'There is something special about being immersed in the language so intensely'
Thanks to the support of the Luftia Rabbani Foundation’s travel grant and a scholarship from Sijal Institute for Arabic Language and Culture, I was able to dedicate all summer to Arabic language and finishing the interviews for my doctoral research.
Whilst I have been in Amman for most of the last three and a half years, I have never been able to dedicate so much time to Arabic or had the means to do so. This summer has been a true gift – every day Sunday to Thursday – glorious Arabic. Whilst it was a shock to the system to study Fusha for the first time since 2015, it really has been a privilege to have such patient teachers who’ve helped me shift out of my Ammiyeh vocab into Fusha – although with many mishaps along the way.
This alongside the fact that Palestine and discussing Palestine has been at the centre of most of our classes and the lectures organised alongside the core curriculum, has meant it has been the perfect opportunity to think about how I’ll begin the final year of my doctoral studies and begin to write up about all the ethnographic encounters in the city of Amman as well as the Material Witnesses of Palestinian Exile that participants have brought with them to my workshops since 2023. Whilst my work focuses on visual culture, the lecture by Dr Ramzi Salti on Arabic museum and revolution sparked a desire to think more about the sound of Amman – something I’d love to come back to after finishing my doctoral thesis.
This summer, alongside another researcher based in Amman, we co-hosted a workshop together as a way to experiment with the different creative tools we use to explore exile and futurity. The workshop was centred on the figure of teta. The workshop space became filled with different Material Witnesses related to teta, and saw the creation of several poems which brought these objects to life in a whole new way. The affective relationship between visual culture, tetas and grandchildren in Amman took on a new material tangibility.
Alongside this I’ve also been able to conduct a number of narrative interviews which will form the final chapter of my analysis and led a seminar series on Tuesday nights for members of the Sijal Community. The seminar series which focused on political (mis)use of archives, archival imagination and memory activism was a fantastic opportunity for me to re-engage with the theories at the heart of my doctoral project. The papers and theories that have already inspired much theoretical musings took on a new meaning by being discussed with individuals working across different disciplines and different geographic backgrounds. Within the seminar series, I was also able to host a screening of the beautiful film “Soil and the Sea” which provides a new way in which to engage with the stories of the disappeared from the Lebanese Civil War. The producer Yara el-Murr joined for the discussion after the screening and it was fantastic to see how attendees were so affected by the film.
It really has been a wonderful but incredibly intensive three months in Amman and I truly am grateful for all those who made it possible. The city itself has been busy with both Palestine Film Week and Amman Film Festival. There really is something special about being immersed in the language so intensely and having the easy access of watching films in Arabic. In having the financial support to allow not needing to work part-time, I was also able to enjoy attending a fantastic “social and political life of portrait photography” at the wonderful Darkroom Studio Amman!
I’m looking forward to full-time thesis writing from September and taking the time to fully memorize all the vocabulary of the summer, but then to continue my Arabic studies! My first ever Arabic teacher always said “Arabic is a life long journey so you must be patient” – this part of the journey has been so enriching and beautiful (and extremely tiring) but I am beyond grateful.
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