Wikipedia

The Arab Mind

The Arab Mind is a non-fiction cultural psychology book by Hungarian-born, Jewish cultural anthropologist and Orientalist Raphael Patai. He 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".[1]

Contents edit

In describing his interest in his subject, Patai writes in the original preface to his book: "When it comes to the Arabs, I must admit to an incurable romanticism; nay more than that: to having had a life-long attachment to Araby."

Along with prefaces, a conclusion, and a postscript, the book contains 16 chapters, including on Arab child-rearing 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.

Public reception edit

The book came to public attention in 2004, after investigative journalist Seymour Hersh, writing for The New Yorker, reported that an academic told him the book was "the bible of the neocons on Arab behavior." Hersh reported: "The notion that Arabs are particularly vulnerable to sexual humiliation became a talking point among pro-war Washington conservatives in the months before the March, 2003, invasion of Iraq. One book that was frequently cited was The Arab Mind.”[2]

Not only was the book a point of discussion among politicians and policy-makers, but it was actively distributed by the Pentagon to the U.S. Armed Forces as a purported pedagogical tool during the U.S. War on Terror.[3]

Criticism edit

Patai is criticized at several points in Edward Said's book Orientalism; he writes that the book functions:

“...to eradicate the plurality of differences among the Arabs (whoever they may be in fact) in the interest of one difference, that one setting Arabs off from everyone else.”[4]

Other scholars describe the book as simplistic, reductionist, stereotyping, generic, racist, essentialist, outdated, superseded, flawed, unscientific, coldhearted, and even intellectually dishonest.[5][6][7][8][9][10][11][12][13] [14] The book has been compared to Fouad Ajami's The Arab Predicament (1992) and Hilal Khashan's Arabs at the Crossroads (2000).[13] It is worth noting that some other scholars, including Arab scholars such as Mohammad Al-Jabri, used the concept of "Arab mind" or "Arab reason" to different effect.[15][16]


Scholar Fouad M. Moughrabi observed that this book is not an isolated incident, but rather part of a wider pseudo-intellectual trend, writing:

"A substantial number of social-psychological studies dealing with the Arab world purport to explain the 'Arab basic personality', or 'the Arab mind'...Furthermore, the core of this research is often relied upon by many in the media and in the professions to explain everything ranging from internal political rivalries in the Arab world to the Arab-Israeli conflict...The use of terms such as the 'Arab mind' or the 'Arab basic personality', unscientific and demeaning to the subject of research, reveals a dangerous and misleading tendency toward categorical and sweeping generalizations which are not conducive to an enlightened search for better understanding of collective behavior."[7]

The Racism Watch organisation reported in June 2004 that Manning Marable, Columbia University director of African American Studies, had called for immediate action to be taken to end the U.S. military's use of the book. This was followed by a surge of media interest in the book during the summer of 2004.[17]

The book was described by The Guardian correspondent Brian Whitaker as one that presents "an overwhelmingly negative picture of the Arabs."[18] According to a 2004 Boston Globe article by Emram Qureshi, the book's methodology is "emblematic of a bygone era of scholarship focused on the notion of a 'national character,' or personality archetype".[19]

See also edit

References edit

  1. ^ # Recovery Resources Press, ISBN 978-0-9672015-5-9.
  2. ^ "The Gray Zone" by Seymour M. Hersh, The New Yorker.
  3. ^ Moughrabi, Fouad (2009). "Moving Toward a Knowledge Society in the Arab World". Arab Studies Quarterly. 31 (4): 17–31. ISSN 0271-3519. JSTOR 41858593.
  4. ^ W., Said, Edward (2019). Orientalism. Penguin Books. ISBN 978-0-14-118742-6. OCLC 1200830761.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  5. ^ Labelle, Maurice Jr (2019-04-01). "Empathy and the Lebanese Civil War of 1958 in the USA". Arab Studies Quarterly. 41 (2). doi:10.13169/arabstudquar.41.2.0172. ISSN 0271-3519. S2CID 198619477.
  6. ^ S. M. Stern (ed.), Ignác Goldziher, Muslim Studies, Transaction 2006, ISBN 0-202-30778-6 p. LXXXVI;
    Abdeslam M. Maghraoui: Liberalism Without Democracy: Nationhood and Citizenship in Egypt, 1922-1936, Duke University Press 2006, ISBN 0-8223-3838-6, p. 11;
    Michael Hudson: The Political Culture Approach to Arab Democratization. In: Rex Brynen, Baghat Korany, Paul Noble (eds.), Political Liberalization and Democratization in the Arab World, Lynne Rienner 1995, ISBN 1-55587-579-3, p. 66;
    Fouad M. Moughrabi, The Arab Basic Personality: A Critical Survey of the Literature. In: International Journal of Middle East Studies, 9.1 (January 1978), Cambridge University Press, pp. 99–112;
    Ibrahim Abhukattala, The New Bogeyman Under the Bed: Image Formation of Islam in the Western School Curriculum and Media. In: Joe L. Kincheloe, Shirley R. Steinberg (eds.), The Miseducation of the West: How Schools and the Media Distort Our Understanding of the Islamic World, Praeger 2004, ISBN 0-275-98160-6, p. 167.
  7. ^ a b Moughrabi, Fouad M. (1978). "The Arab Basic Personality: A Critical Survey of the Literature". International Journal of Middle East Studies. 9 (1): 99–112. doi:10.1017/S0020743800051722. ISSN 0020-7438. JSTOR 162628. S2CID 143599329.
  8. ^ Davis, Eric (2008). "Pensée 3: A Sectarian Middle East?". International Journal of Middle East Studies. 40 (4): 555–558. doi:10.1017/S0020743808081476. ISSN 0020-7438. JSTOR 40206006. S2CID 153808981.
  9. ^ Zayani, Mohamed (2008). "Courting and Containing the Arab Street: Arab Public Opinion, the Middle East and U.S. Public Diplomacy". Arab Studies Quarterly. 30 (2): 48. ISSN 0271-3519. JSTOR 41858543.
  10. ^ فندي, ﻣﺄمون (1996). "«حتى لا نقع في الفخ܃ حدوتة «العقل العربي". The Arab Studies Journal. 4 (1): 17–21. ISSN 1083-4753. JSTOR 27933688.
  11. ^ Turki, Fawaz (1975). "The Palestinian Estranged". Journal of Palestine Studies. 5 (1/2): 82–96. doi:10.2307/2535684. ISSN 0377-919X. JSTOR 2535684.
  12. ^ Aruri, Naseer H. (1989). "The Recolonization of the Arab World". Arab Studies Quarterly. 11 (2/3): 273–286. ISSN 0271-3519. JSTOR 41859072.
  13. ^ a b AbuKhalil, As'ad (2001). "Recent Books: Arabs at the Crossroads". Journal of Palestine Studies. 30 (2): 115. doi:10.1525/jps.2001.30.2.108. ISSN 0377-919X. JSTOR 10.1525/jps.2001.30.2.108.
  14. ^ Strindberg, Anders; Wärn, Mats (2005). "Realities of Resistance: Hizballah, the Palestinian Rejectionists, and al-Qa'ida Compared". Journal of Palestine Studies. 34 (3): 23–41. doi:10.1525/jps.2005.34.3.23. ISSN 0377-919X. JSTOR 10.1525/jps.2005.34.3.23.
  15. ^ "Mohammed Abed Al-Jabri. The Formation of Arab Reason: Text, Tradition and the Construction of Modernity in the Arab World. London and New York: I.B. Tauris, in association with The Centre for Arab Unity Studies, 2011. x+462 pages. Cloth US$90.00 ISBN 978-1-84885-061-3". Review of Middle East Studies. 46 (2): 234–236. 2012. doi:10.1017/S2151348100003451. ISSN 2151-3481.
  16. ^ Esposito, John L., ed. (2003-01-01). "Jabiri, Muhammad Abid al-". The Oxford Dictionary of Islam. Oxford University Press. doi:10.1093/acref/9780195125580.001.0001. ISBN 978-0-19-512558-0.
  17. ^ PCDC Edu - 2004 Racism Watch Calls for Action to End Use of Anti-Arab Books by the U.S. Government Archived 2010-08-30 at the Wayback Machine
  18. ^ "Its best use is as a doorstop" by Brian Whitaker, The Guardian.
  19. ^ Emram Qureshi (May 30, 2004). "Misreading 'The Arab Mind'". Boston Globe. Archived from the original on February 23, 2006.

External links edit

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