Spirits of Palestine: Gender, Society, and Stories of the Jinn

(Paperback)

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The Palestinian Muslim village of Artas is cradled in the lap of four mountains in the Israeli-occupied West Bank. Although Artas has experienced the violence of Israeli occupation, Spirits of Palestine does not focus exclusively on the villagers' experiences of violence, terrorism, or loss. This ethnography looks instead at the daily lives of Palestinian women and men and how they relate to tragedies and difficulties both large and small. Through stories of possession by the jinn, spirits that appear throughout the Koran, anthropologist Celia Rothenberg takes the reader past the dramatic, violent world of street battles and stone-throwing to more intimate realms of powerin homes and prisons, family and neighborhood relations, and personal experiences of migration and diaspora. Rothenberg shows how remarkably far-reaching jinn stories can be; they provide commentary on the constructed nature of kinship, strong social mores, and those who are both on the margins and at the center of a Palestinian community. Jinn stories remind us that power in all its forms has gaps and inconsistencies. Spirits of Palestine is a truly original ethnography and an essential addition to scholarship on Israel, Palestine, and the Middle East that will be of interest to cultural anthropologists, sociologists, and women's/gender studies scholars.

Reviews

Rothenberg is a skilled analyst of jinn stories. . . . Rothenberg presents a picture of the jinn as a valuable force in modern Artas. . . . Passionate, vengeful and impulsive . . . Spirits of Palestine is a valuable book . . . and its publication could not be more timely, as Israel continues to confiscate Palestinian land at an accelerating rate around Bethlehem, and the Separation Wall threatens to destroy the Artas Celia Rothenberg has recorded. * Times Literary Supplement *
Spirits of Palestine is a highly original ethnography offering real insights into the complexities of contemporary Palestinian village and spiritual life and, moreover, is a fascinating account. The old anthropological division between emic and etic is at the heart of the discourse here, between local believe and an outsider's contextualization, but it is extremely sensitively handled. The book is not only of interest to anthropologists and sociologists, but also scholars and students of religion and health. * Palestine Exploration Quarterly *
For the reader seeking to understand both the texture of Palestinian life and the possibilities for resisting oppressive structures of power, Rothenberg offers an original perspective. * Journal Of Palestinian Studies *
In this richly textured and finely tuned ethnography of spirit possession in Artas, Rothenberg follows in the grand anthropological tradition of Hilma Granqvist. Rothenberg is one of the few observers of Palestinian society to forge beyond the visible domains of the exercise of power to inner spiritual worlds. Thus she expands the parameters of Palestinian studies while carrying forward the anthropological approach to power and the supernatural. Through an examination of the jinn (spirits), she connects the moral geography, family dynamics and relations, gendered identities, and diasporic quality of Palestinian village life with the world of spirits. -- Julie Peteet, chair and associate professor of anthropology, University of Louisville

Author Bio

Celia Rothenberg is assistant professor of religious studies and health studies at McMaster University.