Table of Contents

Preface

 Heleen Murre-van den Berg



Note on Transcription

Notes on Contributors



1 Arabic and its Alternatives: Language and Religion in the Ottoman Empire and its Successor States

 Heleen Murre-van den Berg



2 Vernacularization as Governmentalization: the Development of Kurdish in Mandate Iraq

 Michiel Leezenberg



3 “Yan, Of, Ef, Viç, İç, İs, Dis, Pulos …”: the Surname Reform, the “Non-Muslims,” and the Politics of Uncertainty in Post-genocidal Turkey

 Emmanuel Szurek



4 “Young Phoenicians” and the Quest for a Lebanese Language: between Lebanonism, Phoenicianism, and Arabism

 Franck Salameh



5 “Those Who Pronounce the Ḍād”: Language and Ethnicity in the Nationalist Poetry of Fuʾad al-Khatib (1880–1957)

 Peter Wien



6 Arabic and the Syriac Christians in Iraq: Three Levels of Loyalty to the Arabist Project (1920–1950)

 Tijmen C. Baarda



7 Awakening, or Watchfulness: Naum Faiq and Syriac Language Poetry at the Fall of the Ottoman Empire

 Robert Isaf



8 Global Jewish Philanthropy and Linguistic Pragmatism in Baghdad

 Sasha R. Goldstein-Sabbah



9 Past Perfect: Jewish Memories of Language and the Politics of Arabic in Mandate Palestine

 Liora R. Halperin



10 United by Faith, Divided by Language: the Orthodox in Jerusalem

 Merav Mack



11 Arabic vs. Greek: the Linguistic Aspect of the Jerusalem Orthodox Church Controversy in Late Ottoman Times and the British Mandate

 Konstantinos Papastathis



12 Between Local Power and Global Politics: Playing with Languages in the Franciscan Printing Press of Jerusalem

 Leyla Dakhli



13 Epilogue

 Cyrus Schayegh



Index

About the Author

Heleen Murre-van den Berg, PhD Leiden 1995, is Professor of Global Christianity at Radboud University, Nijmegen and director of the Institute of Eastern Christian Studies. Recent publications include (with S.R. Goldstein-Sabbah), Modernity, Minority, and the Public Sphere: Jews and Christians in the Middle East (Leiden, 2016) and Scribes and Scriptures: The Church of the East in the Eastern Ottoman Provinces (1500-1850) (Louvain, 2015).



Karène Sanchez Summerer, PhD Leiden 2009; Paris 2014, is Associate Professor at Leiden University. Her research considers the interactions between European linguistic and cultural policies and the Arab communities (1860-1948) in Palestine. Recent publication: (K.Sanchez and P. Bourmaud (eds)) Missions/ Powers/ Arabization. Changes and Networks, Social Sciences and Missions (2019) 32, 3-4.



Tijmen C. Baarda is subject librarian for Middle Eastern studies at Leiden University Libraries. His research focuses on Syriac Christianity in the modern Middle East. He has recently defended a PhD dissertation about the use of Arabic, Syriac, Neo-Aramaic and other languages by the Christians of Iraq in the period 1920–1950.