Chair: Sabine Schmolinsky
A Socio-Spatial Reading of Neighborhoods and Neighborliness in an Ottoman City: Production and Reproduction of the Mahalles and Making Up the City in the case of Edirne in the Late 17th Century
Yunus Ugur:
In the paper, I
will discuss the debates surrounding the neighborhood or the mahalle in an
early modern Ottoman city focusing on two questions with a socio-spatial
approach: the physical vs. social composition of its space on the one hand and
the isolated vs. relational character of its position within the city, on the
other. In defining neighborhoods, spatial or topographical boundaries are
important as one dominant factor but, beyond this, the question here is whether
and how we can find other distinctive factors that may define or compose a
neighborhood identity in demographic terms and socio-economic relationships
among neighbors. And in addition to these definitions, can we redefine a
neighborhood and neighborliness in a larger scale for instance according to its
position among other neighborhoods to make up a city going beyond defining it
as isolated/separated unit in the city.
The first part
of the paper deals with the concepts and approaches about the neighborhoods and
neighborliness turning around “natural areas” of the Chicago School,
communities, social ties, solidarity, manifest or latent neighborliness, the
Ottoman mahalles, and komşuluk (neighborship).
The second part
will be about the Ottoman Edirne and its huge data as my case and its mahalles
as my units of analysis. The Edirne data, which we have for the late 17th and
the early 18th centuries, is surveys (kefâlet-surety and tax registers) and
contain the information regarding thousands of people living in hundreds of
mahalles. Depicting city dwellers’ ethnic, religious, and professional
identities as well as their social and ownership statuses, all of which are
connected to the city’s socio-spatial structures, the data here is defined, clustered
and analyzed in relation to these socio-spatial structures with new methods of
hierarchical clustering and correspondence analysis. The relational approach
adopted here greatly helped explore, first, the distinctive concentrations of
any attributes recorded with the people and, second, the mahalles’
specializations and the socio-spatial vicinities as opposed to their
topographical neighbors in the city.
The last part of
the paper will be about the outcomes. The first outcome is about description of
the city and the people in motion. It seems both Muslim and non-Muslim
populations moved geographically -among the neighborhoods- within the city.
Another outcome is about the neighborhoods and neighbors’ identities in the
city. In terms of the mahalles’ internal
structures and distinctive identities, the inhabitants of the Ottoman mahalle
were diversified in our case through their religious affiliations, ethnic
origins, gender status, property ownerships, and in terms of their social and
economic statuses.
One aspect of
the social and economic relationships within the mahalle is very significant
here for the neighborliness. It involves the social responsibilities of a
mahalle’s inhabitants. Many cases on the chain surety or kefâlet records are
very illuminating in this respect. They indicate that every person living in
the mahalles, regardless of whether they are property owners or renters, stands
surety for another person. Moreover, the mahalle leaders e.g. imams for Muslims
and cemaatbaşıs for Jews stand surety for all. Some who did not find surety for
themselves from the neighbors either had to be removed from these mahalles or
were imprisoned until they got surety for themselves. Therefore, every
inhabitant of the mahalles had to have surety in order to survive in Edirne.
In conclusion,
we will claim that each neighborhood in Edirne has an identity including
similar features with others as well as distinctive characteristics. The
socio-spatial instruments in them, like the ethno-religious and social status
distinctiveness, occupational concentrations, surety system, the mahalle waqfs
for the public places and the taxes, and even house owners and tenants living
together in the same building can be thought of as the constituent elements of
this neighborhood identity. Likewise, the inhabitants of a mahalle could
develop an identity among themselves as neighbors whether “manifest” or
“latent,” transcending even their religious and ethnic origins.
Our analyses
show at the same time that there are neighborhood clusters in the larger scale
who share the similar identities but in different parts of the city. These mahalles and their inhabitants are
socio-spatially neighbors with each other transcending the physical
proximities. Accordingly, people prefer
to live in a neighborhood in the city accepting and sharing its rules, duties,
and identity and then may decide to move to another one in time. This is very
dynamic process both for the neighbors in the mahalles and for the mahalles in
the city depending on the historical and socio-spatial contexts.
Hijra Neighborhoods in Mohallas of Lahore: Paragons of safe spaces for vulnerable communities
Waqas Halim and Asad Ahmad Khan:
South Asian
region has been intolerant and less sympathetic towards sexual minorities.
These factions have been stigmatized and face numerous challenges while
exercising their basic human rights. Amongst them are gender non-conformist
individuals known as Khawaja Siras/Hijras – that identify beyond the gender
binary framework. This stigma and denunciation triggered by the “fluidity” of
gender perpetuates through a set of controversial British colonial laws
implemented in nineteenth century which systematically criminalized and
marginalized the indigenous Khawaja Sira/Hijra community of the subcontinent
since they did not identify within the two-gendered system, and strongly
hindered their desire to self-express. On the contrary, there is overwhelming evidence
in early chronicles that details the history of Muslim patronage enjoyed by
this community across different empires, for example the Mamluk Sultanate, the
Ottoman and Byzantine empires. While in the subcontinent, during Vedic and
pre-colonial times, Khawaja Siras enjoyed ranks of prestige in the Islamic
royal courts of the Delhi sultanate and were trustworthy enough to be appointed
to sensitive positions such as guarding the royal harems. Unfortunately, the
imposition of strict laws to regulate gender wreaked havoc on them and as a
result the entire community was ostracized from the mainstream society.
Subsequently, its ramifications continued in post-colonial societies and Hijras
were subject to grotesque violence, discrimination and suppression because of
their non-normative identities, sexual and romantic attitudes, and performance
behaviors amongst other traits.
This
constricting attempt to make gender norms adhere to a Eurocentric framework has
put the entire Hijra community across South Asia at a high risk and increased
their vulnerability. Consequently, this has led them to be restricted to
enclaves for their survival and security, particularly in large metropolises.
These enclaves have unique dynamics. Most of the community members within the
Hijra mohallas and neighborhoods are not related by blood, yet they live in a
state of tranquility and cohesiveness. They are adopted by a leader who serves
as guardian and supervises the family. In the context of neighborhood, these
enclaves serve as interesting case studies of a broader culture; that despite
being ostracized from the society at large survives to protect many lives, and
a subculture that exists within.
The objective of
this paper is to examine this under researched topic and investigate the nature
of inter and intra relationships within these neighborhoods. It aims to do this
through axis of identity, religion, class, kinship and other factors. Through
the framework of spatiality of human experience, it elucidates the role of
nostalgia, longing, and memory as most members living in the neighborhood flee
their homes in pursuit of self-expression, emancipation and in most cases
taking refuge after being abandoned by their kin.
Taking hijras of Lahore as the primary locus of
fieldwork, this research aims to interrogate the extent of discrimination that
the society renders to the neighborhoods and assess the dynamics and neighborly
relations through an ethnographic study. Contrarily, there is a strong
relationship of this community with the ‘Outside world’. The nature of
dependency on the larger society for begging, prostitution and dancing on
celebrations provides an interesting insight into how the neighborhoods allow
the Hijras to have exclusive spaces yet live in the larger society as complete
pariahs. Day-to-day aspects of life are also captivating. These communities
have their own hierarchical social structures and set of rituals they practice.
They maintain exclusive rules of living, rite of passage, so much so their
funeral sacraments – which are otherwise socially outlawed – are carried out in
an exclusive fashion. These districts also serve as Red-light areas and are
highly despised by the larger patriarchal culture. The paper intends to shed
light on this under-explored topic and merit existing scholarship on
gender.
