Syria from reform to revolt. Volume 2, Culture, society, and religion / edited by Christa Salamandra and Leif Stenberg.

Includes bibliographical references (pages 209-224) and index.

Introduction : A legacy of raised expectations / Christa Salamandra and Leif Stenberg -- What lies beneath : political criticism in recent Syrian fiction / Max Weiss -- Syria's drama outpouring : between complicity and critique / Christa Salamandra -- The "whisper strategy" : how Syrian drama makers shape television fiction in the context of authoritarianism and commodification / Donatella Della Ratta -- Cultural liberalization or marginalization? : the cultural politics of Syrian folk dance during social market reform / Shayna Silverstein -- Christian charities and the Ba'thist regime in Bashar al-Asad's Syria : a comparative analysis / Laura Ruiz de Elvira -- Performing the nation : Syrian Christians on the national stage / Andreas Bandak -- Merchant background, bourgeois ethics : the Syrian 'ulama' and economic liberalization / Thomas Pierret -- Muslim organizations in Bashar's Syria : the transformation of the Shaykh Ahmad Kuftaro foundation / Leif Stenberg. Modern Intellectual and Political History of the Middle East.

As Syria's anti-authoritarian uprising and subsequent civil war have left the country in ruins, the need for understanding the nation's complex political and cultural realities remains urgent. The second of a two-volume series, Syria from Reform to Revolt: Culture, Society, and Religion draws together closely observed, critical and historicized analyses, giving vital insights into Syrian society today. With a broad range of disciplinary perspectives, contributors reveal how Bashar al-Asad's pivotal first decade of rule engendered changes in power relations and public discourse--dynamics that would feed the 2011 protest movement and civil war. Essays focus on key arenas of Syrian social life, including television drama, political fiction, Islamic foundations, and Christian choirs and charities, demonstrating the ways in which Syrians worked with and through the state in attempts to reform, undermine, or sidestep the regime. The contributors explore the paradoxical cultural politics of hope, anticipation, and betrayal that have animated life in Syria under Asad, revealing the fractures that obstruct peaceful transformation. Syria from Reform to Revolt provides a powerful assessment of the conditions that turned Syria's hopeful Arab spring revolution into a catastrophic civil war that has cost over 200,000 lives and generated the worst humanitarian crisis of the twenty-first century.

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