What keeps us Iranian?
Our culture? You're getting warmer January 13, 2004
iranian.com
It's an interesting question if you
think about it and the answer isn't as obvious as you think. What
has
kept us and makes us Iranian? Is it because of our
language? Well, not exactly, dialects of Farsi are
spoken in Tajikstan, Afghanistan, and Uzbekistan. You
don't even have to go that far, Farsi, or Persian as
it is known in the West, is the native language of
more than half of Iran's population, with many
different dialects spoken. Azari, Kurdish, Arabic and
a number of other languages are spoken in Iran as
well. Therefore, you can't just say that the Persian
language makes us distinct because half of Iran speaks
a language other than Persian.
Is it our religion? I would argue no, again. Although
most Iranians are of the Shia Islam background, not
all Iranians are Muslims. Besides, Shia Islam is far
from unique to Iranians. There are about 120-150
million Shia Muslims in the Islamic World; Iranians
only make up a small portion of that number.
Is it because we all look the same? Far from it,
Iranians come from all shades of color. Our culture?
You're getting warmer.
Throughout the centuries, Iran has been continuously
invaded and cultures have been meshed together. The
Arab invasion posed the most serious challenge to the
Iranian identity. How did the Iranians of the 7th
century keep their identity and character during the
Arab conquests that Arabized the Middle East and North
Africa? Contrary to common belief, Bernard Lewis
argued that this was not a result of the strength of
the Persian language or their dominant religion of the
time. [See: "Persian
Nevertheless"]
Many
Iranians didn't speak Persian and nevertheless, the
language was ultimately highly influenced by Arabic.
Additionally, Iranians were either forced to or
willingly embraced a form of the conquerors' religion
(initially Sunni Islam, but in 1500s Safavid Shah
Ismail forced Shia Islam as the state religion and
made conversion compulsory). The question remains,
how did they maintain their distinct identity while
absorbing certain elements of the occupier?
Lewis argued that while Egypt, Iraq, and other
contemporary Arab countries shed their ancient
identities and culture and became Arabized, Iranians,
after three centuries of Arab occupation, resisted
this transition because of their sense of history.
Iranians always knew they belonged to a distinct
history, part of something big - a glorious past. As
romanticized as it may sound, they always knew they
were different because of their monumental past. My
point is Iranian history is very important to our
character and in preserving our Iranian identity. It
would assist the generation who grew up away from the
homeland in maintaining or discovering their roots by
being better versed in their own history.
As students at UC Berkeley, Hoda Fahimi and I have
been teaching a two-unit course on Iran's 20th century
political history with an emphasis on the last
twenty-five years on behalf of our student group ISAA. We have
addressed historic events like the coup of 1953, the Iranian
Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War and social and cultural
issues as well. As Iranians in the 21st century, this
contemporary history is what we experienced. What
happened within those borders was for us to experience
alone. Chinese lives didn't get turned upside down by
the Iranian Revolution. We are not nationalists, but
Iranians who are addressing the history that makes us
distinct and has affected our lives so drastically,
instead of ignoring it because it was too traumatic.
After visiting Iran, some Iranians have come back
stating that such events are not important to the
youth in Iran, which constitutes more than half of the
population, and that they never talk about such
issues. First and foremost, Iranians who haven't been
back to the homeland in years tend to fall in what I
call the "Iran generalizing trap". Many go back
and create or attend to an environment that suits their
interests, and then come back to the states and say
all of Iran is this or that.
For example, a
party-goer Iranian-American visits only northern
Tehran and come backs talking about how all of Iran is
materialistic, superficial, and a party zone. Or
better yet, a devout Iranian Muslim only goes to Qom
and Mashhad and then talks about how all of Iran is so
deeply religious and conservative. Accordingly, from
recent travelers who just returned from the homeland,
Iran is: a big prostitution ring, party, highly
religious, radically political, vehemently apathetic,
boring, exciting, a whorehouse, conservative, liberal,
western, traditional, etc. Like all countries, I'm
sure all of these elements exist in Iran.
Back to the topic at hand, I assume much, not most,
not all, but much of the Iranian youth are not
concerned enough with Iran's contemporary history to
enroll in such a class. Unfortunately, this is
completely understandable given that they witnessed
the war and therefore know about why it started and
what episodes occurred during that painful war, and
have had themes from the revolution glorified and
shoved down their throats as propaganda. Therefore,
they probably wouldn't be too excited about enrolling
in class on contemporary Iranian history.
We, on the other hand, a generation who grew up
in the states but were deeply affected one way or another by
such historic events, are for the most part, oblivious
of our own contemporary history. Interestingly
enough, a couple recent Iranian immigrants have taken
our class because they never bothered learning for
themselves while in Iran, or simply didn't trust the
curriculum. Either way, they're not to blame, after
all, how much U.S. history do we Iranian-Americans
know? I admittedly will state that I don't know much.
Iranian history is a major component to our identity,
especially contemporary history, because it addresses
those episodes that impacted our own lives. After
all, most of us are here in the United States because
of the revolution and the war. For these reasons, we
have continuously taught a class that brings these
recent Iranian issues to the forefront to a generation
searching to discover themselves.
We hope that
through obtaining some awareness on their own history,
it will assist them in their discovery. A bonus to
the class is the fact that in the fall of 2003, a
little more than half of the class was American.
You'd be surprised about how much their perception of
Iran has changed in a more positive direction (source:
papers they wrote on the topic of how their
perceptions of Iran have changed since they took the
course).
As I near the end of my college career, I would
like to take this time to encourage Iranian-Americans and
Iranians who never cared much for Iranian history to
pay due attention to such matters. I myself have much
homework left to do. Additionally, I would like to
thank all those students who took us inexperienced
student instructors and our class seriously. I would
also like to thank all the members of the community
who would audit the class and offer their experienced
wisdom and powerful stories.
Lastly, thank you Hoda
for being my partner in teaching this past semester.
It has been my honor to work with you and to represent
our homeland, Iran, together.
Author
Pouya Alimagham is a senior at UC Berkeley studying Middle
Eastern Studies and Political Science, and is the president of
the Iranian Student Alliance in America (ISAA).
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