La semplificazione dell''altro': la trasformazione della Palestina e dei suoi abitanti sotto l'influenza britannica, 1831-1922

The Ph.D. thesis of Lorenzo Kamel is based on a vast amount of primary sources from seventeen international archives. It has been structured in three sections. The first one outlines the mindset through which British religious and political authorities approached the Palestinian context during the first half of the 1800s. The second one examines how this mindset translated into concrete policies on the ground. This part, dedicated to the process through which the local complexity has been standardized under British influence, offers a comparative outlook on the various approaches adopted by Western Powers. It sheds also light on †˜Biblical Orientalism', a deformed and preconstructed perception of the area rooted in the Bible instead of local realities. The traditions, customs and expectations of the majority of the men and women who for centuries have lived in Palestine have been relegated to a subsidiary role. Concepts like private property, state, citizenship, border, to name the most significant, have been applied uncritically, taking for granted that the locals would follow that mindsets. This has had repercussions clearly visible up to our days, as showed, for example, by the disputes on land ownership in present day West Bank. The final section focuses on the recent process connected to the construction of the first Palestinian archives. It may be understood as a growing internal need to break the vicious cycle triggered by the process of standardization. Or as an effort to emphasize a local reality that has grown for centuries in the name of an often denied continuity. Or as an attempt to recover a local way of life rooted in what maybe only the German concept of Heimat †" referring to a place in which our most profound memories are rooted †" is able to express.