"Historical Memory, Piety, and Politics: 'Sectarianization' of Syria's Civil War"

Guest Lecture by Christopher Anzalone

Monday, September 9, 2013 3:00 PM EDT
Buchanan Hall, D3AB

Sectarianism has become a significant feature of Syria's ongoing civil war. Some of the rebel groups fighting there against the government of Bashar al-Asad, have utilized anti-Shi'ite rhetoric as part of their media operations campaign against the Syrian government and its regional allies such as Iran and Lebanon's Hizbullah. The emergence at the same time of Shi'ite militias fighting alongside Syrian government forces, are the latest events in the gradual sectarianization of the conflict. Rather than see contemporary instances of sectarianism as simply a continuation of "ancient" animosities, this talk will argue that sectarianism is more accurately seen as a set of processes that serve as tools for social and political mobilization. This talk will compare Sunni and Shi`i narratives of the civil war in Syria, and will focus on the emergence of pro-government Shi'ite militias in Syria, their invocation of historical memory, personal piety, and historical and cultural idioms in the formulation of their media operations and mobilization frames, as well as the role of inter-Shi`ite competition in neighboring Iraq in recruitment and support for military involvement in Syria.

Christopher Anzalone is a PhD student in the Institute of Islamic Studies at McGill University in Montreal, Canada where he studies political Islam with a focus on modern Sunni jihadi movements and Shi'ite political movements, and Muslim and Islamist visual cultures. He is also an adjunct research fellow at the Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies at George Mason University. His articles have been published by the CTC Sentinel published out of West Point's Combating Terrorism Center, the journal Perspectives on Terrorism, openDemocracy, Foreign Policy magazine's and the New America Foundation's AFPAK Channel, and the Royal African Society's African Arguments blog. He has consulted with the U.S. and Canadian governments on political Islam and Sunni militant groups including Harakat al-Shabab al-Mujahideen in Somalia and other Al-Qa'ida groups.

Sponsored by the Ali Vural Ak Center for Global Islamic Studies and the Middle East Studies Program.