Books by Sargon Donabed
Who are the Assyrians and what role did they play in shaping modern Iraq? Were they simply bystan... more Who are the Assyrians and what role did they play in shaping modern Iraq? Were they simply bystanders, victims of collateral damage who played a passive role in its history? Furthermore, how have they negotiated their position throughout various periods of Iraq's state-building processes?
This book details a narrative of Iraq in the 20th century and refashions the Assyrian experience as an integral part of Iraq's broader contemporary historiography. It is the first comprehensive account to contextualise a native experience alongside the emerging state. Using primary and secondary data, this book offers a nuanced exploration of the dynamics that have affected and determined the trajectory of the Assyrians' experience in 20th-century Iraq.
"Sargon Donabed provides a comprehensive overview of the modern Assyrian story, merging emic and etic perspectives of their struggle to attain sovereignty over the past century and beyond. His work offers both an informative source for Assyrian ethnic history and an alternative reading for Mesopotamian regional history as a whole." -- Nabil Al-Tikriti, University of Mary Washington
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of displacement and exclusion, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the marginalized." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
"Sargon Donabed provides a comprehensive overview of the modern Assyrian story, merging emic and ... more "Sargon Donabed provides a comprehensive overview of the modern Assyrian story, merging emic and etic perspectives of their struggle to attain sovereignty over the past century and beyond. His work offers both an informative source for Assyrian ethnic history and an alternative reading for Mesopotamian regional history as a whole." -- Nabil Al-Tikriti, University of Mary Washington
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of tragedy, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the oppressed. No longer may we ignore the plight of this misunderstood minority." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
This volume explores dynamic conversations through history between individuals and communities ov... more This volume explores dynamic conversations through history between individuals and communities over questions about religion and state. Divided into two sections, our authors begin with considerations on the separation of religion and state, as well as Roger Williams’ concept of religious freedom. Authors in the first half consider nuanced debates centered on emerging narratives, with particular emphasis on Native America, Early Americans, and experiences in American immigration after Independence. The first half of the volume examines voices in American History as they publicly engage with notions of secular ideology. Discussions then shift as the volume broadens to world perspectives on religion-state relations. Authors consider critical questions of nation, religious identity and transnational narratives. The intent of this volume is to privilege new narratives about religion-state relations. Decentering discussions away from national narratives allows for emerging voices at the individual and community levels. This volume offers readers new openings through which to understand critical but overlooked interactions between individuals and groups of people with the state over questions about religion.
Images of America Series, 2006
Peer Reviewed Articles by Sargon Donabed
International Journal of Middle East Studies, 2022
Since the (re)discovery of Mesopotamia and Assyria by the Western world in the early middle 19th ... more Since the (re)discovery of Mesopotamia and Assyria by the Western world in the early middle 19th century, there have been a variety of shifts in the demography, culture, and politics of the region. These shifts accompanied the external or etic views of peoples and communities of the region that influenced the local emic identities and perceptions of self and other. Over time, Western scholars and scholars from the region shaped narratives of history, culture, language, and heritage that often subsumed, relegated, or negated entirely the experiences and histories of marginalized and minoritized groups of the Middle East including, but not limited to, the Assyrians. Much of this is done through epistemic violence and is steeped, for the purposes of this paper, in language.
Asirios Una historia de cinco milenios, 2020
En general, los asirios constituyen un grupo étnico y religioso transnacional que conforma una co... more En general, los asirios constituyen un grupo étnico y religioso transnacional que conforma una comunidad, o conjunto de comunidades; surgidos en Mesopotamia, sobre todo durante los últimos dos mil años se extendieron hacia el norte (por lo que fue la antigua Asiria y sus alrededores) y alcanzaron al norte del Iraq moderno, el sureste de Turquía, el noroeste de Irán y el noreste de Siria. Su lengua y su cultura material constituyen una de las más viejas tradiciones ininterrumpidas del Asia occidental y el Medio Oriente.
Testing the Canon of Ancient Near Eastern Art and Archaeology, 2020
The recent century has been a trying time for various peoples and cultures the world around. The ... more The recent century has been a trying time for various peoples and cultures the world around. The region of Mesopotamia has been particularly devastated. Unfortunately, those with arguably the most significant “stake” in the game are themselves disconnected, both from an emic and etic perspective. The idea of dispossession in its current form and as it functions today, suggests a person being deprived of his/her possessions, things, thus “things” of culture and heritage, and is a one-way street. This tale on the other hand, illustrates a symbiosis between land and identity, heritage/culture. From concurrent identity appropriation and abject denial, this chapter is a story of the elephant in the room from the perspective of people who see culture and heritage and home in a vastly different light - through experience. A community navigating between an existential threat with the lofty hope of renaissance through murky waters that swirl around a dialectic between denial and subsistence.
eds. Amy Gansell and Ann Shafer. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Perspectives on History , 2018
Paul Rowe edited, Routledge Handbook of Minorities in the Middle East, 2018
This chapter is largely a linear trajectory of the Assyrian predicament in the Middle East, as a ... more This chapter is largely a linear trajectory of the Assyrian predicament in the Middle East, as a case in point, a litmus test for threatened communities, illuminating patterns of hostility, dispossession, and displacement, but also perseverance, strength, and hope amidst peril. It approaches Assyrians as an indigenous and transnational society with the promise of creating a model that can be used for analyses of similar communities around the globe. This approach undoes forms of violence against the community by making its history larger than the nation-state and dominant narrative. This is accomplished by demonstrating the importance of minorities to generally accepted ‘major’ events, creating a paradigm where the community and its individual experiences are ‘vital to and exist in symbiosis with all others in order to illuminate’ the historical record. This paradigm shift creates a new reality that can be termed panenhistoricism, which at its core observes the minority (in this case Assyrian) history/existence transcendent of politically-charged nation-states and majoritarian perspectives, all the while remaining immanent within majoritarian and/or state narratives that retain the major focus, force, and funding.
State and Society in Iraq: Citizenship Under Occupation, Dictatorship and Democratisation, 2017
The 1970s in Iraq represents a volatile interlude of internal strife illustrated by continued ris... more The 1970s in Iraq represents a volatile interlude of internal strife illustrated by continued rise of ethno-nationalism and new Ba'thist cultural and political policies of a waxing state. These themes are contemporaneous with the renewal of internal fighting between the Iraqi government and opposition groups. The traditionalist view contends this period of Iraqi history is comprised of ethno-political Iraqi Arab versus Kurdish discord that is correspondingly geographical or regional (central/south Arab regions vs. north Kurdish regions). The contention of this chapter is this description serves as an oversimplification at best, especially in light of native Assyrian sources that have gone largely unheeded until recently. These sources paint a far more vivid picture; one of an embattled historical and political system where distinct yet interrelated cultures vied for a place and created by politically motivated ethnies, state players and non-state players alike that fashioned a notion of an exclusive demos. This chapter examines relations between the state and the Assyrians, as well as
National Identities 14:4 (erratum)
This study highlights research on Iraq that includes the Assyrians. It does not intend to argue t... more This study highlights research on Iraq that includes the Assyrians. It does not intend to argue the validity of definitions of ‘nationness’ and nationalism, but provides a brief description of the variety of ways in which Assyrians have been both included and excluded from modern research on the Middle East and, more specifically, Iraq. Moreover, it resituates the Assyrians in the debate and historiography of Iraqi Studies.
Syriac in its Multi-cultural Context, Eastern Christian Studies, Peeters, Louvain., 2013
This work concerning Assyrian Christians originally from Harput, Turkey who settled in the United... more This work concerning Assyrian Christians originally from Harput, Turkey who settled in the United States will serve as a case in point of the past and current problems in assigning arbitrary names and nomenclature as monolithic rubrics of imposed identification to various groups of the Assyrian people. In most cases these people are referred to by their ecclesiastical adherence and recently, the current trend and parlance in academic circles is to identify these people by the ecclesiastical designation utilized today namely Syrian or Syriac Orthodox.
CHRONOS Revue d’Histoire de l’Université de Balamand, Jan 1, 2011
This essay falls into the category of rendering visible a community, the Jacobite Assyrians of Ma... more This essay falls into the category of rendering visible a community, the Jacobite Assyrians of Massachusetts, who have remained virtually unknown in the larger context of Middle Eastern Diaspora studies and American ethnic and cultural history. This brief study of the immigration of the Jacobite Christians originally from Harput, Turkey who settled in New England, shows a variety of distinct method(s) of identity preservation and transmission to subsequent generations, especially in regard to personal and group identity structures. These people, sometimes referred to as “Jacobite Syrians” by early Western travellers and missionaries, identified themselves as the “sons of Asshur” in 1842. (Southgate 1856:87) This paper is a narrative of the community’s tribulations in their country of origin during the first half of the twentieth century, internal religious politics espoused by the church, as well as their life and establishment in American society.
Book Series by Sargon Donabed
This new series provides a forum for exchange on a myriad of alternative histories of marginalize... more This new series provides a forum for exchange on a myriad of alternative histories of marginalized communities and individuals in the Near and Middle East and Mediterranean, and those of Middle Eastern or Mediterranean heritage. It will highlight thematic issues relating to various native peoples and their narratives and – with particular contemporary relevance – explore encounters with the notion of ‘other’ within various societies. Often moving beyond the conventional state-centred and dominant monolithic approach, or reinterpreting previously accepted stories, books in the series examine and explain themes from inter-communal relations, environment, health and society, and will explore ethnic, communal, racial, linguistic and religious developments that go beyond geopolitical compositions.
Building on the foundations of scholarship within an interdisciplinary framework, this series spans the continuum of Near Eastern and Mediterranean traditions extending from the fourth millennium B.C. to the present – bridging previous fields which originally had little connection with each other. The aim is to enhance perspectives by applying various methodological approaches to dilemmas that have in the past been treated as the exclusive concern of a single given discipline.
Key Features
Creates a forum for marginalized and/or indigenous communities to engage with the ‘accepted past and present’ and to challenge previously accepted truths
Opens a dialogue for alternative intellectual histories/narratives
The first series to focus on indigenous and minoritized related narratives from the understudied and often marginal perspective
Covers cultural, linguistic, ethnic, gendered, political, numerical and economic communities in the Near and Middle East, the Mediterranean and its extended environs
Engages with all periods of history from the ancient world to the present day, especially in terms of continuity of culture, cultural heritage and heritage preservation
Communities studied may include Alawites, Alevis, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Copts, Druze, Jews, Mandaens, Maronites, Palestinians, Pontian/ Anatolian Greeks, Samaritans, Shabbaks, Yezidis and Zoroastrians among others
Talks by Sargon Donabed
The 30th Annual Sabbagh Lecture, 2023
When one is introduced to the Middle East (West
Asia), what is one taught? Who and/or what makes... more When one is introduced to the Middle East (West
Asia), what is one taught? Who and/or what makes up
the Middle East? What does it look, smell, feel, taste,
sound like? The stories told about the region and its
communities – in print, orally, and visually – affect
the way outsiders see locals (and their diaspora
communities) but also how locals see themselves.
What does it mean for Middle Eastern research?
When non-majority communities espouse a statecentered
identity, or don’t, what happens? How
do dominant political groups and states represent
marginalized groups to the mainstream public? How
do marginalized communities represent themselves?
And in the midst of all this. one must ask the
question: What then is inclusivity?
Using specific examples from the Assyrian
community in the Middle East in general, and
Iraq in particular, this presentation focuses on
the real-world dynamic of how minoritized/
marginalized and alternative narratives or stories
give a better understanding for more integrated
and representative knowledge of Middle Eastern
communities and the region. This includes when,
where, how, and why peoples imagine and reimagine
themselves from the periphery to the mainstream.
Lying at the crossroads of many cultures and civilizations, the Middle East has long been home to... more Lying at the crossroads of many cultures and civilizations, the Middle East has long been home to a wealth of religious traditions. In the violent wars and political turbulence now affecting the Middle East, religious minorities are threatened to the point that the future of religious pluralism in the region is in question. At this critical juncture, the conference will bring together a wide variety of scholars, many of Middle Eastern heritage themselves, to share their research on these neglected communities. Presentations will focus on three states where anti-minority violence has been particularly traumatic: Iraq, Syria, and Egypt. The religious groups to be examined are all numerical minorities in these states. Some identify as ethnic minorities, some do not. They experience varying degrees of political and economic marginalization in their home countries, but they are all threatened by the violence that has gripped the region over the last decade.
This conference will be organized in three panels of experts examining three crucial conflicts and their repercussions for religious minorities. The first panel will provide historical perspective by tracing the overlooked progression of mass violence against Assyrian Christians, from the 1915-1918 Assyrian Genocide to the 1933 Simele massacre to the current campaign by IS. The second panel will be dedicated to the experience of religious minorities in the ongoing Syrian civil war, a conflict in one of the region’s most religiously-diverse countries that quickly took on sectarian tones. The third will consider the situation and role of religious minorities in post-revolutionary Egypt, particularly the Baha’i community and the Orthodox Copts, the largest religious minority community in the Middle East. This conference will be geared towards academics, University of Chicago students, and especially Middle Eastern communities in the Chicago area, including Assyrians, Copts, Baha’is and others.
This conference will challenge oversimplified narratives of sectarianism, nationalism, and democratization. It will also encourage its attendees to reflect on what constitutes “minority” in the Middle Eastern context, the various ways minorities in the Middle East express their identities, the causes of their marginalization and persecution, and the consequences of their potential extinction.
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Books by Sargon Donabed
This book details a narrative of Iraq in the 20th century and refashions the Assyrian experience as an integral part of Iraq's broader contemporary historiography. It is the first comprehensive account to contextualise a native experience alongside the emerging state. Using primary and secondary data, this book offers a nuanced exploration of the dynamics that have affected and determined the trajectory of the Assyrians' experience in 20th-century Iraq.
"Sargon Donabed provides a comprehensive overview of the modern Assyrian story, merging emic and etic perspectives of their struggle to attain sovereignty over the past century and beyond. His work offers both an informative source for Assyrian ethnic history and an alternative reading for Mesopotamian regional history as a whole." -- Nabil Al-Tikriti, University of Mary Washington
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of displacement and exclusion, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the marginalized." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of tragedy, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the oppressed. No longer may we ignore the plight of this misunderstood minority." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
Peer Reviewed Articles by Sargon Donabed
eds. Amy Gansell and Ann Shafer. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Book Series by Sargon Donabed
Building on the foundations of scholarship within an interdisciplinary framework, this series spans the continuum of Near Eastern and Mediterranean traditions extending from the fourth millennium B.C. to the present – bridging previous fields which originally had little connection with each other. The aim is to enhance perspectives by applying various methodological approaches to dilemmas that have in the past been treated as the exclusive concern of a single given discipline.
Key Features
Creates a forum for marginalized and/or indigenous communities to engage with the ‘accepted past and present’ and to challenge previously accepted truths
Opens a dialogue for alternative intellectual histories/narratives
The first series to focus on indigenous and minoritized related narratives from the understudied and often marginal perspective
Covers cultural, linguistic, ethnic, gendered, political, numerical and economic communities in the Near and Middle East, the Mediterranean and its extended environs
Engages with all periods of history from the ancient world to the present day, especially in terms of continuity of culture, cultural heritage and heritage preservation
Communities studied may include Alawites, Alevis, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Copts, Druze, Jews, Mandaens, Maronites, Palestinians, Pontian/ Anatolian Greeks, Samaritans, Shabbaks, Yezidis and Zoroastrians among others
Talks by Sargon Donabed
Asia), what is one taught? Who and/or what makes up
the Middle East? What does it look, smell, feel, taste,
sound like? The stories told about the region and its
communities – in print, orally, and visually – affect
the way outsiders see locals (and their diaspora
communities) but also how locals see themselves.
What does it mean for Middle Eastern research?
When non-majority communities espouse a statecentered
identity, or don’t, what happens? How
do dominant political groups and states represent
marginalized groups to the mainstream public? How
do marginalized communities represent themselves?
And in the midst of all this. one must ask the
question: What then is inclusivity?
Using specific examples from the Assyrian
community in the Middle East in general, and
Iraq in particular, this presentation focuses on
the real-world dynamic of how minoritized/
marginalized and alternative narratives or stories
give a better understanding for more integrated
and representative knowledge of Middle Eastern
communities and the region. This includes when,
where, how, and why peoples imagine and reimagine
themselves from the periphery to the mainstream.
This conference will be organized in three panels of experts examining three crucial conflicts and their repercussions for religious minorities. The first panel will provide historical perspective by tracing the overlooked progression of mass violence against Assyrian Christians, from the 1915-1918 Assyrian Genocide to the 1933 Simele massacre to the current campaign by IS. The second panel will be dedicated to the experience of religious minorities in the ongoing Syrian civil war, a conflict in one of the region’s most religiously-diverse countries that quickly took on sectarian tones. The third will consider the situation and role of religious minorities in post-revolutionary Egypt, particularly the Baha’i community and the Orthodox Copts, the largest religious minority community in the Middle East. This conference will be geared towards academics, University of Chicago students, and especially Middle Eastern communities in the Chicago area, including Assyrians, Copts, Baha’is and others.
This conference will challenge oversimplified narratives of sectarianism, nationalism, and democratization. It will also encourage its attendees to reflect on what constitutes “minority” in the Middle Eastern context, the various ways minorities in the Middle East express their identities, the causes of their marginalization and persecution, and the consequences of their potential extinction.
This book details a narrative of Iraq in the 20th century and refashions the Assyrian experience as an integral part of Iraq's broader contemporary historiography. It is the first comprehensive account to contextualise a native experience alongside the emerging state. Using primary and secondary data, this book offers a nuanced exploration of the dynamics that have affected and determined the trajectory of the Assyrians' experience in 20th-century Iraq.
"Sargon Donabed provides a comprehensive overview of the modern Assyrian story, merging emic and etic perspectives of their struggle to attain sovereignty over the past century and beyond. His work offers both an informative source for Assyrian ethnic history and an alternative reading for Mesopotamian regional history as a whole." -- Nabil Al-Tikriti, University of Mary Washington
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of displacement and exclusion, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the marginalized." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
"In telling the story of modern Assyrian responses to a history of tragedy, Sargon Donabed helps us understand them as actors in their own right. He thereby rewrites Iraqi history from the perspective of the oppressed. No longer may we ignore the plight of this misunderstood minority." -- Paul S. Rowe, Trinity Western University
eds. Amy Gansell and Ann Shafer. Oxford: Oxford University Press
Building on the foundations of scholarship within an interdisciplinary framework, this series spans the continuum of Near Eastern and Mediterranean traditions extending from the fourth millennium B.C. to the present – bridging previous fields which originally had little connection with each other. The aim is to enhance perspectives by applying various methodological approaches to dilemmas that have in the past been treated as the exclusive concern of a single given discipline.
Key Features
Creates a forum for marginalized and/or indigenous communities to engage with the ‘accepted past and present’ and to challenge previously accepted truths
Opens a dialogue for alternative intellectual histories/narratives
The first series to focus on indigenous and minoritized related narratives from the understudied and often marginal perspective
Covers cultural, linguistic, ethnic, gendered, political, numerical and economic communities in the Near and Middle East, the Mediterranean and its extended environs
Engages with all periods of history from the ancient world to the present day, especially in terms of continuity of culture, cultural heritage and heritage preservation
Communities studied may include Alawites, Alevis, Armenians, Assyrians, Christians, Copts, Druze, Jews, Mandaens, Maronites, Palestinians, Pontian/ Anatolian Greeks, Samaritans, Shabbaks, Yezidis and Zoroastrians among others
Asia), what is one taught? Who and/or what makes up
the Middle East? What does it look, smell, feel, taste,
sound like? The stories told about the region and its
communities – in print, orally, and visually – affect
the way outsiders see locals (and their diaspora
communities) but also how locals see themselves.
What does it mean for Middle Eastern research?
When non-majority communities espouse a statecentered
identity, or don’t, what happens? How
do dominant political groups and states represent
marginalized groups to the mainstream public? How
do marginalized communities represent themselves?
And in the midst of all this. one must ask the
question: What then is inclusivity?
Using specific examples from the Assyrian
community in the Middle East in general, and
Iraq in particular, this presentation focuses on
the real-world dynamic of how minoritized/
marginalized and alternative narratives or stories
give a better understanding for more integrated
and representative knowledge of Middle Eastern
communities and the region. This includes when,
where, how, and why peoples imagine and reimagine
themselves from the periphery to the mainstream.
This conference will be organized in three panels of experts examining three crucial conflicts and their repercussions for religious minorities. The first panel will provide historical perspective by tracing the overlooked progression of mass violence against Assyrian Christians, from the 1915-1918 Assyrian Genocide to the 1933 Simele massacre to the current campaign by IS. The second panel will be dedicated to the experience of religious minorities in the ongoing Syrian civil war, a conflict in one of the region’s most religiously-diverse countries that quickly took on sectarian tones. The third will consider the situation and role of religious minorities in post-revolutionary Egypt, particularly the Baha’i community and the Orthodox Copts, the largest religious minority community in the Middle East. This conference will be geared towards academics, University of Chicago students, and especially Middle Eastern communities in the Chicago area, including Assyrians, Copts, Baha’is and others.
This conference will challenge oversimplified narratives of sectarianism, nationalism, and democratization. It will also encourage its attendees to reflect on what constitutes “minority” in the Middle Eastern context, the various ways minorities in the Middle East express their identities, the causes of their marginalization and persecution, and the consequences of their potential extinction.