Abstract
Time and space transform identity, self-perception, and the perception of others, and ethnic communities in Iran are not an exception to this. Given its important geographical position, Iran has been the locus of cultural, economic, and population exchanges for millennia. As elsewhere, newcomers gradually assimilated1 into and transformed native populations; indeed, cultural identities have constantly evolved in Iran, leading to the emergence of multiple ethnicities. This mosaic character of Iran can be classified in three ways: by nationality, ethnicity (e.g., Persian, Arab, Turk, Kurd, Baluch, Turkoman, etc.), and religious affiliation (e.g., Muslim Shi‘ite, Sunni, or Sufi; Christian; or Jew).
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Notes
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Mahmud Zand-i Muqaddam, Hikayat-i Baluch (Story of the Baluch), 4 vols. (Tehran: Karun, 1370/1991), vol. 1, 169.
Cited in Charles Issawi, The Economic History of Iran, 1800–1914 (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 125–26.
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Mieko Nishida, Slavery and Identity: Ethnicity, Gender, and Race in Salvador, Brazil, 1808–1888 (Bloomington: Indiana University Press, 2003), 30.
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Joseph Schacht, An Introduction to Islamic Law (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1964), 127; Mustafa Husaini, Bardigi az Didgah-i Islam (Islam’s Standpoint on Slavery) (Tehran: Bunyad-i Da’rat al-Ma‘arif-i Islami, 1372/1993), 28.
Ronald E. Hall, An Historical Analysis of Skin Color Discrimination in America: Victimism among Victim Group Populations (New York: Springer, 2010), 124. 56.
Arnold T. Wilson, Persia (New York: Charles Scribner’s Sons, 1933), 34.
Henry Field, Contributions to the Anthropology of Iran (Chicago: Field Musuem Press, 1939; repr. 1968), 238. Legal slavery ended in 1929, just before Field traveled to Iran, so this was a period of transition.
Khusraw Khusravi, Jazira-yi Kharg dar dura-yi Istila-yi Naft (Kharg Island during the Oil Domination) (Tehran: Danishgah-i Tehran, 1342/1963), 110.
Taghi Modarressi, “The Zar Cult in South Iran,” in Trance and Possession States, ed. Raymond Prince (Montreal: R. M. Bucke Memorial Society, 1968), 151
Ghulam Husain Sa‘idi, Ahl-i Hava (People of the Air) (Tehran: Amir Kabir, 2535/1976), 93. In the case of spirit possession, healers continue to perform their ceremonies secretly. By contrast, the ceremony of liwa has either been modified or has disappeared in some areas.
Mekuria Bulcha, Flight and Integration: Causes of Mass Exodus from Ethiopia and Problems of Integration in the Sudan (Uppsala, Sweden: Scandinavian Institute of African Studies, 1988), 88.
Ali Riyahi, Zar va bad va Baluch (Air and Wind and Baluch) (Tehran: Kitabkhana-yi Tuhuri, 1977), 3.
Cynthia Tse Kimberlin, “The Music of Ethiopia,” in Elizabeth May, ed., Musics of Many Cultures: An Introduction (Los Angeles: University of California Press, 1983), 237.
Richard Natvig, “Oromos, Slaves, and the Zar Spirits: A Contribution to the History of the Zar Cult,” International Journal of African Historical Studies 20, no. 4 (1987): 679.
I. M. Lewis, “Zar in Context: The Past, the Present and Future of an African Healing Cult,” in I. M. Lewis et al. eds., Women’s Medicine: The Zar-Bori Cult in Africa and Beyond (Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press, 1991), 2.
The main participants of the Bori cult in Hausaland are women (Ismail H. Abdalla, “Neither Friend nor Foe: The Malam Practitioner—Yan Bori Relationship in Hausaland,” in Lewis et al., Women’s Medicine, 41; Lewis, “Zar in Context,” 6). Evidence of spirit-possession and healing cults can also be observed among the descendants of enslaved Africans in Brazil, Cuba, Haiti, and the United States, as well as among the Fulbe and Bambara people (John Hunwick and Eve Trout Powell, eds., The African Diaspora in the Mediterranean Lands of Islam (Princeton: Markus Wiener, 2002), xxiii.
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© 2014 Lawrence G. Potter
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Mirzai, B.A. (2014). Identity Transformations of African Communities in Iran. In: Potter, L.G. (eds) The Persian Gulf in Modern Times. Palgrave Macmillan, New York. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137485779_14
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137485779_14
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