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Beyond the Abstractions: Hisham Sharabi and an Arab-American Intellectual Generation
Abstract
Hisham Sharabi was a Palestinian intellectual whose life exemplified transnationalism. Though he spent his earliest years in pre-nakbah Palestine, for most of his life he traversed the Middle East and the US in search of educational advancement and political enlightenment. This paper argues that Sharabi was part of a politicized intellectual generation of Arab-American migrants who were spurred into action by the Arab-Israeli conflict and a shared experience of exile. It examines how transnational politics played out in the life of a man who helped found some of the most of the important pro-Palestinian political organizations in the post-1967 era, including the Association of Arab-American University Graduates (AAUG) and the National Association of Arab-Americans (NAAA). These organizations differed in terms of their ideology and methods, but both advocated for justice in America, the Middle East, and the greater Third World based on the transnational perspectives of their members. Using Sharabi’s memoirs and various organizations’ papers, I trace the development of his political ideology and activism. Just as Sharabi was never satisfied with any single movement or method, he never found one place to call home. The tensions of exile and his disenchantment with political structures in the US and the Arab world pushed him to continually question the concept of the nation and civilization-based identities. Thus, my paper will analyze how Sharabi could transform from being an ardent nationalist in the Syrian Social Nationalist Party into someone who later wrote, “Today, what concerns me is not a set of abstractions, but the life of the suffering, the exploited, and the enslaved."1 1. Sharabi, Embers and Ashes: Memoirs of an Arab Intellectual (Northhampton, MA: Olive Branch Press, 2008), 51.
Discipline
History
Geographic Area
North America
Sub Area
Arab-Israeli Conflict