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Grievances and Rumors in Tahrir: Egyptian Bodies between the Material and the Imaginary
Abstract
From January 2012, protests in Egypt turned Tahrir Square into a sit-in of remarkable size and persistence. Accordingly, activists, businessmen, politicians, and provocateurs sought to appeal to this ready audience through pamphlets, newsletters, fliers, signs, and other documents posted or distributed in and around Tahrir Square. My paper will look at the range of accusations, blame, and rumors that circulated in the various documents collected, translated, and published on the Web site www.TahrirDocuments.org. This is productive in two respects. First, looking at such expressions offers an alternative approach to tracing notions of justice in the ongoing Egyptian revolution. Although many documents put forward political programs (often linked to organized political parties and coalitions or individuals), the articulations of a just political future for Egypt tended to harden around several demands (some shared by the majority of political actors, others disputed among them) that came to be repeated over and over again. By looking at accusations and rumors, however, I hope to excavate different articulations of justice, which remained open while material coded as “political” became fixed and closed. And while political demands operated, for the most part, on a national level—making demands and proposing solutions for Egypt and Egyptians—I believe that looking at accusations, blame, and rumors can help to tease out the local, national, regional, and international concerns that were often subsumed by the national (Egyptian Revolution) and the regional (Arab Spring). While attention was often focused on the fall of Egyptian president Husni Mubarak, accusations of corruption leveled at an individual policeman in a local station (to choose just one example) can shed light on how the revolution—and by extension, concepts of justice—might have been envisioned on a smaller scale. Second, looking at a phenomenon such as rumors can also help to illuminate certain anxieties among the revolutionaries of Tahrir Square and Egyptian society more broadly during a period of unrest and uncertainty. Again, looking at this material can help expand our understanding of the concerns of groups and individuals beyond that material which voiced explicitly political concerns (regarding military rule, the Muslim Brotherhood, and so on). Thus, accusation, blame, and rumors make up a field of discussion that includes the explicitly political but expands beyond it, allowing us to better understand the range of Egyptian hopes and anxieties over the past year.
Discipline
History
Geographic Area
Egypt
Sub Area
Current Events