Becoming a man in al-Wihdat : masculine performances in a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan

ACHILLI, Luigi

doi:10.1017/S0020743815000045

Becoming a man in al-Wihdat : masculine performances in a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan

dc.contributor.author	ACHILLI, Luigi
dc.date.accessioned	2015-05-13T08:04:18Z
dc.date.available	2015-05-13T08:04:18Z
dc.date.issued	2015
dc.description	Published online on 26 April 2015.	en
dc.description.abstract	This article explores the complex interplay between masculinity and nationalism among Palestinians living in al-Wihdat refugee camp. Originally set up in 1955 to host Palestinians who had fled Palestine following the establishment of the State of Israel, the camp is part of Amman, the capital of Jordan. Youth masculinity in the camp is widely perceived in Jordan as an expression of either immoral behavior or unthinking radicalism, and as a symbol of cultural and political difference and the failure of camp dwellers to embrace assimilation. These enduring stereotypes about camp dwellers are involuntarily reinforced by a specific understanding of masculinity in the scholarly literature. However, camp dwellers’ masculinities are not uniform. In this article, I explore the complex interplay between masculinity and nationalism among Palestinian refugees living in al-Wihdat. In so doing, I challenge not only popular stereotypes about Palestinian refugees in Jordan today, but also the discursive mutual dependence between nationalism and hegemonic masculinity in the scholarly literature. I argue that young men’s ability to navigate and master diverse and sometimes contrasting registers of manhood enables them to reproduce a Palestinian national identity in exile while achieving socioeconomic integration in Jordan. In pursuing this argument, the article has two goals: to challenge popular stereotypes about Palestinian refugees in Jordan today; and to problematize the discursive mutual dependency between nationalism and hegemonic masculinity in the study of Palestinian masculinity.	en
dc.format.mimetype	application/pdf
dc.identifier.citation	International journal of Middle East studies, 2015, Vol. 47, No. 2, pp. 263-280	en
dc.identifier.doi	10.1017/S0020743815000045
dc.identifier.endpage	280	en
dc.identifier.issn	0020-7438
dc.identifier.issn	1471-6380
dc.identifier.issue	2	en
dc.identifier.startpage	263	en
dc.identifier.uri	https://hdl.handle.net/1814/35777
dc.identifier.volume	47	en
dc.language.iso	en	en
dc.relation.ispartof	International journal of Middle East studies	en
dc.rights	info:eu-repo/semantics/openAccess
dc.title	Becoming a man in al-Wihdat : masculine performances in a Palestinian refugee camp in Jordan	en
dc.type	Article	en
dspace.entity.type	Publication
person.identifier.orcid	0000-0002-8408-7099
person.identifier.other	38498
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