Held in trust : Waqf in the Islamic world
Waqfs (pious endowments) long held a crucial place in the political, economic, and social life of the Islamic world. Waqfs were major sources of education, health care, and employment; they shaped the city and contributed to the upkeep of religious edifices. They constituted a major resource, and their status was at stake in repeated struggles to impose competing definitions of legitimacy and community. Closer examination of the diverse legal, institutional, and practical aspects of waqfs in different regions and communities is necessary to a deeper understanding of their dynamism and resilience. This volume, which evolved from papers delivered at the 2005 American University in Cairo Annual History Seminar, offers a meticulous set of studies that fills a gap in our knowledge of waqf and its uses.
Family Life in the Ottoman Mediterranean: A Social History
Beshara Doumani’s book deals with the family dynamics in the Ottoman Arab lands before the Western hegemony ruled over there, focusing on “three of the areas usually ignored in the scholarship: provincial regions, the middle centuries of the Ottoman rule, and middling propertied urban groups.” (p. 39) Challenging “big isms” such as Orientalism or Islamism, he aims at historicizing family in Nablus and Tripoli in order to offer a new and better frame for family, gender and property of this time and freeing them from stereotypes. The relatively large time period of this study is two centuries spanning from 1660 to 1860 on the ground that “family life is best measured by generations, not decades.” (p. 40) The author primarily relies on the Ottoman court records and utilizes stories of people derived from these records as the skeleton of the chapters. To him, these registers create a “communal textual memory,” therefore worthy of attention of not only legalists, but also of social historians to delve into daily life of ordinary individuals.
Continents of Liberty: Emerson and Gerald Vizenor’s Chair of Tears
Ralph Waldo Emerson protested what came to be known as the Trail of Tears in a public letter to President Martin Van Buren in 1838. Th e Cherokee Nation, he argued, had been cheated by a “sham treaty” (Emerson, “Letter” 50), the will of the people ignored, and a false acquiescence to removal written into law. In making a passionate appeal to the highest “chair” of the land, Emerson underscored the great political and moral stakes involved: