthropology at the University of Massachussets, Amherst. Her research interests include community-based research and indigenous archaeology and heritage. Her book Community-Based Archaeology: Research with, by, and for Indigenous and Local Communities (Berkeley: University of California Press, 2012) is a pioneering work in the field of engaged archaeology. Atalay’s interest in community-based participatory research (CBPR) draws on her Anishinabe (Ojibwe) heritage. She has worked extensively with American Indian communities, especially in the Midwestern United States. Here I will focus not on this research but rather on Atalay’s work in Çatalhöyük, an archaeological site in southern Turkey.

Çatalhöyük is most famous for the remains of a large, densely packed settlement from around 9000 years ago. The ruins point to a community that was remarkably complicated for its time. The site is particularly important because it testifies to “the evolution of social organization and cultural practices as humans adapted to a sedentary life,” including early forms of religion (to quote from the site’s inscription as a UNESCO World Heritage Site). Çatalhöyük was first excavated in 1958, but the current project dates to 1993. This second phase of excavation is based on the principles of post-processual archaeology developed by Ian Hodder, the site’s director. In short, this theoretical movement emphasizes the subjectivity of archaeological interpretations, undermining positivist tendencies and universalist claims. In other words, Çatalhöyük is a natural environment for the implementation of Atalay’s engaged archaeology. Continue reading “Engaged Archaeology: Sonya Atalay’s Work at Çatalhöyük” →

Scholar, Activist, or Religious Figure? John Wesley Gilbert’s Reception and Legacy

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This paper was delivered as part of a student-led symposium on the life and legacy of John Wesley Gilbert held on 2 March 2018, as part of the Joukowsky Institute’s conference entitled State of the Field 2018: Archaeology and Social Justice. A video recording is available here; my presentation begins at 30:30. The slides I used are available here, and I’ve added the appropriate images below when possible. Any questions or comments are very much appreciated (as are requests for sources)!

Please see also my later piece published in Eidolon, “How to Write Black Disciplinary History on Its Own Terms: The Complex Life of John Wesley Gilbert” (with Amanda Brynn).

In this paper, I analyze primary sources to reveal contemporary attitudes to Gilbert and his work as a cleric, a writer, and a scholar. First, I discuss Gilbert’s relationship with Methodism, including his mission to the Congo. I then turn to Gilbert’s political activity and contemporary reception, before ending with Gilbert’s modern legacy. I argue that these three facets of Gilbert’s life – his religion, politics, and scholarship – reflect three different approaches to John Wesley Gilbert, the man and the symbol. Paying close attention to the shifting emphases in the legacy of John Wesley Gilbert pushes us to be more reflexive in our own approaches to him and reflect on how our politics are entangled with the representation of the past. Continue reading “Scholar, Activist, or Religious Figure? John Wesley Gilbert’s Reception and Legacy” →

Textbook Narratives in Cyprus

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I wanted to briefly talk about the presentation of recent Cypriot history in Turkish and Greek textbooks. This subject was treated very adroitly in the volume edited by Rebecca Bryant and Yannis Papadakis entitled Cyprus and the Politics of Memory, and I don’t want to beat a dead horse. But there’s a few interesting observations I’d like to make towards the end of this post.

Historical context

Cyprus is an island in the Mediterranean with a long documented history, including Mycenean settlement in the second millennium BCE and a Greek presence since. In the past four thousand years, the island has been governed by many major powers, including – in chronological order – Egyptians, Romans, Venetians, Ottomans, and the British. In July 1878, the British Empire assumed control of the island from the Ottoman Empire. This short background is necessary to understand the context for the narratives I discuss here.

A demonstration for enosis in the 1930s.
Continue reading “Textbook Narratives in Cyprus” →

Reviewing Derek Walcott’s Omeros

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                                        I said, “Omeros,”

and O was the conch-shell’s invocation, mer was
both mother and sea in our Antillean patois,
os, a grey bone, and the white surf as it crashes

and spreads its sibilant collar on a lace shore.
Omeros was the crunch of dry leaves, and the washes
that echoed from a cave-mouth when the tide has ebbed.

(Omeros bk. 1 ch. 2 sec. 3)

Derek Walcott’s masterful Omeros is a palimpsest. As an epic poem, it is deeply indebted to Homer; as a portrait of St Lucia, it is bound to the daily rhythm of island life. It is this tension between rootedness in the Caribbean and participation in the “global republic” of English (to borrow from Paula Burnett) that Walcott explores in his imagination of a postcolonial world. Reading Omeros means inhabiting the contradictions inherent in the postcolonial condition. Walcott’s poetic work is an extraordinarily successful exploration of modern life, all accomplished in poignant and achingly beautiful lyric verse.

The poem is structured as an odyssey, shifting from the present-day Caribbean to modern-day Europe and seventeenth-century Africa before returning to Walcott’s home island. The narrative is divided into seven books that provide a structure for the 64 chapters, each of which comprises a handful of sections. Yet the plot, such as it is, can be roughly split in three. In the first part, Achille and Hector (two fishermen) are competing for the affections of Helen against the backdrop of modernizing St Lucia. The second part of Omeros shifts to a broader view of the world by considering Philoctete and Ma Kilman. Their connections with Africa are visceral, spiritual, and deeply allegorical; in the case of Philoctete’s wound, the legacy of slavery quite literally bleeds into the present. The narrator dwells both on the horrors of the Middle Passage and the contradictions of the contemporary metropole before returning to the St Lucian town of Gros-Ilet in the concluding section. To end, the narrator turns away from history to instead depict the tourists who flood St Lucia’s beaches today: “barefoot Americans strolling into the banks— / there was a plague of them now, worse than the insects / who, at least, were natives” (1.10.3). In this third and final section, Hector dies driving these same tourists from the airport to a hotel, while Achille remains afloat as a fisherman.

Continue reading “Reviewing Derek Walcott’s Omeros“ →