UNCERTAIN
TRAVEL
A visual travel ethnography, following the production process of the catholic rosary in Palestine.
Master thesis
Adinda van Kranendonk 10296255 Cultural & Social Anthropology
GSS
Supervisor: Anja Hiddinga Word count: 16644 Amsterdam 19-02-2018
Cover image: Still from the movie Uncertain Travel (2018): in the car, on the background the separation
Preface
Palestine is a place I feel deeply connected with, and conducting my research there seemed a natural decision. To turn some of my despondency about the region’s issues into action, I decided to make a film which I could share with an audience. My film, Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.), became an important part of this thesis.
The following work can be considered as a journey through Palestine. The reader will encounter different ‘dead-endings’, ‘crossroads’ and ‘barriers’ while following the production process of the rosary. As it unfolds, the journey of the rosary reveals some of the everyday realities in Palestine: as the Israeli occupation, tensions between religions, and violence at the checkpoints. But above all, I encountered again and again life at this moment. In spite of everything, Palestinians are very good in living life. As I wrote in my dairy:
Going to college knowing you cannot freely practice your envisioned occupation. Giving a big marriage party even if this means you lose your daughter to the other side of the checkpoint. Sometimes it seems as if everything is about this: living life to its fullest, like in the expression behemish, meaning “letting go of concerns, living in the now”.
Regarding the limits of my time and scope, many important aspects of the everyday life of the rosary in Palestine fell outside this filmic-thesis. A full inquiry is beyond my reach but I hope the reader and viewer enjoyed it, that it inspired, changed thoughts, and added some value to the field of anthropology.
Acknowledgment
Doing anthropological research was such a great experience. Being a researcher gave me the opportunity to cross boundaries and talk to people I would never have talked to otherwise. Having the role of a researcher opened up a new world. A world I constructed by the given answers to my questions, which I will try to describe in this thesis and visualize in the short film Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.).
The realization of this thesis and the movie would not have been possible without the support of certain people. I would like to take the opportunity here to express my gratitude to those people involved. First and foremost I would like to thank everyone I met during my fieldwork. The film and the thesis would not have been possible without the hospitable and open attitude of many people, who accepted me and my camera, and invited me into their homes many times. I want to thank Mahmoud Safi, who became a good friend and let me live in his house with his family. The first day I met him he already gave me the key of his house. When I left, he put the key in my bag with the words: ‘you always have a house in Palestine’. I would like to thank Usama Nicola, Salah Abu Laban, Ali Nobani and Nizar Lama for the many conversations and their responses to my calls and questions.
During the editing and writing process in the Netherlands, I received a lot of support and trust as well. I want to thank Kusai Kwayis, a friend from Amsterdam who helped me with translations of interviews. I would like to thank Shosha and Gidon, my second sister and brother, Frank, Fleur, Linde, Nienke and Thijs who watched the film and gave me feedback. I would like to thank Daniel, Hendrik Jan, Lisette and Marceline for their English grammar skills. I want to thank my classmates from the visual pilot: Jip van Steenis, Robbert Blauuboer and Kristina Järvekülg. We were a warm little group where I could share my doubts and received wonderful feedback. Furthermore, I would like to thank Mattijs van de Port and Sanderien Verstappen. They inspired me during their visual workshops with their experiences and articles we read together. During my entire research I got support from Anja Hiddinga, my supervisor. She assisted and believed in my project beyond all expectations. Lastly, I want to thank my friends and parents for their ongoing care during the entire process.
Abstract
This research took place in Bethlehem and its surroundings in Palestine. My first encounter with this area was through political discussions about the Israeli occupation. I wanted to understand the everydayness given the violence and oppression. Therefore, I decided to follow the journey of an object going from one place to another.
My interest in the rosary’s production process is combined with epistemological arguments for using visual methods in research. Film is a suitable medium to emphasize the human condition and the feeling of being there, at my research site Bethlehem. The journey of the rosary - who is involved, what is needed for the transport, where is it going to be sold – is at the same time a system of significance.
Within three fields, the olive tree groves, the olivewood factories and the transportation on the roads, the rosary gets more form, which causes specific views and behaviors. The three practices, the olive tree cultivation, olive woodcarving and the transportation on the roads, are interrelated and cannot be analyzed separate. Using theoretical perspectives of commodity making and violence, the journey of the rosary envelops some of the everyday reality in Palestine.
Keywords: Palestine, catholic Rosary, Practice Theory, Commodities, Everyday life, Violence, Visual methods.
List of figures:
Figure 1: Catholic rosary from Bethlehem (picture taken by me). 8
Figure 2: Map of the Segregated Road system. 13
Figure 3: Map of Shrinking of Palestine (www.visualpalestine.com). 15
Figure 4: Manger Square Bethlehem left a piece of wall of the Nativity Church, in the front
Omar mosque (picture taken by me). 17
Figure 5: Palestinian Christian and Muslim girls at a picknick near Bethlehem (picture taken by
me). 17
Figure 6: My father and me in Jerusalem (picture taken by my mother). 27
Figure 7: two times a map of Palestine. Blue is Area C with illegal settlements; dark brown is Area A with Palestinian villages (B’Tselem interactive maps)1. 29
Figure 8: Farmers are prevented by Israeli military to go to their olivewood fields on the other side of the separation barrier (picture from Colin Hinchelwood). 32 Figure 9: Kalandia checkpoint, between Ramallah and Jerusalem (taken by me) 38
Figure 10: Traffic jam near Kalandia checkpoint (picture taken by me). 38
Figure 11: An ‘Abdallah picknick’ near Bethlehem (picture taken by me). 41
Figure 12: A Palestinian road in Bateer and Road 60 to Hebron is separated by a fence (picture
taken by me). 42
Figure 13: Guard post near Hebron (picture taken by me). 42
Figure 14: Making barbeque on the roof with Fedwa, Mohammad and their three children: Sara,
Sef and Sandy. 51
Figure 15: Peace of the Wall in Bethlehem (picture taken by me). 53
Tabel of Content:
Preface ... 3 Acknowledgment ... 4 Abstract ... 5 List of figures: ... 6 Tabel of Content: ... 7 Catholic Rosaries ... 8 Chapter 1 - Introduction ...91.1 ‘The Social Life’ of the Rosary ... 10
1.2 Filmic-thesis ... 11
1.3 Sensitive Semantics ... 11
Chapter 2 – Placing the three fields within Palestine ... 12
1.1 The Promised Land ... 12
1.2 The Little Town of the Bible ... 15
Chapter 3 – Placing the three Fields within Anthropology ... 18
3.1 Commodity Making Practices ... 18
3.2 Everyday(ness and) Violence ... 20
Chapter 4 - Ethnography in Words and Images ... 22
4.1 Tutorial of this filmic-thesis ... 22
4.2 How to speak Truth to Data? ... 23
4.3 How to tune my research to local interests? ... 24
Chapter 5 - The ‘Social Life’ of the Rosary ... 28
5.1 Olive Wood Cultivation ... 28
5.1.1 The strong connection to olive trees and the know-how of its cultivation ... 30
5.1.2 The material and social structure: uprooting of olive trees in Area C ... 31
5.2 Everyday transportation through Area C ... 34
5.2.1 Geographical strategies against the mobility of others: forbidden road regime ... 34
5.2.2 The body and agency: their own unpaved roads ... 36
5.2.2 Everyday (ness and) violence: the state of exception ... 36
5.3 Olivewood carving industry in Bethlehem ... 43
5.3.1 A minority and higher in ‘social class’: the Christian Palestinians ... 43
5.3.3 Underneath, Israeli occupation presents itself again ... 45
5.3.2 Friction and the production of shared meaning ... 46
Chapter 6 – Conclusion: Travel of the Rosary in Words and Images ... 48
Chapter 7 – Discussion on the complexity of reality ... 50
7.1 ‘Live life’ and not just survive... 50
7.2 How to obtain, translate and display with different languages? ... 52
7.3 Future of Palestine? ... 52
Catholic Rosaries
"Say the Rosary every day...
Pray, pray a lot and offer sacrifices for sinners... I'm Our Lady of the Rosary.
Only I will be able to help you.
...In the end My Immaculate Heart will triumph."
The rosary is a type of prayer, mostly used by catholic Christians. The prayers are arranged in several sets, each set composed of one Lord’s Prayer followed by ten ‘Hail Marys’ and one ‘Glory Be’. During the recitation of each set, thoughts are given to a mystery of the rosary, which recalls an element of the life of Jesus and Maria.
Chapter 1 - Introduction
“Where can I get Rosary beads?”, “Where Can I Find Rosaries?” The answer is, right here at HolyLand-Gifts.com. Perfect for any member of the family, and a great gift for another member of your faith community, these beautiful beads help support prayer and meditation practices. Remember, you are supporting the skilled Christian artisans who make all of the gifts by hand and we send a portion of profits to Bethlehem Christian charities, as well. So whether this is a gift for yourself, or for someone special, you’re actually giving twice.2
At the beginning of my fieldwork, I was not aware of the Christian community in Palestine. I did not know all the mayors of big Palestinian cities had to be Christian, that the majority of Palestinian Christians lives scattered across different territories, let alone that I knew of the international Christian olivewood artifacts export. During my fieldwork in and around Bethlehem, I learned more about the Christian community in Palestine. I visited churches, made many Christian friends, went to lectures about why Christians are leaving Palestine, and made my own cross out of olive wood. But most of all, what I learned from being ‘in the field’ was how much impact the occupation has on the everyday lives of Palestinians. At the same time, I was surprised how much the conflict had become ‘normal’ in the lives of the Israeli and Palestinians around me. Comments to friends and fellow travelers on the astonishing tangle of paths one had to take to get almost anywhere would be met with a rhetorical question, ‘What else can we do?’ People have to work, shop, go to school, visit family. The question of how to get on with their lives, despite all these obstacles and dangers, was not taken into consideration anymore. The long lines in front of checkpoints and streams of cars taking detours were themselves a reply to the problem; ‘What else can we do?’. Everyday activities continued, and shock and despair became part of the daily routine.
I wanted to know more about this ‘two-folded’ everyday life in Bethlehem. There is, indeed, the occupation and the ongoing displacement. Yet, Palestinians are also busy with the here and now. People have to go to school and work and there are tears and laughter. The Palestinian expression ‘Jom basal, jom assal’ (one day onions, one day honey) captures this attitude towards life in an unsteady environment. Especially on the roads the military occupation
is most visible. Here, the tumultuous past envelops many hilltops and meanders through everyday life in the form of Israeli settlements, checkpoints and militaries.
Historically, Bethlehem has been a Christian town, 10 km south of Jerusalem, where Jesus was born. Nowadays, Bethlehem’s economy is primarily tourist-driven and thousands of Christian pilgrims are going to the Church of the Nativity, as they have done for almost 2000 years. Shopping is a major attraction, especially during the Christmas season. I became interested in pilgrims and souvenir shops in Jerusalem and Bethlehem. What do pilgrims think of the occupation, and do they know about the origin of their products? And how do souvenir shopkeepers perceive the hundreds of pilgrims entering their city everyday?
In my research I will explore how the olive wood industry in Bethlehem functions within the occupation. With the production process of the rosary a complex world enveloped which resulted in the following research question: ‘How does the production process of the catholic rosary - from the olive trees till the souvenir shop in Bethlehem - looks like, taken into account that this journey takes place in Palestine occupied by Israel?’.
1.1 ‘The Social Life’ of the Rosary
Following the production process of the catholic Rosary seemed eminently suitable because the rosary makes a journey. The journey demonstrates how the rosary is entangled in this divided society, not only symbolically, but also literally. I accompanied Palestinians who use the yellow public-busses to transport the rosary to the factory and souvenir shop in Bethlehem. The production process of the rosary takes place in different stages. The following three stages appeared from the theoretical framework, me as a researcher and my methods as Appadurai (1986: 5) writes; ‘tracing objects “career” reveal knowledge’. These three fields are depicted below. The number behind the field refers to the chapters in which they are explored: Olive Wood Production (1), Olive Woodcarving Industry Bethlehem (2), Transportation of the Rosary (3).
To locate these fields within the anthropological literature I use the following concepts; commodities, violence, and practice theory. The people who have the most engaging approach on violence are: Foucault (1997), Abu-Lughod and Bourgois (2005), Agamben (2005) on commodities: Appadurai (1986), and on practice theory: Sahakian, & Wilhite (2013), Giddens (1984) Tsing (2005). Drawing on this theoretical framework I made a network of stories and sidetracks to map the route from the olive trees to the buyer in Bethlehem.
1.2 Filmic-thesis
My interest in the journey of the production process of the rosary in Palestine was combined with the arguments for using visual methods in my research. I decided to make a film with the rosary as main actor, which can be watched separately as an audio-visual narrative on its own right. I want to surpass standard textual borders of conventional anthropological ethnography. For this I followed the experimental footsteps of MacDougall (MacDougall 1998). Besides that, using different kinds of media offers a venue to do justice to the complexity of research sites (MacDougall 1998). Lastly, I would like to share the film in different screening rooms in Ramallah as in Amsterdam. Following Collins and Durington (2014) ‘publishing data in near-real-time across multiple platforms is to engage multiple audiences, i.e. home public, social media, academically scholars worldwide’ (ibid.: 27).
Concerning the structure of the filmic-thesis, two components must be considered: the film Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.) and the text of this thesis. These two composite parts were produced parallel; I was editing parts of the film and the next moment I was writing my chapters. The research question became the storyline of the film: the journey of the production process of the catholic rosary within the everyday Israeli occupation. Within the text I added film clips and images to merge and prolong text with visual-audio means.
1.3 Sensitive Semantics
I am aware of the role linguistics has in writings about this particular situation. It is difficult to write about Palestine without offending an involved individual, side or party. The description ‘Israel/Palestine’ for instance, might seem neutral, but it already triggers sentiments on the Israeli side for there is no state that is called Palestine. Instead ‘New Territories’ or ‘Occupied Territories’ is a common terminology in Israeli media (Chomsky and Pappé 2015). On the other hand, many Palestinians can be offended by the phrasing of ‘conflict’, because they view their situation not as a conflict but as colonization. Another example is the terminology pertaining to the building of the wall around the West Bank and Gaza: apartheid wall, separation wall, security fence, anti terrorism fence, West Bank wall, separation barrier etc. The sensitivities around semantics were taken into consideration while writing this thesis. I use ‘Palestine’ instead of the ‘Occupied Territories’ as it acknowledges the Palestinian pursuit of liberation. In the light of the General Assembly’s recognition of Palestine as a non-member observer State, it seem appropriate to call it ‘Palestine’ rather than ‘Occupied Palestinian Territories’.3
Chapter 2 – Placing the three fields within Palestine
1.1 The Promised Land
Israel, Palestine, is situated on crossroads of political and religious powers, positioned between Europe, Asia and Africa, and the birthplace of Judaism, Islam and Christianity. The region has a long and tumultuous history with different religions, cultures, commerce and politics. The Palestinian region has had numerous different people and powers, including the Romans, Babylonians, Persians, Byzantines, Turks, British, Jordanians, Egyptians (in Gaza) and currently Israelis.4
There are many perspectives on this region but the grim part of living there is that of the occupation of Palestine. Presently, the Israeli government enforces severe and discriminatory restrictions on Palestinians in Palestine (Chomsky and Pappé 2015). Society is segregated (literally see figure 2), and because of the contested circumstances of the military occupation and the difficult conditions of transportation, Palestinian economic development is limited, according to a recent UN rapport.5 Olive trees are one of the major agricultural crops in Palestine. The olive
tree, holy for many Palestinians (Teeffelen 2014) is the first stage where the production process of the rosary takes part in. The trees are an important symbol of the Palestinian struggle. Olive trees can live up to thousands of years and survive harsh conditions. Because of the similarities with the Palestinian struggles with the occupation they have become a symbol of resistance. Israel’s prolonged military occupation has had a significant effect on the olive wood industry; 2.5 million trees, one-third of which are olive trees, have been uprooted since 1967.6
After a history of conflict, the Oslo Peace Accords of 1993 gave the Palestinians limited self-rule and a Palestinian state-gained momentum. The West Bank was split up in three areas; A, B, and C.7 Area C was supposed to be under Palestinian control, but the tide of history has
moved in the opposite direction. Israel retained control of security and land-management, and
4 See http://pov-tc.pbs.org/pov/pdf/promiese/promises-timeline.pdf (09-12-17)
5The Besieged Palestinian Agricultural Sector. United Nations Conference on Trade and Development. (21-11-2017) 6 See http://www.miftah.org/Display.cfm?DocId=25491&CategoryId=4 (09-12-17)
7 Area C: Israel has created in Palestine a regime, the only one of its kind in the world, and is reminiscent of
distasteful regimes from the past, such as the apartheid regime in South Africa (B’Tselem 2002: 132). The Oslo
Accords, a peace-making attempt between Israel and the Palestinian Authority (PA) in 1993, divided Palestine in A, B and C regions. The PA has civil and military administration in the A Areas. The C Areas are fully controlled by Israel. Here the regime is based on discrimination; applying two separate systems of law in the same area and basing the rights of individuals on their nationality. For example, there is a planning system that operates along two separate tracks, one for Jews and the other for Palestinians (ibid.: 132).
area C remains open for Israeli development and above all, has to serve Israeli needs, such as military training, economic interests and settlement development (Baram 2016: 48).
While traveling through Palestine, the confiscation of fertile land became very visual. In the following clip a piece of the ‘separation wall’ between Bethlehem and Jerusalem is being shown. As the video fragment shows, the Oslo agreement for Israeli settlers and the Israeli settlement enterprise, since it is created in 1967 when Israel occupied Palestine in the Six Day War, is the basic conditions on which this project could bloom, according to Dror Etkes, an Israeli expert on the settlement.9 From the Oslo agreements until today, Israel has intensively and effectively used
it in order to triple the number of Israeli settlers in Palestine and to change the landscape completely. A good example is the Bypass system. Between 1993 and 2000 the Israeli population in the Palestine grew fast (B’Tselem statistics)10 with a growth rate of 2% in 2000, which is more
than three times faster than the average of 0.6%.11 In these years the Bypass system was built.
This system consists of parallel roads for Israeli and Palestinians, and parallel water and electricity. Today, Palestinians and Israelis hardly encounter one another, since they both have their own roads. Eyal Weizman (2007) describes the transformation processes of space, in his book Hollow Land. In exploring Israel’s methods to transform the landscape, Weizmann (2007) states that these are themselves tools of domination and are the material center of the irresolvable Israeli-Palestinian conflict. Transformations, like settlements and roads, are creating ‘facts on the ground’,12 observable and permanent Israeli footholds on Palestinian territories (Abu El-Haj:
2001). In this way, the maintenance of inter-community infrastructure, including roads, and water and electric grids, requires passing through area C.
9 See http://www.timesofisrael.com/houses-fences-and-fruit-trees-a-decade-of-watching-settlements-grow/(15-05-17) 10 See https://www.btselem.org/statistics (10-01-18)
11 Population Growth, OECD. OECD 2012 (02-02-18)
12 She conducted her research in Israel and Palestine about the capacity of science for maintaining colonialist
Figure 3: Shrinking of Palestine.13
1.2 The Little Town of the Bible
The Palestinian city of Bethlehem, translated in Arabic ‘House of Meat’, in Hebrew ‘House of Bread’, embodies the story of Palestine; the city has a long history of conquests and many great dominions have passed by. Jordan retained control until the Six-day War in 1967; afterwards Bethlehem was captured by Israel, along with the rest of Palestine. In 1995, almost 30 years later, Israel withdrew and turned the city over to the Palestinian National Authority in accordance with the Oslo Peace accords (Pappé 1954). It is not by coincidence the catholic rosary is sold in Bethlehem. As already seen in the title of this paragraph, Bethlehem, the little city holy for many given that Jesus was born here.14 For hundreds of years Christian pilgrims arrive in-, or pass by
Bethlehem. When they leave again, many of them want to take something home; a religious artifact that reminds them of this religious experience in the little town of the Bible.
13 See www.visualizingpalestine.com (03-01-18)
14 Bethlehem is important for Judaism, and Islam as well. For Jews, Bethlehem is the burial place of Rachel and the
Bethlehem had become the manufacturing center of a global trade in Christian objects of devotion (Norris 2013: 1). Mostly carved from locally harvested olive wood and decorated with stones or mother of pearl, Bethlehem provided souvenirs for pilgrims visiting the town. Jacob Norris (2013) argues in Exporting the Holy Land how trade and migration in and to Bethlehem cannot be split in West and East, Muslims or Christians, or in diaspora and homeland. This becomes clear in the way family histories are connected to the seven historic quarters in Bethlehem, each inhabited by particular families. These families living have a higher status; they are after all originally from Bethlehem. Simultaneously, each of these clans are blends of foreign influences as Jacob Norris (2013) describes. In time of the Crusades, soldiers, merchants and noblemen married women from Bethlehem. Their children, who were “mixed children’s”, called themselves Talhami (translated ‘Bethlehemite’). I want to finish with another interesting fact of the demography of Bethlehem. The Christian Palestinians comprise 6-7% of the 12 million Palestinians and are 1-2% of the total population of Palestine. As of 2015, 70% of them live outside of Israel and Palestine (Adelman, Kuperman 2006). Leila Sansour15 wrote many articles
about the reasons of Christian Palestinians leaving Palestine. Many think they leave because they are a minority and they don’t go well with the Muslim Palestinians (Providence,16, Mosaic,17 ).
During my three months fieldwork, this appeared not to be the case. They are foremost Arabs and Palestinians. 15 http://www.openbethlehem.org/ (12-01-18). 16 See https://providencemag.com/2016/03/why-are-palestinian-christians-fleeing/ (15-02-18). 17 See https://mosaicmagazine.com/picks/2016/03/the-real-reason-palestinian-christians-are-leaving-bethlehem/ (15-02-18).
Figure 4: Manger Square Bethlehem, left a piece of wall of the Nativity Church, in the front Omar mosque (picture taken by me).
Chapter 3 – Placing the three Fields within Anthropology
As an anthropologist, I will try to provide not a one-dimensional view on the journey of the catholic Rosary in Palestine. The three different fields do not only consist of physical objects like the checkpoints, nor does it only exist due to the olive wood where the beads are made-of. This thesis approaches the journey of the production process of the rosary as a dynamic journey with different tracks and dead-endings. When looking at the ‘travel’ it is important to address 1) practice theory, to capture, conclude and accumulate different elements of the journey of the rosary, 2) a theoretical framework surrounding commodity making to pertain the ‘social life of objects’, 3) literature to theorize violence, since the production process of the rosary is in the midst of the occupation.
3.1 Commodity Making Practices
This filmic-thesis follows the journey of the rosary from the perspective of practice theory, a branch of social theory centered on practices rather than structures, individuals or interactions. As outlined by Ortner (2006), practice theory tries to explain the relationship obtained between human action and a global entity. She brings up the idea of “serious games”, and on transformation within a society. Actors play with their individual skills in a game of life, which is colored with inequality and dominant power structures. Ortner (2006) sees social structure as an arena, where the rules are set by state policies. The game of life is played, but one does not have to follow the rules. The players can change the rules by playing the game, so within its action and practice (Ortner 2006). The comparison with the battle of the game of life resonated with the production process of the rosary where the opponent can be seen as Israeli policies and militaries. Schatzki (2001) continues on this idea and states that the maintenance of practices over time depends on ‘…the successful inculcation of shared embodied know-how’ (2001: 3) as well as on the continued performance. Because activities and bodies are ‘constituted’ within practices, ‘the skilled body’ is where activity and mind as well as individual and society meet (ibid.: 3). In addition to Ortner (2006) and Schatzki (2001), I choose to use Sahakian, & Wilhite (2013) perspective on practice. Their aim was the sociology of consumption; mine the production process of the rosary. I focused on three fields the production process the rosary goes along: olive wood production, olive woodcarving and the transportation and selling of the rosary. While looking to these three fields, I recognized three ‘pillars’ of the practice theory stated by Sahakian, & Wilhite (2013):
1) people and the knowledge they embody, 2) the material world and infrastructure that influence everyday life; and 3) the social world that includes everything from social norms and values to legal frameworks (Sahakian, & Wilhite 2013: 39).
Since the journey takes part in different practices, it is important to recognize these are interrelated (Sahakian, & Wilhite 2013: 37). If one of the ‘pillars’ of one practice change this can result in changes in another practice. I adopted this holistic approach of the practice theory: ‘… practices are interrelated and must be viewed as a system and not as siloes (Sahakian, & Wilhite 2013: 37). Space and time are also two important dimensions, which are involved in social practices, what relates to influences of- and on the phenomenon of globalization. The catholic rosary is being sold all over the world. A bigger purchase of the rosary, in Russia, may increase rate and scale of flows (people, ideas, things) in Bethlehem. Beside the interrelatedness, the practices are located in a land occupied by Israel. How the transportation of the rosary is influenced because of the field I used habitus and agency to make this visible.
Pierre Bourdieu’s concept of “habitus” which connects an individual’s actions to culture, structure, and power (Swartz; DiMaggio 1997). Before Bourdieu, sociological theory could be broken into two opposing groups in regards to individual behavior. First, individuals respond to external factors such as economic factors or social factors. Second, individuals act in response to internal factors such as intentions or calculation (Swartz). Bourdieu’s concepts of habitus attempts to find the middle ground between the two groups of theories. According to Swartz, the habitus is a ‘structured structure’ that develops from early class specific experiences of socialization in family and peer groups during which external structures are internalized. In other words, attitudes are contextualized.
The theoretical concept commodities helped to understand the development of the rosary. In every practice the rosary becomes a bit more a rosary. A commodity is mostly seen as an economical item produced to satisfy needs. Appadurai (1986) extends this idea and argues that commodities, like people, have ‘social lives’. He sees a commodity not as a thing ‘in-itself’ but as a certain social relationship with the ‘thing’. The ‘thing’ can move in and out of its commodity status, which is one aspect of its social existence. The olive tree provides the material sources of the rosary and is transported to Bethlehem with the purpose of its commodification. Karl Polanyi and James O’Connor (2016) contest the place of nature in economic production. They see nature as fictional commodity in capitalist economies. Olive trees cannot be uniform, rationalized commodity. Trees grow in all different shapes and sizes and very slowly (ibid: 208). The nature of trees is limiting the technology’s role in industrial consolidation. The trees are not growing in a linear, clear-cut way, but make twists and grow how they like. Besides the ‘social life of things’,
Appadurai (1986) proposes a way in which economic exchange creates a particular value of commodities. In his words “economy consist not only in exchanging values but in the exchange of values (ibid.: 4). So, exchange is not a by-product of the commerce of objects, but its source. Appadurai’s perspective on the circulation of commodities makes it possible to argue that ‘…what creates the link between exchange and value is politics’ (ibid.: 3). His perspective on commodities and their “social life”, offered me an understanding on political links between the exchange and value of the rosary in its production process.
3.2 Everyday(ness and) Violence
Unfortunately, violence is prominent in the everyday life of the Palestinians. Nancy Scheper -Hughes and Philip Bourgois (2003) address the fact that violence is not specific to war but intimately woven into the fabric of society. Following Scheper -Hughes and Bourgois, I argue violence is not just physical violence; there is a wide spectrum of different kinds. Because of the existence of different types of violence we should not be blinded by one, or ignoring others, in their words “the continuum of violence have to be taken into account” (20 03: 4-5). Bourgois (2001) differentiates between four different forms of violence: direct, structural, symbolic, everyday. In my research, I focus on structural violence. This form appeared the most relevant within the journey of the production process of the rosary.
Structural violence goes back to Johan Galtung (1990), the founding father of peace studies in the 60’s. Structural violence takes place, when the actual and the potential are separated – when the potential is not reached, even though facing the actual – and could be reached (Galtung 1990). I will give an example. Nowadays 12 billion people could be fed but we don’t manage to feed 7,5 billion. Galtung (1990) would say this is violence: structural violence. The same with HIV in Africa: nowadays it is clear that the virus could be stopped or at least reduced if there was just enough money for research and aid in Africa as it is done in Europe and the US (United States). However, this isn’t done. Whereas you can have a long and rather normal life in Europe or in the US with a HIV infection, in Africa this means your death. So if something could be different, but it is not acted accordingly, for Galtung (1990) this is violence. One of the problems of his thoughts is that easily everything turns potentially into violence. The fact that precarious and unbearable structures in society tend and lead to violence is clear, Marx and many others showed that before Galtung (1990). What Galtung (1990) however says is, that these structures are inherently violent. They don’t refer to something that’s beyond them; it is the structure itself that is violent and therefore problematical. This structure can be misleading and not seeing as violence as such: ‘Brute force is a misnomer, it is the very human face of violence that we are trying to
unravel here.’ (Bourgois 2001: 3). However it is visual: ‘structural violence is rooted in unequal terms of within organizations or trade and it is expressed locally, in the monopolization of industries or exploitative markets (Bourgois 2001: 7).
Looking at the journey of the rosary, structural violence is omni-present. The limited freedom to move around causes many difficulties for economical development or political unity. Checkpoints can close at any moment and curfews lurks. Going to work or attending a political meeting in another city can be uncertain or frightful. Structural violence is a significant concept within my filmic-thesis to understand the limited freedom of movement of the rosary on the roads in Area C.
Since the duration of the occupation and the permanence of the status quo I will take the everyday life as my main point. With the focus on the everyday I will avoid the opposition of the ‘heroes and victims perspectives’ Ortner (1995) and Lughod (1990) are warning of. Within social research, conflict dominated areas often are reduced to the opposition of those with power and those without: ‘… there is something admirable about resistance … to look to it for hopeful confirmation of the failure of systems of oppression’ (Lughod 1990: 51) and ‘resistance studies are thin… thin on the internal politics of dominated groups, thin on the cultural richness of those groups, thin on the subjectivity of the actors engaged in these dramas’ (Ortner 1995: 190). According to Abu-Lughod (1990) and Ortner (1995), social scientists have to take into account the frequently made objectification of heroes (mostly those in power) and victims (the people without any power). This holds for the scope of my research: Israeli are victims of the occupation as well. Focusing on the ‘everyday’ will dissolve this opposition, since Palestinians are usually portrayed as victims. I explored violence by following the transportation of the olive wood through Area C in Palestine and by mapped the production process of the rosary to Bethlehem.
Chapter 4 - Ethnography in Words and Images
4.1 Tutorial of this filmic-thesis
This research is an interpretive study on the production process of the catholic rosary in Bethlehem. In line with the post-positivist perspective, the opinions and answers of the interlocutors were held as truth, even though they were subjective (Cresswell et al. 2011: 5). I was guided trough the travel of the production process of the rosary and the answers of the people I encountered. By using multiple approaches and methods, as my camera next to the more conventional ways as interviews and participant observation, I tried to capture the production process as they experience and describe it. This pragmatist perspective is used to adopt a real world, practice oriented and as a pluralistic approach to my research (ibid.: 5).
This thesis consists, next to a conventional anthropological text, of cinematic elements. I added film clips and images, which meander through the chapters. Next to this thesis, the film Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.) can be watch separately. This visual-travel-ethnography is based on a three-month research mainly in Bethlehem. The focus of my research is the ‘everyday life’, the production process of the catholic rosary. The history of this religious artifact brought me to a very diverse group of people. I will elaborate on this diverse group of interlocutors below. For this research I used interviews, participant observation and visual methods to collect my data. In total I interviewed 22 people, which I grouped in different categories: Palestinian and Dutch academics, Palestinian and non-Palestinian governmental officials, Palestinian Christian ‘Bethlehmites’, Palestinian Muslim olivewood workers, Palestinian olivewood-factory bosses, Palestinian souvenir-shopkeepers, and a couple of other people relevant to tourism in Bethlehem such as a Israeli and Dutch tour guide in Bethlehem. Moreover, I conducted participant observations on a daily basis. I lived with Mahmoud, who became a good friend and gatekeeper. Mahmoud has been working in an olive food factory for 15 years. Because of Mahmoud’s friends who where also employees of the olive wood factory, I was often surrounded with people who were involved with the olive tree in one way or another. In order to expand my network and get to know my way around, I spent the first ten days traveling with a friend from the Netherlands and visited events and lectures in Bethlehem. Halfway through my research period, I guided my family through the Palestine for a week, and lastly I worked as a volunteer in a guesthouse in Bethlehem and at a farm called Tent of Nations. These different methods helped me collect new insights into the field. As well, new experiences that gave me insights along side my research.
The camera gave me an entrance I did not expect. Besides it became a license to go where I wanted to go, my camera turned out to be a tool of communication. On the one hand it became an advantage in my relations with respondents. Most of my respondents knew the concept of ‘film-making’ and understood immediately, the aim of a film was part of my studies. The concept ‘Anthropology’ was more difficulty to understand. Often at the end of my explanation many interlocutors connected it to journalism, of which they were a little suspicious. In Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.), I present my findings in a cinematographic language. Because the storyline of the journey of the rosary gave coherence to the film, there was space for juxtapositions and layers. The method of editing became the main tool in the production of knowledge. As classifications are at core of anthropological ‘objective’ statements (Pels 2014: 228), within the film this is achieved through montage. The three fields, with subjects one can relate to, are the following: the olive trees, the olivewood factories, and the transportation. Each one is embedded in scenes and shots of the surroundings, daily activities, composed in spherical and essayistic style. By mixing different age groups, religions, strategies within the selected categories I tried to challenge stereotypes as ‘Palestinian as victims’ or ‘a Muslim world’. I added an attachment with the title Cinematic Justifications in which I will elaborate my editing choices.
4.2 How to speak Truth to Data?
In one of our workgroups, Jip asked the following question after her presentation in our class: ‘how ethical is it to discuss a Northern Albanian ancient old custom through a non-Northern Albanian perspective?’ Her question made me think of my own ethical standpoints within the representation of my findings in the film. What are the written ethics and the moral philosophy within the anthropological discipline about representations? I went back to the reflection section of my research proposal to read what I wrote down there. I described how I always would send the interviews back so they could read them and see the visual material. This way, they could check if they identified with these representations I made of them. The ethical discussions within the discipline of anthropology helped me to reflect on how I can represent my data within the text and film. But data is not growing in trees and shrubs. What is interesting and relevant enough to end up in my basket? Maxim Februari, a Dutch writer and philosopher, says ‘mainly social researchers are making this data’.18 New phenomenon scientist thinks to discover, are formed of
ideological and political colored. Jip’s question made me realize this point again. Within the written text I will comprehensively describe this reflection on the ‘colored data’. My thoughts about ethics and morality continued when I was listening to a podcast of Februari. He starts with: ‘do we need a voice in a society where our data speak for us? Where our smart dishwashers and
smart cities pretend to know us better than we know ourselves?’ I asked myself the question; what does it mean that social scientist becomes more and more knowledgeable about the behavior of people and in my case of Palestinians? And what exactly is data? It is a manmade interpretation of human behavior. Februari describes how our toilets will eventually talk to our doctors and how we, at this moment, are building a new society where we give our voice to random people and organizations. Because I am making a film my main concern is representation. Not only their voice will be shared with a bigger world, also their image. I do not want to represent and reduce the Palestinian to a particular group with which they do not identify themselves. My final work has to present ideas that the people I work with share with me and I tried to overcome this with the ‘colored data’ in mind. I received full agreement of my participants of what I have showed in the film Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.).
The most important ethics within anthropological fieldwork are the following; do not harm individuals you as an researcher are working with (this also includes the misuse of people’s trusts of sharing personal information), be aware what the methods do, in the field but also when I present the findings, and bear the responsibility for the reputation of the discipline and its practitioners (Banks 2012: 90). These three laws I saw as opportunities rather than barriers. I always asked permission for interviews, and wherever I had the possibility I sent the interviews back so my participants could read them. To several respondents, I showed the visual material and checked if they could identify with this representation. Moreover, my main concern during the writing process was representation. I didn’t want to represent and reduce the Palestinian to a particular group with which they couldn’t identify. Not only their voice is shared with a bigger world, also their image. I hope this filmic thesis represent ideas and images my interlocutress shared with me.
4.3 How to tune my research to local interests?
Central in the ethical codes is limiting any harm to your respondents. Being harmless to your respondents often meant I couldn’t be critical. Following Van Meijl (2005: 235) respondents demand scientists “to attune their research directly to local interests”. But I have a clear political stance in different debates related to Israel and Palestine. And I think, and I believe in, a critical moral approach to individuals and parties must be possible. Anthropological fieldwork requires skillful maneuvering between an involved insider and a detached outsider, making way for political and ideological advocacy and simultaneous contextual criticism and moral judgment (Carrithers 2005). However presence of armed militaries and the threat of being sent back to the Netherlands influenced certain ethical standards I tried to uphold. The ongoing struggle between
Israel and Palestine influenced my research in various ways. The practicalities19 at the airport in
Tel Aviv made me anxious because there was a chance the material and data would be investigated. I changed the names of my respondents and transferred the material to the Netherlands by Internet. Traveling back however went without any problems. Beside this, a Palestinian friend warned me about a certain status researchers and internationals sometimes have in Palestine. Palestinians are used to the coming and going of internationals. I searched for a way my research could be a benefit for the local population or the olive wood industry. I would like to present the film Uncertain Travel (2018, 20 min.) in several screenings rooms and cinemas. Readings in Bryman (2012) which states researchers have to plight to be transparent, and Wang’s (2012) ideas on ‘open ethnography’ inspired me even more to present the film to a wide audience, here in the Netherlands and in Palestine. 20
4.4 Being a Foreign Girl in Palestine My appearance is quite different from most Palestinians. I have brown curly hair and a pale skin. Due to this, I experienced being an outsider when walking around. This position helped me in this research as Palestinians regarded me as a tourist and invited me in to their houses. In the following clip I present a scene of a visit to one of Mahmoud’s aunts. The feeling of watching and being watched appears. After a while, having little daily rituals, I forgot my position as an outsider. The fact that I am a young woman and 26 years old (turned 26 during my fieldwork period) has undoubtedly influenced my research, as Bryman (2012) points out. Nevertheless, the access to the right people and the willingness of people to talk to me were both favorable. Palestinian men were in general open to connect; tough it was more difficult to achieve contact with Palestinian women. Result: most of my friends and respondents mainly existed of man. As Abu-Lughod (2000) writes ‘men are the center of Palestinian life…’ (ibid.: 208). I already wrote in my proposal: ‘I have to take my position as woman into account and see if this will be received well and make my decisions accordingly.’
After a discussion with Stephanie, a friend I regularly saw, I became worried about possible negative effects for Palestinian girls because of ‘our’ presence (‘foreign girls’). For me, growing up in Amsterdam, it is normal to have male friends. Consequently, I had a couple of male friends in Bethlehem; Palestinian male friends. I went out with them, drank beers, and undertook little trips. For most of the Palestinian girls this was not that normal as it was for me. Since I am
19 The control and supervision of people who are entering or leaving Israel at the airport of Tel-Aviv are stricter than
just a visitor and I don’t want to harm anyone, I became more and more concerned what Palestinian girls would think of ‘us’, what consequences ‘our’ presence had and our open attitude to Palestinian man in Palestinian cities?
Furthermore I lived two months with Mahmoud and his family. But gossiping neighbors didn’t seem to be the only danger that made my presence in this house difficult. Mahmoud, his sister and mother remain vague about the details of all the dangers they saw, but they were obsessed with my safety. Mahmoud insisted many times to accompany me to interviews or bring me with his car wherever I wanted to go. Additionally to possible influences on my research of being a foreign girl and living with a Palestinian family, my father has a Jewish background. He and my mother visited me during my fieldwork period for 10 days. Since my father lost many family members in the Second World War, he feels emotionally connected with the state of Israel. I visited Palestine many times and feel myself submerged with their contested and profound daily life. Their visits made me conscious our different attachment to Israel-Palestine. Due to this, and especially our talks about the situation in Israel-Palestine, turned out to be an improvement of my reflexivity on my limited one-sided perspective. I easily condemn Israeli for living in Palestine and sometimes even in Israel. A nephew of my father invited us one day in Rosh Pina, in the northern part of Israel. He did not feel safe in Amsterdam and moved to Israel when he was 22 years old. Nowadays he feels secure and wares for example the kippah freely, the cap worn by Jews. But still, it is hard for me to understand why Jewish people, move to Palestine and live in settlements surrounded with walls and fences.
Chapter 5 - The ‘Social Life’ of the Rosary
“The Rosary”—when one looks at it closely—is not a single object but rather a series of beads and a cross reflecting the various phases of the ‘social life’ of the catholic rosary. Appadurai’s (1958) notion on the ‘life history of an object’ became, an important theory in my study. In this study I examine the production process of the catholic rosary and relate my findings and interpretations. In this chapter I describe the production process of the rosary. The following three practices are significant: olive wood cultivation (5.1), olive wood transportation (5.2) and olive woodcarving (5.3). Within each practice the foundation is developed for the next step in the process of becoming a rosary. First the olive tree is transformed into olive wood, afterwards the wood is transported to olive wood factories in Bethlehem and then the wood is developed into rosary beads which will be stringed together and sold as a catholic rosary.
5.1 Olive Wood Cultivation
The first time I realized how delicious olive oil from Palestine could be was three years ago in the village called Jamma’in. Abu Nassar offered me breakfast, a typical Palestinian breakfast with a glass of sweet tea, taboon flatbread and a great bowl of olive oil and za’atar. Olive oil plays an important part in Palestine, as it is served with breakfast, lunch and dinner. The next day a broad strip of his land was destroyed with a ‘security fence.’21 Abu Nassar was unlucky enough to live in
Area C close to Ariel, an illegal settlement. Ariel is located in the middle of Figure 7, and the small brown area above this settlement is the village of Abu Nasser. Since 1967, Israeli settlements have been taking pieces of land that Palestinians consider being theirs. This day it was Abu Nassar’s turn. A fence separated him from a large part of his olive grove. Abu Nassar’s example illustrates what the practice of olive wood cultivation in Palestine looks like. It encompasses pride and love for this ancient tree and its oil and, at the same time, a fight against the confiscation of Palestinian land.
Following Sahakian & Wilhite (2013), olive wood cultivation can be seen as a practice with three pillars: (1) the knowledge people embody both mentally and physically,, (2) the material and infrastructure and (3) the socially grounded context, norms, values and legal frameworks. The tree pillars helped me to deconstruct and eventually reassemble and understand the practice of olive wood production in Palestine. The following two paragraphs explore the different perspectives I
collected when olive wood cultivation using the tree pillars of the practice theory (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2013).
Figure 7: two times a map of Palestine. Blue is Area C with illegal settlements; dark brown is Area A with Palestinian villages (B’Tselem interactive maps).22
5.1.1 The strong connection to olive trees and the know-how of its cultivation When looking at the first pillar of the practice theory of olive wood cultivation, I discovered that the Palestinian farmers and owners possess widespread knowledge on how to cultivate olive trees. Besides this ‘know-how,’ most of them feel deeply connected with the trees. Following Sahakian & Wilhite (2013), the first pillar represents the way culture and personal histories shape the body and mind, and as a result shape action, in present practices. Many Palestinian olive wood farmers I spoke with learned about olive wood cultivation from their fathers, and those fathers learned it from their fathers. Olive wood cultivation practice can only be understood through their articulations with historical events, as I learned from Ortner (2006): a theory of practice is a theory of history. When I was living at Tent of Nations I had to take care of a small olive tree grove for two weeks. Daher, a member of the family who lived at this farm, taught me how to cultivate the trees. They needed water, weeding, and more weeding, piles of stones around the stump, fertile sand, fences around the small trees and more. His father Bashara was a mazaria mumtaz or an excellent farmer as Daher always said. Following Sahakian & Wilhite (2013), for Daher this cultivation knowledge was ‘acquired by the body through social experiences, inscribed in space and over time’ (ibid.: 28). This physical knowledge, or the action-oriented embodied knowledge (Bourdieu, 1979), is an important agent within practices. Without the knowledge of cultivating the olive tree, this practice would fail.
Besides this physical know-how of cultivation, there is a strong attachment and connection as the olive tree has special significance throughout the Middle East. In Palestine, it is an essential aspect of their culture. Like the olive trees, Palestinians are rooted deep into the soil of the land to which they belong, as in the following words of Ali:23 “How many generations have
passed by and that are now gone, yet the tree is still here today and bearing fruit” and Daoud,24 “We received an
open check: we could just write down how many millions we wanted. But of course for us – Palestinians – land with the olive trees is our identity. If you sell your land, you sell your soul.” For him it is self-evident, in particular as a Palestinian, to say ‘no’ to an open check for the sale of land with olive trees. Abu Zeitoun25
also expressed this idea with the following words: “Its like identity, it is my live. When they uproot the trees, they uproot my idea. It is our presence. When I go to my land and I see a tree that dies or something, I will be very sad and stressed.”
23 Ali, a Palestinian farmer who ones a big olive tree grove. He lives in Beit jalla, in the Bethlehem Destrict.
24 Daoud, a Palestinian farmer who lives in Area C. His little farm (Tent of Nations) is known for its non-violence
ideology and continuing resilience and resistance by keep on staying and living at his place despite the problems caused by Israeli military and illegal settlements close by Daouds farm.
25 Abu Zeitoun, translated ‘father of olive’, is a Palestinian farmer of olive trees in the Palestinian village Jaba3 (the
number 3 is used for the Arabic letter ﻉ, called ‘ayn). Jaba3 is located in Area C near the wall and illegal Israeli settlements.
The first pillar, the knowledge people embody within a certain practice, allowing me to understand that olive trees carry significant value for Palestinian olive wood farmers. Furthermore, the concept of habitus, the socialized norms and tendencies that guide behavior and thinking (Bourdieu 1979), connect a practice to culture, structure and power (Swartz; DiMaggio 1997). This brings me to the second and third pillars of the practice theory whereby the material and social structures within the field of the practice can be analyzed. While the habitus can be seen as the internalized structure granted by an individual, the field is the structure in which the habitus works. According to DiMaggio (1997), “field refers to both the totality of actors and organizations involved in an arena of social or cultural production and the dynamic relationships among them” (ibid.: 1464). In this case an olive wood farmer belongs to the field of farming and to all the institutions, structure and organization that support that field. Through examining the second and third pillars (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2013), the impact of the Israeli occupation on the symbolic value of the olive trees was found to be significant.
5.1.2 The material and social structure: uprooting of olive trees in Area C
Following Sahakian & Wilhite (2013), the second pillar focuses on the material aspect within the field of the practice, and the third pillar regards social norms and legal frameworks. Applying these two pillars to olive wood cultivation helped me understand the impact of Israeli policies. The Israeli occupation enters the olive wood cultivation process in the form of curfews, security closures, barricades and checkpoints (see Figure 8). The main effect of checkpoints on olive cultivation concerns the access to land and markets (Hughes, 2012: 88). Many farmers I spoke with confirmed that they face many difficulties going to their groves. During the harvest season Ali and Mohammad stay and sleep at their olive tree groves. They are afraid of unexpected closures, which can have disastrous results, such as missing the harvest or watering to late.
Besides the concrete obstacles, there is a shortage of water. Two days after the occupation in 1967 the Israeli government declared ownership of all the water in Palestine.26 Nowadays, few
Palestinian households have water every day. Especially in the summer, the water can be closed off for days. Palestinian homes have to buy it from Israel.
Then, there is the uprooting of trees: thousands of olive trees have been taken.27 The
Israel Defense Forces (IDF) has been accused that this destruction is only to facilitate the building of illegal settlements, to expand roads and infrastructure in favor of Israelis living in Palestine.
The confiscation of these centuries-old olive trees, with some trees more than 2000 years old, has caused tremendous losses for many Palestinian families.28 In the film clip titled Daoud’s story,
Daoud shares his experience with the Israeli military.
Figure 8: Farmers are prevented by Israeli military to go to their olivewood fields on the other side of the separation barrier (picture from Colin Hinchelwood29).
In summary, applying the second and third pillars reveals how the context—the Israeli occupation and policies—influence olive wood cultivation practices. The occupation has an effect on the emotional connection with the tree as well. In other words, the Israeli occupation catalyzes the feeling of attachment to the trees, which can be seen as a way of resisting the occupation. Saying ‘no’ to an open check for the sale of land, or ‘olive-tree-plant-demonstration,’ are examples of this resistance.30 However, Van Teeffelen (2014) states that resistance is not just confined to those
who engage in movements such as demonstrations: “Resisting the occupation is also part of life
28 Since 1967 more then 800,000 olive trees have been uprooted in Palestine. This has threatened the livelihood of
80,000 families, according to The Applied Research Institute Jerusalem (www.poica.org/editor/case_studies (12-02-18).
29 See http://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/03071375.2008.9747524?journalCode=tarb20 (18-02-18) 30 Demonstrations pop up every Friday at fixed places in Palestine. Some are large, others smaller. They often fail but
succeed in revealing to the world the absurdity of the occupation of Palestine and keeping the Israeli military off balance. Beside whether there is an effect on Israeli policy, this act of non-violence resistance give many Palestinians strength: When I am walking with the whole group and everyone holds this little olive tree I feel this energy. I feel proud. Someday, in’shallah (God willing), this will be history and we will be free. Until that time the demonstrations will fail and fail again, as creative as possible.
for people focused on going forward and keeping their hope in a more just and human future alive” (2014: 92). Alexandra Rijke and Toine Van Teeffelen (2014), Malik (2013) and Lori Allen (2008) among others have described this idea of resistance by Palestinians using the word sumud. Van Teeffelen(2014), who has been living in Palestine for years, even argues that sumud is the soul of the Palestinian people.
Paradoxically, when an olive tree is uprooted for the making of the rosary beads, it loses its symbolic significance. Following Appadurai’s (1986) writings on commodities, a ‘thing’ is not a thing ‘in-itself.’ Instead, individuals form a social relationship with the ‘thing.’ Olive wood became an object of significance, but when it is used as a commodity i.e., an economic item (ibid.: 14) it loses any meaning beyond that of being wood, as Appadurai (1986) states that: ‘The thing’ can move in and out of its commodity status’ (ibid.: 14). The changeable meaning of an olive tree can be seen as one aspect of its social existence.
In summary, with the help of the first, second and third pillars of the practice theory (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2013), it becomes clear that the olive wood cultivation practice has made been possible by the individuals, the materials and social structure of the field in space and time. When examining olivewood cultivation using the practice theory, different significant aspects appear: the Palestinian olive tree is a vital symbol and linked with sumud, the soul of the Palestinians (Teeffelen, 2014). Moreover, the impact of the Israeli military occupation on the olive wood cultivation has disastrous consequences. Farmers stay overnight at the groves and need to buy water from Israel. But the practice of olive wood cultivation continues and the journey of the rosary can move to the next practice: transportation of the olive wood to Bethlehem.
5.2 Everyday transportation through Area C
The second practice within the production process of the rosary is the transportation of the olive trees and wood to the carving factories in Bethlehem. However, a network of roads connects the illegal Israeli settlements, which restricts Palestinian drivers. The olive wood therefore needs to take detours to arrive in Bethlehem. I assumed that this alternative route would influence the olive wood business in terms of time and arrival management. The restrictions on the roads in Area C indeed influenced the olive wood transportation, but few of my respondents had problems with it. Ahmed Abudullatif Dababat, a Palestinian man from TooBass, transports olivewood from the northern Palestine to the factories in Bethlehem. He told me that the amount of olivewood has not changed in the last ten to fifteen years. In addition, Ahmed allocated some additional time and exchanged his car for a stronger one that could manage the alternative unpaved routes. By using theories on violence (Foucault, 1997; Abu-Lughod & Bourgois, 2005) and practice theory (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2013), in this paragraph I argue that the daily practice of olivewood transportation became a routine. The different forms of violence on the roads during the journey to Bethlehem lose their meaning of being a form of violence, as illustrated by Ahmed.
5.2.1 Geographical strategies against the mobility of others: forbidden road regime I will argue that the 2nd and 3rd pillars of Sahakian & Wilhite (2013) points at the impact of the
field where the transportation of the olive wood is located. As I described before, the 2nd and 3th
pillar are regarding the material world – including technology and infrastructure – and the social world – the setting, norms, values and institutions (ibid.: 28).
The practice of olive wood transportation is located in Area C of Palestine. Area C is fully controlled by Israeli military surveillance through the use of technology, roadblocks and checkpoints, informants as by geographical organization of the building of settlements and military camps inside of Palestinian population centers (Allen, 2008). According to Halper (2000), these efforts are to enforce the “matrix of control.” The control of the Palestinian economy and population’s movement is of great significance to Israel, as stated by a member of Breaking the Silence:31‘Israel is cutting the grass.’His explanation of this was that if one wants to keep the enemy
off balance, Israel needs to weaken the capabilities of the Palestinians once in a while. If this strategy of ‘weakening’ is carried out too quickly, Palestinians will rise and demonstrate. Usama confirmed this strategy of slowing down the process of land confiscation using the words ‘Israyiyl dhukiat, siasia swaje swaje,’ which translates as ‘Israeli politics do it slowly, slowly.’ Michael Taussig (2003) starts his essay with the words ‘A question of distance—that’s what I’d like to say about talking terror, a matter of finding the right distance, holding it at arm’s length so it doesn’t turn
on you...’ (ibid.: 269). But he continues: ‘…terrors talk, always talk back…’ (ibid.: 269). Is a ‘terror response’ what Israel wants to overcome? In light of the slow but steady construction of the separation wall and Israeli settlements, it looks like the ‘terror response’ of the Palestinians in Palestine is not coming or, as many think, is coming too late.
Roads are especially important spaces to manage. Across the world roads are being built to develop mobility, economic growth and modernizations. When considered as infrastructural technologies, roads can provide new perspectives on politics of social relations. The book Roads, written by Harvey and Knox (2015), tells an intriguing story about flows of money, goods and people on two roads in Peru in order to describe what infrastructural projects can tell us about state formations, social relations and emerging political economies. Roads inspired me to see infrastructure as a dynamic and relational form that highlights political issues and processes of conflict. Besides this social-political perspective, Harvey and Knox (2015) discussed an important economic aspect of roads: ‘Roads enable growth, flows of goods, labor and services; delivering the basic conditions of modern living’ (ibid.: 26). Related to the controlling of the Palestinian economy, there is an idea that Palestine cannot become too strong, too independent. Roads are the connections between work and people and therefore an important target for Israel when it comes to its occupation of Palestine. The olive tree cultivation is suffering as a result, and the alternative to farming is often unemployment (New Agriculturalist, 2006). In addition to these blockades and restrictions, there are roads that are forbidden to Palestinians. Separated road policy has a clear racist character which views all Palestinian as risks, and it is therefore justifiable to restrict their freedom of movement:
The forbidden roads regime has forced West Bank Palestinians to use long and winding routes rather than roads that lead directly from one town or district to another. Travel on these alternate roads disrupts all aspects of daily life in the West Bank, in such areas as the economy, health, and education, and gravely affects social and family life. In addition, Palestinians suffer the insult and humiliation that are part and parcel of the measures used by Israeli security forces to enforce the discriminatory roads regime (B’Tselem, 2004).32
The 2nd and 3rd pillars of the practice theory (Sahakian & Wilhite, 2013) show the problematic
field of transportation through which the olive wood must travel. The obstacles and checkpoints
