The Arab Mind
Encyclopedia
The Arab Mind is a non-fiction cultural psychology
book by cultural anthropologist Raphael Patai
, who also wrote The Jewish Mind
. The book advocates a tribal-group-survival explanation for the driving factors behind Arab culture.
It was first published in 1973, and later revised in 1983. A 2007 reprint was further "updated with new demographic information about the Arab world".
The book came to public attention in 2004 after investigative journalist Seymour Hersh writing for the New Yorker magazine revealed that the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior" to the effect that it was the source of the idea held by the US military officials responsible for the Abu Ghraib scandal that "Arabs are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation".
practices, three chapters on Bedouin
influences and values, Arab language, Arab art, sexual honor/repression, freedom/hospitality/outlets, Islam
's impact, unity and conflict and conflict resolution
, and Westernization
. A four-page comparison to Spanish America
is made in Appendix II.
The Foreword is by Norvell B. DeAtkine, Director of Middle East Studies at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg
.
's book Orientalism
.
The book is described as simplistic, reductionist
, stereotyping, generic, essentialist, outdated, superseded, flawed, unscientific
and even intellectually dishonest by other scholars.
, Manning Marable
, had called for immediate action to be taken to end the U.S. military's use the book.
This was followed by a surge of media interest in the book during the summer of 2004.
The book was described by Guardian Newspaper
correspondent Brian Whitaker
as one that presents "an overwhelmingly negative picture of the Arabs."
In an article in the New Yorker magazine, Seymour Hersh
said that he was told by an academic that the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behaviour". The Guardian also said that the book's best use was as a door stop.
According to a 2004 Boston Globe article by Emram Qureshi, the book's methodology is
In his view the book is "emblematic of a bygone era of scholarship focused on the notion of a 'national character,' or personality archetype". According to Qureshi, Sondra Hale
, a professor of anthropology and chair of the women's studies
program at UCLA, sent him an e-mail in which she stated it can "no longer be taken seriously".
Philip S. Golub calls it “a compendium of racist
stereotype
s and Eurocentric
generalizations” which “has become the bible of the Bush administration’s leading neoconservative lights and ‘the most popular and widely read book on the Arabs in the U.S. military.’”
Cultural psychology
Cultural psychology is a field of psychology which assumes the idea that culture and mind are inseparable, and that psychological theories grounded in one culture are likely to be limited in applicability when applied to a different culture...
book by cultural anthropologist Raphael Patai
Raphael Patai
Raphael Patai , born Ervin György Patai, was a Hungarian-Jewish ethnographer, historian, Orientalist and anthropologist.-Family background:...
, who also wrote The Jewish Mind
The Jewish Mind
The Jewish Mind is a non-fiction cultural psychology book by cultural anthropologist Raphael Patai. first published in 1977.-Contents:The part I, "Preliminaries", lays the groundwork for the rest of the book. The part II, "Six Great Historic Encounters", reviews the formative and lasting...
. The book advocates a tribal-group-survival explanation for the driving factors behind Arab culture.
It was first published in 1973, and later revised in 1983. A 2007 reprint was further "updated with new demographic information about the Arab world".
The book came to public attention in 2004 after investigative journalist Seymour Hersh writing for the New Yorker magazine revealed that the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior" to the effect that it was the source of the idea held by the US military officials responsible for the Abu Ghraib scandal that "Arabs are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation".
Contents
Along with prefaces, a conclusion and a postscript, the book contains 16 chapters including Arab child-rearingParenting
Parenting is the process of promoting and supporting the physical, emotional, social, and intellectual development of a child from infancy to adulthood...
practices, three chapters on Bedouin
Bedouin
The Bedouin are a part of a predominantly desert-dwelling Arab ethnic group traditionally divided into tribes or clans, known in Arabic as ..-Etymology:...
influences and values, Arab language, Arab art, sexual honor/repression, freedom/hospitality/outlets, Islam
Islam
Islam . The most common are and . : Arabic pronunciation varies regionally. The first vowel ranges from ~~. The second vowel ranges from ~~~...
's impact, unity and conflict and conflict resolution
Conflict resolution
Conflict resolution is conceptualized as the methods and processes involved in facilitating the peaceful ending of some social conflict. Often, committed group members attempt to resolve group conflicts by actively communicating information about their conflicting motives or ideologies to the rest...
, and Westernization
Westernization
Westernization or Westernisation , also occidentalization or occidentalisation , is a process whereby societies come under or adopt Western culture in such matters as industry, technology, law, politics, economics, lifestyle, diet, language, alphabet,...
. A four-page comparison to Spanish America
Ibero-America
Ibero-America is a term used since the second half of the 19th century to refer collectively to the countries in the Americas that were formerly colonies of Spain or Portugal. Spain and Portugal are themselves included in some definitions, such as that of the Ibero-American Summit and the...
is made in Appendix II.
The Foreword is by Norvell B. DeAtkine, Director of Middle East Studies at the John F. Kennedy Special Warfare Center and School at Fort Bragg
Fort Bragg, North Carolina
Fort Bragg is a major United States Army installation, in Cumberland and Hoke counties, North Carolina, U.S., mostly in Fayetteville but also partly in the town of Spring Lake. It was also a census-designated place in the 2010 census and had a population of 39,457. The fort is named for Confederate...
.
Criticism
Patai is criticized in passing at several points in Edward SaidEdward Said
Edward Wadie Saïd was a Palestinian-American literary theorist and advocate for Palestinian rights. He was University Professor of English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University and a founding figure in postcolonialism...
's book Orientalism
Orientalism (book)
Orientalism is a book published in 1978 by Edward Said that has been highly influential and controversial in postcolonial studies and other fields. In the book, Said effectively redefined the term "Orientalism" to mean a constellation of false assumptions underlying Western attitudes toward the...
.
The book is described as simplistic, reductionist
Reductionism
Reductionism can mean either an approach to understanding the nature of complex things by reducing them to the interactions of their parts, or to simpler or more fundamental things or a philosophical position that a complex system is nothing but the sum of its parts, and that an account of it can...
, stereotyping, generic, essentialist, outdated, superseded, flawed, unscientific
Science
Science is a systematic enterprise that builds and organizes knowledge in the form of testable explanations and predictions about the universe...
and even intellectually dishonest by other scholars.
2004 criticism of the book's use by the US military
The Racism Watch organisation reported in June 2004 that Columbia University director of African American StudiesAfrican American studies
African American studies is a subset of Black studies or Africana studies. It is an interdisciplinary academic field devoted to the study of the history, culture, and politics of African Americans...
, Manning Marable
Manning Marable
William Manning Marable was an American professor of public affairs, history and African-American Studies at Columbia University. Marable founded and directed the Institute for Research in African-American Studies. Marable authored several texts and was active in progressive political causes...
, had called for immediate action to be taken to end the U.S. military's use the book.
This was followed by a surge of media interest in the book during the summer of 2004.
The book was described by Guardian Newspaper
The Guardian
The Guardian, formerly known as The Manchester Guardian , is a British national daily newspaper in the Berliner format...
correspondent Brian Whitaker
Brian Whitaker
Brian Whitaker has been a journalist for the British newspaper The Guardian since 1987 and its Middle East editor from 2000-2007. He is currently an editor on the paper's "Comment Is Free". He also writes articles for Guardian Unlimited, the internet edition of the paper...
as one that presents "an overwhelmingly negative picture of the Arabs."
In an article in the New Yorker magazine, Seymour Hersh
Seymour Hersh
Seymour Myron Hersh is an American Pulitzer Prize-winning investigative journalist and author based in Washington, D.C. He is a regular contributor to The New Yorker magazine on military and security matters...
said that he was told by an academic that the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behaviour". The Guardian also said that the book's best use was as a door stop.
According to a 2004 Boston Globe article by Emram Qureshi, the book's methodology is
"based on a fatally flawed set of assumptions -- most importantly, that there is one entirely homogenous Arab culture, derived from nomadic Bedouin culture. This ignores both the diversity and history of a people and civilization that extends across dozens of countries, from the Indian Ocean to the Atlantic, and the deeply rooted Arab culture of cities and agricultural communities."
In his view the book is "emblematic of a bygone era of scholarship focused on the notion of a 'national character,' or personality archetype". According to Qureshi, Sondra Hale
Sondra Hale
Sondra Hale is Professor of Anthropology and Women’s Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles ; former Co-editor of The and former Co-Chair, Islamic Studies.-Life:...
, a professor of anthropology and chair of the women's studies
Women's studies
Women's studies, also known as feminist studies, is an interdisciplinary academic field which explores politics, society and history from an intersectional, multicultural women's perspective...
program at UCLA, sent him an e-mail in which she stated it can "no longer be taken seriously".
Philip S. Golub calls it “a compendium of racist
Racism
Racism is the belief that inherent different traits in human racial groups justify discrimination. In the modern English language, the term "racism" is used predominantly as a pejorative epithet. It is applied especially to the practice or advocacy of racial discrimination of a pernicious nature...
stereotype
Stereotype
A stereotype is a popular belief about specific social groups or types of individuals. The concepts of "stereotype" and "prejudice" are often confused with many other different meanings...
s and Eurocentric
Eurocentrism
Eurocentrism is the practice of viewing the world from a European perspective and with an implied belief, either consciously or subconsciously, in the preeminence of European culture...
generalizations” which “has become the bible of the Bush administration’s leading neoconservative lights and ‘the most popular and widely read book on the Arabs in the U.S. military.’”
See also
- Arab culture
- Islamic culture
- Shame societyShame societyIn cultural anthropology, a shame society is the concept that, in a given society, the primary device for gaining control over children and maintaining social order is the inculcation of shame and the complementary threat of ostracism...
vs Guilt societyGuilt societyIn cultural anthropology, a guilt society is the concept that the primary method of social control in a given society is the inculcation of feelings of guilt for behaviors that the individual believes to be undesirable... - Bedouins
- Bedouin systems of justiceBedouin systems of justiceSystems of justice among the Bedouin are varied among the tribes. A number of these systems date from pre-Islamic times, and hence do not follow Sharia...
- Honor codes of the BedouinHonor codes of the BedouinSharaf and ird are Bedouin honor codes. Along with hospitality and courage/bravery, it is one of the Bedouin aspects of ethics that contain significant amounts of pre-Islamic customs...
- Bedouin systems of justice
- The Bookseller of KabulThe Bookseller of KabulThe Bookseller of Kabul is a non-fiction book written by Norwegian journalist Åsne Seierstad, about a bookseller, Shah Muhammad Rais , and his family in Kabul, Afghanistan...
(in Pakistan) - Tales from the Expat HaremTales from the Expat HaremTales from the Expat Harem: Foreign Women in Modern Turkey is a nonfiction anthology by 32 expatriate women from seven nations and five continents about their lives in modern Turkey, published by Seal Press in North America and Doğan Kitap in Turkey .Edited by Anastasia M...
(in Turkey)
External links
- "The Arab Mind Revisited" by Col. Norvell B. De Atkine (ret.), an updated foreword to the book
- "Inside The Arab Mind" by Lee Smith, Slate (magazine)Slate (magazine)Slate is a US-based English language online current affairs and culture magazine created in 1996 by former New Republic editor Michael Kinsley, initially under the ownership of Microsoft as part of MSN. On 21 December 2004 it was purchased by the Washington Post Company...
- “Culture Knowledge” and the Violence of Imperialism: Revisiting the Arab Mind by Frances S. Hasso (Oberlin CollegeOberlin CollegeOberlin College is a private liberal arts college in Oberlin, Ohio, noteworthy for having been the first American institution of higher learning to regularly admit female and black students. Connected to the college is the Oberlin Conservatory of Music, the oldest continuously operating...
), The MITMassachusetts Institute of TechnologyThe Massachusetts Institute of Technology is a private research university located in Cambridge, Massachusetts. MIT has five schools and one college, containing a total of 32 academic departments, with a strong emphasis on scientific and technological education and research.Founded in 1861 in...
Electronic Journal of Middle East Studies, Spring 2007 (PDF). - "The Arab Mind by Raphael Patai. Book review by Lloyd F. Jordan"