Arab Identity

Three lines of poetry plot the trajectory of Arab national consciousness. “Awake, O Arabs, and arise!” begins the famous ode of Ibrahim al-Yaziji, penned in 1868 in Lebanon. Around that time, but even today, we saw people who insisted on sovereign 'Arab states "in the Middle East. They thus seem to assume that there is one universal Arab identity, but what does this entail, and can we even speak of an Arab identity, looking at the historical perspective of the region that we call the Middle East? These are questions I will try to address in this paper although this is extra difficult since there is no universal definition of which countries are in the Middle East and which are not (some even include Cyprus). Here, I will only focus on the Islamic part of the region since an absence of one universal Islamic identity already shows the diversity of identities present in the region.

Looking at the history of the region, I do not necessarily believe that we can speak of one universal Arab identity. The Middle East has a history that goes back thousands of years full of trade, not only of goods but also of peoples. The movement of many different ethnic and linguistic groups to and within the region has resulted in a very rich diversity of languages, cultures and ethnicities. Every country in the Middle East, in every layer of society had people who have left their mark on cities, landscapes and culture . The region can therefore be described as a melting pot in which ingredients are still being added. While Arabs are indeed the most prominent ethnic group in the region, these historical developments have created a much more complex comprising of ethnic groups. There are for instance also three other ethnic groups, being the Tur...

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...p of the Islamic community , is hereditary to his male descendants they call Imams . These Imams are both seen as religious and political leaders . In addition there are a number of these theological issues their mark on society pressures (eg, whether the Qur'an is created or not). Although these differences generally not resulted in major conflicts, it does show that in the Middle East, despite the large Muslim majority, there is no question of an Islamic identity.

All in all, these different aspects of the Middle East show that one cannot speak of one universal identity. One can have similarities on two of the decisive factors of identity (eg. language and nationality), but might have a different religion. The sense of an identity depends on the individual rather than the entire region as is the case in all parts of the world, and the Middle East is no exception.