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Muslims and Muslim Cultures
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From: Charles Bayless <charles.bayless_at_gmail.com>
Date: Sun, 07 Sep 2014 18:07:30 -0400
Elsa,
Thanks for moderating the thought provoking discussion this month.
It prompted me to go back and read a book I purchased a couple of years ago which looked interesting but which I had just not gotten to, Three Empires On the Nile by Dominic Green. My review is at Revivifying History <http://thingfinder.blogspot.com/2014/08/revivifying-history.html> . The story is that of the three empires on the Nile 1869-1899, the Egyptian Empire (which conquered and ruled Sudan and parts of Abyssinia, in large part for the riches associated with the slave trade), the Ottoman Empire which nominally maintained suzerainty over Egypt, and Britain (seeking to stamp out the slave trade, and maintain the open trade routes to India, but not wanting to get stuck in Egypt). In addition, there was a budding empire, the Caliphate of the Mahdi seeking to establish a global caliphate starting in Sudan and spreading to Egypt.
It is a wonderful read, treating all parties as full fleshed complex individuals and groups with shifting and conflicting objectives and interests within each state, among the states, among the actors within the states, and over time. Green has done an amazing job at resurrecting voices from the past. It is especially interesting because what happened on the Nile in 1869-1899 is still being played out all across the Middle East today: geopolitics, class struggles, struggles of economic development, religious zealots, gender conflicts, sectarian struggles, reformists, technocrats, landed gentry, urban poor, rural poor, traditionalists, nationalists, ideologists, ethnic cleansing, etc. All generating the types of horrors we have seen in the headlines in the past month from Nigeria to Syria to the UK.
In reading this book, my first instinct was that, while wonderfully researched, well written and intelligently conveyed, it could in no way be considered anything other than an adult book. Of interest at best to perhaps AP World History students.
On the other hand, Marc Aronson had an interesting column back in October last year, The Elephant in the Reading Room <http://www.slj.com/2013/10/opinion/consider-the-source/the-elephant-in-the-reading-room-consider-the-source/> . His thesis was: “The elephant in the reading room is the textbook. Sucking the life out of content has insured that pleasure reading levels decline. Want our kids to choose more challenging independent reading? Give them better required reading.”
I suspect Three Empires On the Nile was the type of book he was referencing. It delivers what Marc was seeing as missing: “history as epic, as operatic, as tragic or triumphant.” Far, far better than any canned textbook account of the region and the period and a good example of E.O. Wilson’s idea of consilience in that it integrates the fields of governance, politics, economics, anthropology, religion, industrialization, engineering, scientific innovation, etc. Plus, it delivers no pat answers and provides a platform for all sorts of discussions about how to interpret history differently than what resides in textbooks.
Charles
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Received on Sun 07 Sep 2014 05:08:58 PM CDT
Date: Sun, 07 Sep 2014 18:07:30 -0400
Elsa,
Thanks for moderating the thought provoking discussion this month.
It prompted me to go back and read a book I purchased a couple of years ago which looked interesting but which I had just not gotten to, Three Empires On the Nile by Dominic Green. My review is at Revivifying History <http://thingfinder.blogspot.com/2014/08/revivifying-history.html> . The story is that of the three empires on the Nile 1869-1899, the Egyptian Empire (which conquered and ruled Sudan and parts of Abyssinia, in large part for the riches associated with the slave trade), the Ottoman Empire which nominally maintained suzerainty over Egypt, and Britain (seeking to stamp out the slave trade, and maintain the open trade routes to India, but not wanting to get stuck in Egypt). In addition, there was a budding empire, the Caliphate of the Mahdi seeking to establish a global caliphate starting in Sudan and spreading to Egypt.
It is a wonderful read, treating all parties as full fleshed complex individuals and groups with shifting and conflicting objectives and interests within each state, among the states, among the actors within the states, and over time. Green has done an amazing job at resurrecting voices from the past. It is especially interesting because what happened on the Nile in 1869-1899 is still being played out all across the Middle East today: geopolitics, class struggles, struggles of economic development, religious zealots, gender conflicts, sectarian struggles, reformists, technocrats, landed gentry, urban poor, rural poor, traditionalists, nationalists, ideologists, ethnic cleansing, etc. All generating the types of horrors we have seen in the headlines in the past month from Nigeria to Syria to the UK.
In reading this book, my first instinct was that, while wonderfully researched, well written and intelligently conveyed, it could in no way be considered anything other than an adult book. Of interest at best to perhaps AP World History students.
On the other hand, Marc Aronson had an interesting column back in October last year, The Elephant in the Reading Room <http://www.slj.com/2013/10/opinion/consider-the-source/the-elephant-in-the-reading-room-consider-the-source/> . His thesis was: “The elephant in the reading room is the textbook. Sucking the life out of content has insured that pleasure reading levels decline. Want our kids to choose more challenging independent reading? Give them better required reading.”
I suspect Three Empires On the Nile was the type of book he was referencing. It delivers what Marc was seeing as missing: “history as epic, as operatic, as tragic or triumphant.” Far, far better than any canned textbook account of the region and the period and a good example of E.O. Wilson’s idea of consilience in that it integrates the fields of governance, politics, economics, anthropology, religion, industrialization, engineering, scientific innovation, etc. Plus, it delivers no pat answers and provides a platform for all sorts of discussions about how to interpret history differently than what resides in textbooks.
Charles
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Received on Sun 07 Sep 2014 05:08:58 PM CDT
