Arabists: The Romance of an American EliteSimon and Schuster, 1995 M07 1 - 368 pages A tight-knit group closely linked by intermarriage as well as class and old school ties, the “Arabists” were men and women who spent much of their lives living and working in the Arab world as diplomats, military attaches, intelligence agents, scholar-adventurers, and teachers. As such, the Arabists exerted considerable influence both as career diplomats and as bureaucrats within the State Department from the early nineteenth century to the present. But over time, as this work shows, the group increasingly lost touch with a rapidly changing American society, growing both more insular and headstrong and showing a marked tendency to assert the Arab point of view. Drawing on interviews, memoirs, and other official and private sources, Kaplan reconstructs the 100-year history of the Arabist elite, demonstrating their profound influence on American attitudes toward the Middle East, and tracing their decline as an influx of ethnic and regional specialists has transformed the State Department and challenged the power of the old elite. |
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... Jerusalem in 1823 and 1824, in 1825 he died of illness in Beirut at the age of thirtythree, in utter agony on his deathbed, exactly like that of his friend Parsons. Then there was William McClure Thomson, twentyeight, and his bride ...
... Jerusalem in 1823 and 1824, in 1825 he died of illness in Beirut at the age of thirtythree, in utter agony on his deathbed, exactly like that of his friend Parsons. Then there was William McClure Thomson, twentyeight, and his bride ...
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... Jerusalem, and Beirut had taught the Congregationalists that the Eastern Christians were no less in need of Christ than the Moslems. If anything, they needed him more. The very impossibility of converting the Moslems—or the Eastern Jews ...
... Jerusalem, and Beirut had taught the Congregationalists that the Eastern Christians were no less in need of Christ than the Moslems. If anything, they needed him more. The very impossibility of converting the Moslems—or the Eastern Jews ...
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... Jerusalem, so was Charlotte Perkins in Tabriz. Charlotte survived, but her newborn daughter did not. The Boston board realized that missions in such primitive places were doomed without the presence of a trained physician. So in the ...
... Jerusalem, so was Charlotte Perkins in Tabriz. Charlotte survived, but her newborn daughter did not. The Boston board realized that missions in such primitive places were doomed without the presence of a trained physician. So in the ...
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... Jerusalem may have loomed as the most glorious of postings. But in reality, Jerusalem was a cold and stony Turkish provincial rathole, while Beirut was a modernizing harbor town with a gemlike climate and lovely, Europeanlike mountain ...
... Jerusalem may have loomed as the most glorious of postings. But in reality, Jerusalem was a cold and stony Turkish provincial rathole, while Beirut was a modernizing harbor town with a gemlike climate and lovely, Europeanlike mountain ...
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... Jerusalem. When Crusader strength ebbed, the Maronites switched allegiance to the Egyptian Mamluks, who soon drove out the Crusaders. As Mamluk dominance in the Middle East weakened, the Maronites resumed ties with the Catholic Church ...
... Jerusalem. When Crusader strength ebbed, the Maronites switched allegiance to the Egyptian Mamluks, who soon drove out the Crusaders. As Mamluk dominance in the Middle East weakened, the Maronites resumed ties with the Catholic Church ...
Contents
Aggrieved Area Experts | |
Mugged by Reality | |
Horan of Arabia | |
Indiana Jones | |
Debacle | |
The Icy Eyes That Had Contemplated Nineveh | |
Cowering in a Dark Alley | |
Hostages to Idealism | |
Reality | |
Mr Foreign Service | |
Old Hands | |
Never a Dull Moment | |
Redemption | |
A New Species? | |
Bibliography | |
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Common terms and phrases
Akins American missionaries antiSemitism April Glaspie Arab country Arab nationalism Arab world ArabIsraeli Arabists Aviv Baghdad became Beirut Bill Stoltzfus Bliss British cables Cairo career Christian Cluverius colleagues College Congregationalist Coon Crane culture Custis Damascus David Department Department’s desert Doughty Eagleton Eastern Egypt Eli Smith expatriates Falashas Feisal Foreign Service French FSOs Glaspie’s going Hermann Eilts Hume Horan Iran Iraq Iraq’s Iraqi Islam Israel Israeli Jerry Weaver Jerusalem Jewish Jews Jidda Kelly Khartoum Killgore Kissinger Kissinger’s knew Kuwait language Lawrence Lawrence’s learn Arabic Lebanon lived Loy Henderson Maronites Mesopotamia Middle East military mission Moslem NEA assistant secretary never officer Operation Moses Palestine Palestinian Parker peace Philby political president Protestant Roy Atherton Sadat Saddam Saudi Arabia says Seelye’s Shiite Sisco SixDay Soviet Sterner Sudan Sudanese Syria Talcott Seelye U.S. ambassador U.S. diplomats U.S. embassy United University Veliotes Washington Western Wiley William Yemen