The most recent ACOR virtual lecture event, “Human Heritage: Preserving Palmyra, Petra, and Hatra,” was cohosted with the Getty Research Institute (GRI) to commemorate the launch of the Getty’s new interactive online exhibition, Return to Palmyra. The presenters discussed the unique set of challenges regarding preserving the cultural and physical remains of three monumental heritage sites and the impact archaeological sites have on local communities. While not explicitly relating to the role of digital media in preservation, the lecture was a compelling example of how digital humanities content can be successful.

Histories of Exchange

From the Bronze Age through the Roman period, Palmyra (modern Tadmor) was a caravan city and a fertile oasis. As commercial trade between the Mediterranean and Near East flourished during the Hellenistic period, Syria became an integral part of these routes (Sommer 2018, i, 40–44). The land yielded valuable natural resources, such as metals, that would have been attractive to Mesopotamian and Egyptian traders (Sommer 2018, 30, 189). While Palmyra does not have immediate access to a waterway, it acted as “the middle of a sea of sands … the bottleneck of trade between the territories on both sides of the Euphrates” (Sommer 2018, 188, 190).

Along the trade routes to and from Palmyra, some merchants would have stopped at Petra as well. Caravans would have trekked through the rock-cut Nabataean city in today’s Jordan as the middle ground between Egypt, the Mediterranean, Arabia, and central and eastern Asia. After the addition of the Via Nova Triana in the early 2^nd century CE, there was a significant increase in economic prosperity in Petra, similar to that of the Near Eastern region as a whole (Schmid 2008, 364–386).

Unlike Palmyra and Petra, the Iraqi site of Hatra is secluded, located in Upper Mesopotamia, west of the Wadi Tharthar (Ahmed 1972, 103). Hatra lay between two of the most powerful empires of the early 1^st millennium: the Romans and the Parthians. Consistent interaction between these empires resulted in Aramaic, Hellenistic, and Roman influences on Hatra visible in the city’s architecture and artistic styles. Despite its precarious location, walled Hatra and its small kingdom remained an independent state and culture for much of its history (Edwell 2017, 111–112).

The Current State of Preservation

These ancient cities, while vastly different, share at least one thing in common: their potential to enrich the lives of generations to come. While European and American archaeological efforts have been underway in the Near East for a couple of centuries now, the true value of archaeological sites rests in the hands of the local communities, individuals, and institutions who are on the frontlines of the safety and prosperity of our shared human histories.

Dr. Suliman Ali Al-Farajat of the Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority (PDTRA) spoke about how, with the decrease in international tourism due to COVID-19, the Petra Archaeological Park conducted essential maintenance to support plans to boost visitor capacity and quality of services. In addition, over the years, the archaeological park has partnered with several Jordanian and regional institutions to ensure the safety of the site and the continuation of the educational and tourism initiatives. One such partnership was ACOR’s Petra Church Conservation Initiative, funded by multiple donors to preserve the mosaics throughout the church (Fig. 2). ACOR funded the installation of a protective covering for the mosaics in 1998 (Fig.  1) (American Center of Research 2021).

Dr. Al-Farajat argued that one of the most pressing issues for the PDTRA are the concerns from the local Bedouin community. The Jordanian government moved hundreds of local families out of the protected park and into a nearby village. While there is room for improvement on the park and government’s part in assisting the Bedouins (Ajaka 2014), the local community has supported the archaeological park by providing dozens of restaurants and hotels for tourists, and Jordanians see Petra as symbolic of their cultural and historical identity. Without tourism, the community would suffer from an economic decline, and yet, at the same time, the archaeological park would not be as successful as it is were it not for the education and support initiatives between preservation officials and the Bedouin community.

The ongoing political conflict in Syria and Iraq has created an entirely different set of hurdles for site management and upkeep beyond typical complications due to the age of the sites and tourism in these countries. For example, both Palmyra (Fig. 3) and Hatra (Fig. 4) were the targets of several iconoclastic campaigns by ISIL. Such attacks occurred across the region and included bulldozing structures, looting sites and museums, and removing, hammering, or shooting reliefs and sculptures (Anderson 2017, 137).

Up until the early 20^th century, the community of Tadmor lived in the old city, which had been repurposed into contemporary neighborhoods while preserving the historical and cultural integrity of ancient Palmyra. The Roman temple of Bel (Fig. 3), for example, was a Mesopotamian temple and then a Christian church before it was used as a mosque, all the while retaining its previous religious iconography (Moumni 2021). Under the French mandate after World War I, officials removed the residents of Tadmor from the old city to undertake archaeological excavations and make room for weapons storage (Sommer 2018, 4–5). During the Syrian civil war and the rise of ISIL over the last decade, large swaths of the city, ancient and modern, now lie in rubble after a series of attacks in 2015 and 2017 (Moumni 2021).

Notable Syrian archaeologists Khaled al-As’ad and his son Waleed al-As’ad have dedicated their lives to the protection and prosperity of Palmyra’s deeply rich cultural significance despite the forced removal of the community and its history over the last century (Moumni 2021). Dr. Salam Al Kuntar is a board member of Syrians for Heritage (SIMAT), an organization that prioritizes the preservation of the global Syrian cultural heritage through community-based initiatives. During her panel remarks, Dr. Al Kuntar discussed how Syrian schools have begun to amend curriculums to bring students to archaeological sites to educate the younger generation.

The local community near Hatra, according to Dr. Yasmin Abdulkareem Mohammed Ali, does not yet understand the site’s archaeological importance. Due to its location — which is over a hundred kilometers from the nearest city, Mosul — the site does not have the luxury of tourism to jump-start an international interest in preservation efforts at Hatra. Unfortunately, the area suffers from frequent insurrections, which has not provided the stability required for community engagement initiatives.

Heritage in a Digital World

Designations of these three cities as World Heritage sites (Palmyra in 1975; Petra and Hatra in 1985) have garnered international interest through tourism and research, and the growing and productive partnerships between preservation scholars and local communities have proven to be significant. In addition to such community-based initiatives, there has been an increase in universities, museums, and other research institutions providing accessible educational content online in recent years. From 3-D renderings to virtual walk-throughs and online events, such advancements have come at an opportune time with the impacts of COVID-19.

I was overcome by gratitude as I attended the “Human Heritage” panel event and browsed the Return from Palmyra exhibit from my home in North Carolina. In my personal experience, this type of supplementary material, in concert with my courses, has broadened my horizons and has vastly improved my experience as an undergraduate student. While some of these online events may have begun only as a solution to temporary restrictions on travel and public gatherings, there is something to be said for the long-term ability to bring cultural heritage preservation, in digital form, into classrooms and communities across the globe. For the last year, students, scholars, and the general public have been able to engage with content that they would not have been able to access otherwise. The application of digital humanities initiatives and projects in traditional education and advocacy settings has real potential for success (Brier 2012).

In his interview for the Return to Palmyra exhibit, Waleed Khaled al-As’ad quoted his father, who, I believe, encapsulated the beauty and importance of heritage preservation: “A human being without a past is a human being with no present and no future” (Moumni 2021). Al-As’ad went on to add that the preservation of ancient sites is also an act of self-preservation: “we must hold on to the past and learn from [the] history [of] … these civilizations; they represent a part of the human experience” (Moumni 2021). Thus, while preserving these sites provides a glimpse into human history, it also reflects who we are today and how we see ourselves. What a gift that is — to be able, through advocacy and education, to create, or deepen, intergenerational connections through new technologies.

I would like to thank ACOR and the Getty Research Institute for hosting this event and the lecturers, Dr. Salam Al Kuntar, Dr. Suliman Ali Al-Farajat, and Dr. Yasmin Abdulkareem Mohammed Ali, for their time and knowledge. This lecture event was recorded and is now available online for additional viewership.

You can watch the recorded panel “Human Heritage: Preserving Palmyra, Petra, and Hatra” on YouTube via the following links:

References

Ahmed, S. S. 1972. ”Hatra, Iraq.” Archaeology 25 (2): 103­–111.

Ajaka, N. 2014. “In Pictures: Jordan Tourism Threatens Bedouin.” Aljazeera, 4 May 2014.

American Center of Research. 2021. “Petra Church Conservation.” American Center of Research, 21 June 2021.

Anderson, B. 2017. “Beyond Rome/Parthia: Intersections of Local and Imperial Traditions in the Visual Record of Hatra.” In Arsacids, Romans, and Local Elites: Cross-Cultural Interactions of the Parthian Empire, edited by J. M. Schlude and B. B. Rubin, 137–158. Oxford: Oxbow Books.

Brier, S. 2012. “Where’s the Pedagogy? The Role of Teaching and Learning in the Digital Humanities.” In Debates in the Digital Humanities, edited by M. K. Gold, 1–10. Minneapolis: University of Minneapolis Press. DOI:10.5749/minnesota/9780816677948.003.0038

Edwell, P. 2017. “Osrhoene and Mesopotamia between Rome and Arsacid Parthia.” In Arsacids, Romans, and Local Elites: Cross-Cultural Interactions of the Parthian Empire, edited by J. M. Schlude and B. B. Rubin, 111–136. Oxford: Oxbow Books.

Moumni, R. 2021. “Interview with Waleed Khaled al-As’ad.” Return to Palmyra. Getty Research Institute, 21 June 2021.

Schmid, S. G. 2008. “The Hellenistic Period and the Nabataeans.” In Jordan: An Archaeological Reader, edited by R B. Adams, 353–411. Oakville: Equinox Publishing.

Sommer, M. 2018. Palmyra: A History. Oxford: Routledge.

The post The Challenges and Benefits of Preservation: Reflections on “Human Heritage” appeared first on ACOR Jordan.

المركز الأمريكي للأبحاث و معهد بحوث جيتي يقدمان وبكل فخر

التراث الإنساني:
الحفاظ على تدمر، البترا والحضر
برنامج عبر الفضاء الإلكتروني
يوم الأربعاء 16 حزيران

وصف البرنامج:

تحكي التواريخ القديمة لمدينة تدمر (سوريا) والبترا (الأردن) والحضر (العراق) قصة التبادل الثقافي بين هذه المدين، حيث تشارك سكانها طرق التجارة، كما قاموا ببناء آثار مماثلة، وعبدوا آلهة محلية وإقليمية مشتركة. ورغم الإدراك بالقيمة العالمية لهذه المدن من قبل المجتمعات المحلية والدولية، فإن حماية ما تبقى منها والحفاظ عليها باعتبارها تراثًا إنسانيًا مشتركًا يزال يمثل تحديّا كبيراً

هذا البرنامج مقدم باللغتين العربية والإنجليزية من قبل معهد بحوث جيتي بالتعاون مع المركز الأمريكي للأبحاث، يجمع علماء آثار من هذه المناطق لمناقشة وفهم مستقبل هذه المدن التي كانت يوما ما نابضة بالحياة وكذلك الجهود المبذولة للحفاظ عليها.

المتحدثون:

د. سلام القنطار عميدة مساعدة لشؤون الشرق الأوست من روتجرز جلوبال وأستاذة مساعدة في علم الآثار في قسم الكلاسيكيات في جامعة روتجرز في نيو برونزويك. وهي كذلك مستكشفة لناشيونال جيوغرافيك، باحثة استشارية في متحف بينسلفانيا، ورئيسة جمعية سوريون من أجل التراث في برلين.

د. سليمان علي الفرجات رئيس مجلس المفوضين لسلطة اقليم البترا التنموي السياحي في الأردن. شغل سابًقا منصب مفوض محمية البترا الأثرية. تركز اهتماماته البحثية على التخطيط والتطوير السياحي لمواقع التراث العالمي وتمكين المجتمعات المحلية.

د. ياسمين عبد الكريم محمد علي أستاذة مساعدة في علم الآثار والفنون القديمة في قسم الآثار وعميدة كلية الآثار في جامعة الموصل. هي كذلك مديرة مشروع الحفاظ على التراث المجتمعي للموصل، الذي يوثق المباني التراثية في جميع أنحاء المدينة ويوفر سجلات لأعمال الحفظ المستقبلية.

د. هيلين ملكو المديرة المشاركة للزمالات والبرامج في المركز الأمريكي للأبحاث في الأردن. تركز أبحاثها على علم الآثار والتراث الثقافي في الشرق الأوسط، والتمثيل في المتاحف، وكذلك أفكار الوعي التاريخي.

نأمل ان نراكم قريباً ومحاضرة جديدة مع أكور 

Related Links:

ACOR’s Archaeological Projects Portal

Archaeology in Jordan 2 Image Gallery

Introducing the USAID SCHEP Collection (ACOR Digital Archive)

“A Journey from the Excavation Archive Back to the Site: The Architectural Decoration of the Temple of the Winged Lions, Petra,” by Marco Dehner (14 June 2021)

“My Petra” photo essay by Jane Taylor (17 December 2020)

Return to Palmyra (interactive online exhibition) (العودة إلى تدمر)

The post التراث الإنساني: الحفاظ على تدمر، البتراء والحضر appeared first on ACOR Jordan.

ACOR and the Getty Research Institute Proudly Present:
“Human Heritage: Preserving Palmyra, Petra, and Hatra”
Hosted on Zoom on Wednesday, June 16, 2021

This program is also available in Arabic.

About the program:

Cohosted in Arabic and English by the Getty Research Institute and the American Center of Research in Jordan, this program brings together archaeologists from these regions to gain insights on the future of these once vibrant cities and efforts toward their preservation.

The ancient histories of Palmyra (Syria), Petra (Jordan), and Hatra (Iraq) tell a story of cultural exchange: their citizens shared trade routes, built comparable monuments, and worshiped common local and regional gods. These cities’ universal value has been recognized by local and global communities, but protecting and preserving their remnants as a shared human heritage remains a significant challenge.

About the panelists:

Dr. Salam Al Kuntar is assistant dean of Middle Eastern Affairs at Rutgers Global and assistant professor of archaeology at Rutgers New-Brunswick’s Department of Classics. She is a National Geographic explorer, a consulting scholar at the Penn Museum, and the chair of Syrians for Heritage (SIMAT), a cultural heritage association based in Berlin.

Dr. Suleiman Ali Al-Farajat is the chief commissioner of the Petra Development and Tourism Region Authority in Jordan. He previously served as the commissioner for the Petra Archaeological Park. His research interests focus on tourism planning and development around World Heritage Sites and empowering local communities.

Dr. Yasmin Abdulkareem Mohammed Ali is an assistant professor of archeology and ancient arts in the Department of Archeology and dean of the College of Archaeology at the University of Mosul. She is the director of the Preserving Community Heritage of Mosul project, which documents heritage buildings throughout the city and provides records for future preservation work.

Dr. Helen Malko is associate director for fellowships and programming at the American Center of Research in Jordan. Her research centers on Middle Eastern archaeology and cultural heritage, cultural representation in museums, and ideas of historical consciousness.

We hope to see you again soon for future ACOR lectures!

Related Links:

ACOR’s Archaeological Projects Portal

Archaeology in Jordan 2 Image Gallery

Introducing the USAID SCHEP Collection (ACOR Digital Archive)

“A Journey from the Excavation Archive Back to the Site: The Architectural Decoration of the Temple of the Winged Lions, Petra,” by Marco Dehner (14 June 2021)

“My Petra” photo essay by Jane Taylor (17 December 2020)

Return to Palmyra (interactive online exhibition)

The post “Human Heritage: Preserving Palmyra, Petra, and Hatra” appeared first on ACOR Jordan.

In its broadest sense, Julia’s dissertation explores the intersections between the waning of secular, populist, and transnational Pan-Arabism and the emergence of new modalities of politics centered on religion, class, and the nation-state. The narrative is structured by a series of social and institutional biographies of activist networks linked to the Movement of Arab Nationalists (Harakat al-Qawmiyyin al-‘Arab, or MAN), an influential Pan-Arabist group whose ideological and organizational transformations acted as a microcosm of the region’s dramatic mid-century political shifts. Drawing on a mix of archival and oral sources in Lebanon, Jordan, Palestine, and the United States, these social and institutional biographies interrogate a variety of modes of popular political engagement, ranging from ideological production through MAN-linked presses and literary societies to grassroots activism and guerrilla struggle. The dissertation’s bottom-up approach to political mobilization aims to demonstrate the contingent and contested nature of Arab nationalist, nation-state nationalist, and Marxist forms of politics, recognizing how even ideologically grounded activists’ political choices reflected the structuring influence of nation-state boundaries and subjectivities of class, gender, locality, and sect. 

Julia’s work in Jordan focuses specifically on the MAN’s networks in Jordan and the West Bank, where cadres recruited through local schools, sports clubs, and Palestinian refugee camps organized demonstrations in support of Gamal Abdel Nasser and ultimately formed the vanguard of the early feda’i movement. While earlier phases of Julia’s research in Beirut and Tyre utilized a mix of press and institutional archives, oral histories, and family papers, her research in Amman, Irbid, and Salt will be almost entirely based on interviews with former activists and their networks.

Julia received her M.A. in History from Brown University in 2016 and has conducted extensive archival and oral history research in Lebanon and France in preparation for her dissertation. Before starting her Ph.D. studies, she spent a year living in Lebanon where she worked as an editor at a local news website focused on regional politics. She received her B.A. (highest honors) in History from the University of California at Berkeley in 2013. 

The post Julia Gettle, ACOR-CAORC Pre-Doctoral Fellow Spring 2019 appeared first on ACOR Jordan.

Political scientist and ACOR-CAORC fellow Rana B. Khoury was in Jordan during fall 2016 researching networks of Syrian activists. She writes below about her research methodology.

As researchers, we ask many questions related to the characteristics of populations. How many voters plan to go to the polls on election day? How satisfied are citizens with a country’s economic performance? We could survey every member of a population to answer these questions, but conducting such a census is immensely expensive and impractical. It’s also unnecessary because we can make good estimates of a population based on just a sample. Randomly selecting individuals from a sampling frame—such as a voter registry or a telephone directory—allows us to estimate population characteristics with a certain amount of confidence. Collect a sample, understand a population—statistics can be beautiful.

Beautiful, unless a sampling frame for our target population does not exist. How can we study populations that are not listed anywhere? Or those who engage in informal behaviors? Hard-to-reach or “hidden” populations might include groups such as undocumented migrants, the self-employed, or jazz musicians. We can use a variety of non-probability sampling methods to reach these people, for example by “snowballing” through their connections. But in these cases we can only draw conclusions about the people in our sample—we cannot infer to the population.

Rather than giving up on the systematic study of hidden populations, researchers have developed an innovative sampling method that approximates probability sampling: respondent-driven sampling (RDS). The driving force of RDS has been the epidemiological study of populations at high-risk of HIV infection. Lately RDS has been adopted for sociological studies, especially of migrant populations. I was excited to encounter one of these studies in a course on “human rights statistics” at Northwestern University, where I am studying for a doctorate in political science. RDS struck me at that moment as a promising way to systematize my study of activists among Syrian refugees.

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Activism among Syrian refugees is nonconventional activity undertaken on behalf of the Syrian cause. Broadly understood, activism among refugees can include engagement in humanitarian relief, development projects, media and advocacy efforts, political party activities, and so forth. Such behavior is not formally accounted for as a population characteristic—that is, there is no sampling frame of activist Syrians. My prior qualitative research in Jordan did, however, indicate that activists are networked with each other, making them well suited for a network referral method like RDS. In the course of a survey, RDS researchers assess respondents’ social network size to estimate their inclusion probability and weight them into the analysis, allowing for population estimates to be made, thereby approximating a probability sample.

RDS begins with the selection of “seeds,” members of the survey population who we select to be the initial participants of the study. Seeds recruit a limited number of their peers to participate, and the process repeats with each new wave of recruits. The more waves we achieve, the more independent we become of the non-randomly selected seeds.

Maintaining the confidentiality of respondents, each survey is conducted as a 30-minute computer-assisted telephone interview. Respondents answer questions about the nature of their activism, their demographic characteristics and political values. I hope the data collected will help inform us about the development of activism under seemingly adverse circumstances and about the potential impact that activists can have in their communities and on the conflict. While studies of displacement increasingly recognize refugees as political agents, I hope to further our understanding with a systematic study of how that agency is enacted.

Today Syrians constitute the largest refugee population in the world. But this topic extends beyond Syria. The number of people displaced by conflict has dramatically increased in the decades since the Second World War. Rather than disconnected victims, many of these refugees are actively involved in the events around them. Respondent-driven sampling provides a means to better understand how regular people are transforming and transformed by conflict.

Written by Rana B. Khoury

Rana B. Khoury is currently a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Political Science at Northwestern University. She has an M.A. in Arab Studies (2012) from Georgetown University and B.A. in Political Science (2008) from American University. Her recent book, As Ohio Goes: Life in the Post-Recession Nation, explores the impact of the Great Recession and income inequality on regular Americans, placing their experiences in a political-economic context. To learn more about her work, visit https://ranakhoury.com/

The post Studying a Hard-to-Reach Population of Syrian Refugees appeared first on ACOR Jordan.