Practicing Sectarianism: Archival and Ethnographic Interventions on Lebanon

Practicing Sectarianism explores the imaginative and contradictory ways that people live sectarianism, using the concept as an animating principle across Lebanon and its diasporas over historical periods. The book examines how people experience sectarianism, sometimes pushing back, evading it, or deploying it strategically, to various effects and consequences. It argues that sectarianism can only be fully understood and dismantled if we take it seriously as a practice.

Format: Paperback / softback
Length: 258 pages
Publication date: 22 November 2022
Publisher: Stanford University Press

Practicing Sectarianism delves into the imaginative and paradoxical ways in which individuals embrace sectarianism. The book's essays employ the concept as an animating principle across diverse sites in Lebanon and its diasporas, spanning various historical periods. Contributions from historians and anthropologists shed light on the manifold ways in which sectarianism is employed to exhibit, imagine, or challenge power. This volume explores the profound affective pull it exerts on individuals and communities, the epistemological work it performs as a concept, and its role in marking social differences.

In examining social interactions, each essay scrutinizes how individuals experience sectarianism, engaging with it in varying ways, such as resisting, evading, or strategically deploying it to achieve diverse outcomes and consequences. The collection contributes to a nuanced understanding of sectarianism, as it is simultaneously constructed and experienced, a concept that is slippery and subject to change, with material implications.

While the book's focus is on Lebanon, its analysis challenges the association of sectarianism solely with the nation-state and opens up possibilities for its application in other contexts. Practicing Sectarianism, taken as a whole, posits that sectarianism can only be fully comprehended and dismantled if we approach it with a sincere commitment to understanding it as a practice.

Dimension: 229 x 152 (mm)
ISBN-13: 9781503633865