Saudi Arabian Literature

Saudi Arabian Literature

Saudi Arabian Literature

Purpose of the Research

This paper argues that the label Arab American as it is framed by Arab-American organizations and used in research on Arab Americans is in essence a political category (speaking to political activism), and that there are significant consequences to the Arab-American identity and community in terms of its narrow social construction.

Aims and Objectives

This paper argues that this invisibility and diminished authenticity has resulted in a significantly skewed understanding of the Arab-American community. Political activism, while a potential source of creating unity in a diverse ethnic community, can also be source of unity and disunity, as it has been in the Arab-American community.

Introduction

Ethno-political activism can be a powerful unifying force that brings together ethnic communities comprised of diverse constituencies. A collective cause (and action devoted to that cause) can obscure differences and distinctions that might otherwise create cleavages and make a collective identity difficult to achieve. For instance, Espiritu (1992) demonstrates this through an extensive analysis of how Asian-American activism served as a linchpin for pan-ethnic unification across national and ethnic lines. Causes such as societal discrimination and violence against the group, ancestral homeland conflicts, the need for political representation, negative portrayals in the media, and other social issues directly impacting the ethnic group all can serve as a rallying point. Just as geological pressure can transform coal into a diamond, social pressure can transform a diverse ethnic community into a unified social and political force.

Literature Review

Many different labels have been used to describe those who have come from what is today the Arab World. Part of this stems from the diversity in this region. As Hudson (1977:34) observes, “Nowhere is the task of definition more difficult than in the Arab world where the multiplicity of primordial identifications include kin group, sect, and universal religious community.” The confusion around how to describe Arab Americans has led them to occupy a status as “ambiguous outsiders” (Naber 2000). The ambiguity lies in the many ways in which they have been described, and have described themselves, at various points in their history in the US.

There are three general theories of ethnicity and ethnic group development (see Min 2002: pp.6-13). The primordial perspective “emphasizes premigrant, primordial ties associated with physical affinity, a common language, a common religion, and other cultural and historical commonalities as the basis of ethnicity” (p.6). The structural (mobalizationist) perspective posits ethnic solidarity and collectivity as emerging from discriminatory treatment, which results in members of the group uniting and mobilizing against structural inequalities. Finally, the social constructivist perspective “considers ethnicity to be fluid and dynamic, socially constructed in people's concrete social interactions with others” (p.11). Thus, ethnic identity is constructed in the present, rather than rooted in the past. Th is view refers to an active rather than passive ethnic identity (see Song 2003:14; Bradley 1996) in the sense that it is constructed in and through discrimination.

Methodology

This research will be founded on the lesser data. This research engaged investigations in minutia the report, items ...