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Talking About the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of ConflictResolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
Adrienne Mannov
Nr. 268/2009
Projekt- & Karrierevejledningen
Projekt- & Karrierevejledningens Rapportserie
Nr. 268/2009
Talking About the Conflict: A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in
Jerusalem
Adrienne Mannov
ISSN: 1339-5367
ISBN: 9788791536175
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Talking About the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution
Dialogue in Jerusalem
Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
Table Of Contents
Resume på dansk……………………………………………………………………..1
Introduction…………………………………………………………………………. 2
Background & Terminology ………………………………………………………. 5
Basic Facts
Numbers & Categories
Contact & Position
What Kind of Data?
A Riddle & Some Clues
The Conundrum
Terminology
Crisis as Context – Conflict as Culture?
Thick Description of the Field……………………………………………..……….11
History and Politics
The Discourse
Crisis & Time
Ritual & Liminality: The Group…………………………………………………..16
Turnerian Structure
Separation: The Neophytes
Liminality:
Communitas
Group Equality
Social Ambiguity
Time
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
i
Talking about the ConflictA Definition Please………………………………………………...………………..20
A Triad. And ethno-national Perspective
Arab-Muslim Palestinians
Jewish-Israelis
In-Between Women
A Need For Other Terms
Duality: An Emotional Perspective
Unspoken Rules & Narrow Alleyways
Power
Telling the Right Story
Back in the Norm……………………………………………………………………32
Storytelling about Storytelling
Alternative Tendencies
Concluding Thoughts………………………………………………….……………38
Bibliography……………………...…………………………………………………..40
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
ii
Resumé på dansk
Konfliktløsningsprojekter har eksisteret i Israel-Palæstina siden 1950’erne. Disse
projekter skaber et forum, hvor borgere forsøger at bidrage positivt til en løsning af
den voldelig konflikt, som har hærget befolkningen i over halvtreds år. Følgende
analyse tager udgangspunkt i mit feltarbejde i en kvindelig dialoggruppe i Jerusalem i
2008. NGO’en bag projektet ønsker, ved at ”tale åbent og direkte”, at deltagerne
gennemgår en transformation i forhold til deres holdning til udgruppen, som
resulterer i socialaktivisme.
Min empiriske undren udspringer af det faktum, at kvinderne sagde, at de ikke talte
om konflikten til dialogmøder. Dette har inspireret mig til at fortage en ritualanalyse
af projektet med deltagernes beskrivelse af gruppedynamikken og deres dialog som
fokus. Gennem de konsekvenser som kronisk krise udgør for min teoretisk tilgang,
påstår jeg, at dialog i denne gruppe kan forstås som en ritualiseret handling, (Bell
1992) der skaber et liminoid rum (Turner 1982). Dette rum muliggør at kvinderne kan
vise empati for deres påståede fjender, hvilket udgør et klart skel fra den polariserede
og dehumaniserende diskurs, som er udpræget i Israel og Palæstina. Det viser sig dog,
at empati er en social strategi der muliggør deltagerne at ’lege fred’ til
dialoggruppemøder. På baggrund af hvordan kvinderne opfattede det at snakke om
konflikten, hævder jeg, at dialog i denne konstellation er med til at opretholde den
dehumaniserende diskurs i stedet for at nedbryde den.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
1
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
___________________________________________________
___________________________________________________
During a five-month sojourn in Jerusalem, I was asked to evaluate an all-female
conflict-resolution dialogue group, run by a local NGO1. Conflict resolution dialogue
groups have existed in Israel-Palestine since the 1950’s (Miall, Ramsbotham &
Woodhouse 1999:42). They are non-governmental and civilian initiatives seeking to
influence the self-perpetuating conflict between Israel and Palestine over central
issues such as land and human rights.
Over the last sixty-plus years, the conflict between Israelis and Palestinians has been
played out on a political plane, where wars have been fought, violent resistance has
taken place, and peace agreements have been made, only to be broken again. The
conflict has also been experienced on an individual level, where political struggles
have touched civilians’ lives in powerful ways. Many have lost loved ones and have
been victims of violence and discrimination themselves2. In Jerusalem, the conflict
manifests itself on a daily basis through extreme ethno-religious segregation and a
polarized and dehumanizing discourse. Being involved in a conflict-resolution
dialogue group entails talking about these things with people who are perceived as the
enemy.
The NGO’s point of departure for this dialogue program was to provide a peacebuilding forum where women’s voices could be heard. The goal was to empower the
participants, ideally resulting in their becoming more active in the peace-process on a
1
The organization is quite small; ca. ten employees are on staff. For this reason, I have chosen to refer
to it as an “NGO”, rather than using its real name in order to protect the staff members’ identity. The
NGO’s offices are in West Jerusalem, a Jewish section of the city, and most of their employees are
Israeli-Jews. The NGO works regularly with Palestinian peace-building professionals and
organizations. Their funding comes from European and American donors, both on a state and
individual level.
2
See bibliography for web source.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
2
community level3. The dialogue method used, called Storytelling (Bar-On & Kassem
2004), was meant to move the participants from “frank and open exchanges” to
demonstrating “to the wider community the tangible benefit to be gained by working
together for common goals” 4. By sharing personal stories with individuals who are
perceived as the enemy within a mediated dialogue setting, it is postulated that the
otherwise dehumanizing and polarized discourse present in mainstream society, can
be broken down (ibid). This in turn, should contribute to a solution to, or at least relief
from, the intractable conflict. This is a hypothesis that is shared by many conflictresolution professionals (Kelman 2004, Kahanoff et al 2007, Gurevitch 1989, Kassem
& Bar-On 2004, Maoz 2000, Halabi 2004).
However, in my interviews with the women, this was not a process that I was able to
discern. Instead, there seemed to be a rather strong resistance to both concrete
confrontation within the group, especially in the form of uncomfortable, conflictrelated discussions, and to working on community activities together. During our
interview sessions, the women confided in me that, although the conflict was
occasionally discussed, they were not comfortable talking about it in the group.
Neither did they report on a strong desire to develop a group activity that would
exemplify peaceful co-existence between Israelis and Palestinians, the message that
such activities were meant to convey to their local communities.
If the women only occasionally spoke of the conflict, why then were they
participating in a conflict resolution dialogue group? Beyond their generally peaceful
intentions, there were both pragmatic reasons and emotional incentives for their
participation, which in turn shaped their perceptions of what talking about the
conflict, meant. Universal for all of the women however, was a powerful emotional
attachment to the dialogue group.
This context inspires me to claim that participation in the dialogue group functioned
as a ritualized activity (Bell 1992), creating thereby a liminoid space (Turner 1982).
This space enabled the women to display empathy for their perceived enemies,
3
4
Organization Project Proposal, 2006
Organization Project Proposal, 2006.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
3
marking a clear deviation from the zero-sum (Miall et al 1999:6) discourse otherwise
present in Jerusalem. Incorporating the theoretical consequences that chronic crisis
implies, I further claim that empathy functions as a social tool. This tool creates a
forum where political activism, personal encouragement and peace can be ‘played’,
suggesting that the strategies adopted in the group confirmed the dehumanizing
discourse present in Israeli and Palestinian societies, rather than dismantled it.
After presenting the background for the research project and some preliminary
clarification of terminology discussed in this paper, I will describe the sociopolitical
context of my fieldwork. Here, social psychologist Daniel Bar-Tal’s analysis of “The
Ethos of Conflict” (2007) and anthropologist Henrik Vigh’s concept of crisis
chronicity (2008) will be central. These two foci, the ethos of conflict and crisis
chronicity set the scene for my main arguments. Building on this context, I will use
Turner and Bell’s ritual-theoretical apparatus to illustrate how dialogue functioned as
ritual behavior. Thereafter, the women’s varying concepts of talking about the conflict
will be discussed, leading to my claim that these concepts confirmed the norm
discourse.
My final thoughts are pledged to hopeful tendencies in the group. This brings me to
my final comments on conflict resolution dialogue methods, casting a brief light on
the political sphere, rather than the civilian.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
4
Background & Terminology
___________________________________________________
Basic Facts
Numbers & Categories
When I became acquainted with the women in September 2008, there were eleven
members and one Israeli-Jew facilitator active in the group. During the Storytelling
phase, there had been more group members and a second facilitator, who, in
collaboration with her Israeli-Jew colleague, led the dialogue5. Having one
Palestinian-Israeli and one Israeli-Jew facilitator, meant that there was at least one
group leader who represented the women’s ethno-national positions. Their job was to
lead group dialogue and to mediate arguments (Saunders 1999:101). The facilitators
designed the program and planned activities. As a rule, they did not share their
personal opinions with members of the group, but encouraged the women to
contribute their own opinions.
The NGO chose to categorize participants in terms of religious ascription, hoping to
have an equal amount of Muslim, Christian and Jewish group participants. I suggest
the following categorization scheme, illustrating that the social lines drawn between
the various groups were not as clear as the NGO perhaps assumed:
Muslims
Jews
Christians
5
1 Palestinian
Secular Arab
2 Israeli
Orthodox Jews
2 Palestinian
Christian Arabs
1 Palestinian
Muslim Gypsy
1Israeli
Conservative Jew
(Sabra)
1 Palestinian
Christian Aramean
1 Israeli Muslim
Circassian
1 Israeli Reform
Jew (Rabbi)
1 Palestinian
Muslim Arab
As mentioned, the participants in the group are women, but gender will not be my focus in this paper.
The goal of the project was for the women to pursue topics about how the conflict affected their lives
on an individual and personal level. “Storytelling” (Bar-On & Kassem 2004), focuses on personal
experience and is not a gender specific method.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
5
Of the eleven participants in the group, I interviewed ten at length. The Israeli-Jew
facilitator, who I will call Esther6, is also the program director at the NGO and my
supervisor for the project, making her a gatekeeper7par excellence. I will discuss her
role in more detail shortly. In addition to informal meetings regarding the planning
and execution of the evaluation research, we also met for a formal interview and saw
each other privately.
Finally, I was able to interview the Palestinian-Israeli facilitator who lives outside of
Jerusalem, just as I was about to conclude the research project. Alina was no longer
affiliated with the group but had accompanied the women through the Storytelling
phase. She was a powerful presence in my interviews with the women and so I was
eager to meet with her in person. She offered her perspectives on the Storytelling in
the group, her work in the NGO and her collaboration with Esther. Of particular
importance is the fact that Alina had tailored the Storytelling method, originally
conceived as a method to facilitate dialogue between descendents of Holocaust
victims and Nazi perpetrators, to conflict resolution between Israelis and Palestinians
(Bar-On & Kassem 2004)8.
I also interviewed the director of the NGO informally on several occasions as my
project progressed. I did participant observation at the NGO office, at NGO activities
and at dialogue meetings over the space of four-months.
Contact & Position
I initiated contact with the NGO because I was interested in working with an
organization that dealt with conflict resolution in connection with my studies at
Hebrew University. As the NGO was interested in evaluating the dialogue project,
this became my task as their intern (Mannov, n.d). I was put into contact with Esther
who controlled to a great extent which information was accessible to me; information
6
I have changed all of my informant’s names. See bibliography for web source.
See bibliography for web source
8
Applying a conflict resolution method designed to address a conflict that happened in the past, to a
conflict that is on-going implies some methodological consequences, that I, due to lack of space,
cannot unfold here. Similarly, Alina’s position in the group and the NGO is interesting, but due to the
scope of this paper, I will not be able to elaborate on this.
7
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
6
that clearly mirrored her own experience in the dialogue group.9 Together, we
prepared a statement about the evaluation project that was sent to the women. They
were told that I was “an American Jew currently living in Copenhagen, married with
two teenage children....” If the women agreed, they were told that I would interview
them and come to dialogue meetings. Esther and I discussed the central topics upon
which the evaluation would be based and she gave me an introduction to the project
and the women.
Although the NGO was interested in having specific questions answered about the
women’s experiences in the dialogue group, I wanted the women to define the issues
that they saw as central. In a roundabout way, I made sure that we discussed the
salient issues for the NGO, but I allowed myself to be led by the women onto other
topics which they were eager to discuss, even if these had nothing directly to do with
the dialogue program.
What Kind of Data?
The Storytelling phase formed the backbone of the women’s impressions of the
group, making this the basis of my interviews and the evaluation report. 10 This is an
important point, because although my data is very rich, it was not generated through
participant observation at Storytelling sessions. My data does, however, tell me a
great deal about how the women conceive of dialogue, what benefits and drawbacks
they see in participating, how they experience their positions in Israeli-Palestinian
society and how they feel about the facilitators and their fellow group members.
Therefore, most of my data was generated by conducting interviews; stories about
storytelling, if you will.
9
Esther was of course not willfully misleading, but I did not have any substantial contact with her
Palestinian-Israeli colleague with whom she had mediated the storytelling process. This fact meant that
Esther’s representation of the field was disproportionate to the actual role she played in the dialogue
group.
10
For this purpose, I conducted twelve interviews lasting usually about two hours. In addition, I
attended two out of three dialogue group meetings and did participant observation at some of the
NGO’s other events during my four-month project.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
7
A Riddle & Some Clues
The Conundrum
From the beginning, the women presented me with an ethnographic conundrum, to
which I alluded in my introduction. This riddle has served as my point of departure
and inspiration for the ensuing analysis: All of the women claimed that they did not
talk about the conflict during dialogue meetings. According to their own definitions,
however, the participants did in fact talk about the political and personal affects of the
ongoing struggle between Israelis and Palestinians at group meetings, as excerpts
from my interviews will show. These discussions were however rare and clearly left
the women with the impression that conflict was a topic to be avoided.
Terminology
Ritualization and the liminoid have been introduced as central themes for my ensuing
analysis and so for the sake of clarity, I will offer a preliminary explanation of them
here.
These terms originate from “ritual” and “liminality”, which will also play a role in the
following arguments. Having been inspired by Van Gennep’s study on rites de
passage (1908), Victor Turner wrote about liminality in his anthropological analysis
of Ndembu rituals (1967), where a ritual is comprised of three phases: separation,
margin or limen and aggregation. A ritual serves to bring about change in the social
status of those undergoing the rite, and is process-oriented in nature (Turner 1982:24,
29). For Turner, rituals and liminality belonged within the realm of religion in tribal
societies (ibid: 28).
He characterizes interaction among the initiands in a ritual-liminal phase by
Communitas, described as a kind of group bonding. Here, a sense of social equality
pervades the group, making mainstream social roles temporarily obsolete. The
passing of time is perceived differently from that outside of the ritual framework and
normative social rules are no longer adhered to (Turner 1967 & 1969).
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
8
Turner also observed ritual-like behavior in so-called modern societies, which were
not bound by a religious context. However, the function that liminality served within
rituals in tribal societies was, according to Turner, not the same in ritual-like acts in
modern societies. And so, he called the middle position in ritual-like acts, a liminoid
state, instead (Turner 1982). The liminoid is a “realm of possibilities” (Sjørslev
2007:1511) and is often characterized by a kind of game or pretending (Turner 1982
:33). In this space, the quotidian social rules are inverted, making that which is
forbidden, allowed. It is a space that conjures up “collective subjectivity carried by
emotions, will, lust, fantasy and play” (Sjørslev 2007:15), suggesting that communitas
also plays a role in the liminoid as well as in the liminal.
In contrast to liminality, an integral part of a ritual process, the liminoid is
characterized by being opposed to the norm (Turner 1982:34). The liminoid is
therefore antithetically defined, whereas liminality is integrated in a process where
change occurs (Sjørslev 2007:17). The difference between process, denoting change,
and dialectic, a non-processual digital function, is central to my analysis.
Ritualization
Catherine Bell’s conception of ritualization does not distinguish between tribal and
modern societies (1992:88). Instead, ritualized acts are defined as being strategically
different from the norm and are seen as “privileged”, or set apart from otherwise
standard social behavior (Bell 1992: 74). Contrary to Turner (1982:33), her perception
draws attention to the fact that ritualized acts, although they are defined by being
different from the norm, are not hermetically closed off from the everyday social
experience. Instead, they have a relationship to that from which they are
differentiated, connecting the two intrinsically.
Harkening back to Turner’s analysis of rituals in tribal societies, the liminal is part of
a process that changes the social status of the initiand. Ritualization, in Bell’s use,
does not (Bell 1992:141). This brings me back Turner’s discussion of the liminoid,
11
I have translated both of Sjørslev’s quotes on this page.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
9
which can be likened to a kind of fun house mirror of society’s values and
perceptions, turning everything precisely upside down (Turner 1982:32). He however
refers to the liminoid as a space where creativity reigns free from the norm, whereas
Bell perceives ritualized acts as being relationally connected to and consequently,
dependent on the norm (Bell 1992 :90).
Space & Place
I have referred to the liminal and the liminoid as a “space”, a point that I would like to
clarify here with the help of Michel de Certeau. He explains, “space is a practiced
place” (1988:117), or a place where something the actor has defined happens. From
this point of view “there are as many spaces as there are distinct spatial experiences”
(Merleau-Ponty in de Certeau 1988: 117-118), opening up the possibility of one
occurrence being defined differently by actors experiencing it simultaneously (Bruner
1991:3). The experience is perceived through a “phenomenology or existing in the
world” (de Certeau 1988: 118). Subjectivity regarding the perception of shared
experience is an important component of my analytical apparatus.
Armed with these terms and perspectives, I will now turn to the undercurrent and
context, which pervaded everyday life in Jerusalem and provided the raison d’être for
the women’s dialogue group and for my research.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
10
Crisis as Context – Conflict as Culture?
Thick Description12 of the Field
___________________________________________________________
History and Politics
In Jerusalem, Israelis and Palestinians live, for the most part, starkly segregated from
one another due to the over sixty-year violent struggle between the two nations13. The
cardinal points of contention are national borders, the right of return of Palestinian
refugees,14 and the national status of Jerusalem. These have been the central reasons
for the recurring wars between the two parties, violent and other kinds of resistance
such as the 1st and 2nd Intifada, and the building of the separation wall between Israeli
and Palestinian areas (Scham, Salem & Pogrund 2005). The most recent chapter in
this bloody story was in January 2009 when the Gazan shelling into Israel provoked
an Israeli military retaliation15. The overriding ideological themes informing these
struggles are security and human rights (Bar-Tal & Rouhana 1998:764). All of this
has led to a dehumanizing and polarized rhetoric among both Palestinians and Israelis,
characterized by black and white perceptions of both themselves and their perceived
enemy (Gur-Ze’ev & Pappé 2003). Such parsimonious and nihilistic narratives have
been observed among other groups in crisis or conflict and one could argue that they
are definitive of such conditions (Bar-Tal 2007, Hervik 2004, Malkki 1992, Kelman
2004, Vigh 2008).
12
Geertz 1973:6
Choosing terminology to describe the conflict between Israel and Palestine is an epistemological
morass. Most terms, such as nation, can and are continually contested. I have used the term ‘nation’
here to describe a group of people that see themselves as a discrete ethno-national group. Palestine is
however not yet a sovereign nation-state and conversely, the legitimacy of Israel’s national status is
often challenged by her rivals.
14
The refugees that are referred to here were created during what Israelis call the War of Independence
and what Palestinians call Al Naqba (the catastrophe). Both are names for the first war between Israel,
Palestinians and some of the surrounding Arab countries in 1948. (From: Round Table “Narratives of
1948” – see bibliography for details).
15
There are varying opinions about how and why the Israeli Gazan campaign started and how and why
Gazan Hamas shelled Israel, which fed a historiographical knot I will not attempt to unravel here.
13
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
11
The Discourse
In Jerusalem, I developed a habit of chatting with taxi drivers and my co-passengers
on buses. I was often struck by how easily locals shared their negative and
generalized views with me of their perceived enemy. On one occasion a Palestinian
taxi driver explained to me that Jews had no heart; all they were interested in was
money. Another man wearing a kippah, his tzitzit16 visible, volunteered the following
“information” in a conspiring whisper, “The Arabs say the Jews are stealing from
them, but it is really the other way around. They’re taking everything from us”17.
These are personal observations, not systematically gathered data, but they exemplify
the rhetoric I found to be standard fare among both Israeli-Jews and Palestinians18.
These accounts described the perceived enemy as barbaric, evil, heartless, dishonest
and conniving, accompanied by a description the in-group as peace-loving victims.
Social-psychologist Daniel Bar-Tal refers to strategies such as those described above
as manifestations of an “ethos of conflict” (2007:3). He argues that “societal beliefs,
collective memory and ethos of conflict” are the components of a constructed social
framework, which enable a society to continue to exist within the context of
intractable conflict. In his analysis, societal beliefs refer to points of common societal
interest, which establish the in-group’s sense of cultural distinctiveness (ibid: 5).
Collective memory is a narrative that evolves over time, in which the history of the
conflict is told to members of society. This historiography does not necessarily give a
factual rendition of events (should one exist), but explains and defends the reasons for
the conflict, confirms society’s positive self-image, delegitimizes the enemy and
establishes the in-group as victims of the rival society. He concludes that without the
employment of these social mechanisms, a society entwined in protracted conflict
(Azar in Miall et al 1999) would have “great difficulty meeting the challenges of the
16
“Kippah” is a small skullcap and “tzitzit” are the fringes that dangle from a four-cornered garment
that all orthodox Jewish men wear. This dress signalizes the wearer’s socio-political role, in addition to
his religious ascription.
17
This is paraphrased, as the gentlemen shared his comments with me on a bus, where I did not have a
pen or paper with me.
18
Because of the ambiguous political status of Jerusalem, Palestinians and Israeli-Jews living side by
side in an area that each party defines as their own. Otherwise Israeli-Jews live within the pre 1967
Israeli borders (unless they live in a settlement or another disputed area) and Palestinians live within
the pre 1967 West Bank or Gazan borders (unless they are Israeli citizens). Jerusalem is therefore a
demographically exceptional place. See bibliography for web details.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
12
conflict” (Bar-Tal 2007: 5). He explains that this triad structure serves to create
feelings of in-group solidarity and belonging, assuages feelings of guilt and
responsibility and enables the “ethnocentric tendency to attribute positive traits,
values, and behavior to own society (ibid: 6)”. Finally he concludes that these
strategies
“provide the contents that contribute to the continuation of the conflict by
constituting its epistemic basis” (ibid: 6).
They have, in other words, become so ingrained in local identities and knowledge,
that, in order to perpetuate group existence, the conflict also must be perpetuated.
Bar-Tal’s vantage point has led me to some useful considerations regarding the
temporal aspects of crisis.
Crisis & Time
Anthropologists Gregory Bateson and Clifford Geertz described ethos as “a people’s
emotional sounding board (Bateson in Eriksen & Nielsen 2002:10219)” and an
“underlying attitude towards themselves and their world (Geertz in Bell 1992: 36).
Grammatically, these definitions usher in a temporal aspect to Bar-Tal’s analysis of
crisis, namely that of permanency. They indicate that the local conflict in which my
informants are embedded, is a permanent condition, rather than a series of isolated
responses to crisis, which will pass. Instead of crisis being a single event, it becomes a
way to describe, or a characteristic of a place or people consistently in a state of crisis.
Crises are often conceptualized as exceptions to the norm, both with regards to quality
and quantity; life before the crisis is defined as “normal”, both in terms of what is
acceptable (quality) and what is common (quantity). When a crisis disrupts and
deviates from the norm, it is both unusual and uncomfortable. When the usual
conditions are restored, life is again acceptable; the crisis has passed (Vigh 2008:7).
For Israelis and Palestinians, crisis is the norm, derailing a concept of crisis in time.
However, it has certainly not become acceptable or comfortable (ibid:11).
19
my translation
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
13
Therefore, instead of explaining the cultural context in Jerusalem by telling its
conflicted history, it is imperative to see the cultural context where conflict is a
condition. Or in Vigh’s words, my vantage point is not conflict in context, but conflict
as context (ibid:8).
This idea is helpful in understanding how crises constitute individual perceptions of
Israeli or Palestinian identity but it also illustrates how the ongoing nature of the
conflict becomes woven into the collective social fabric (Montville 2001:132).
Referring back to Bar-Tal, the dehumanizing discourse is part of how everyday life is
experienced in Jerusalem, and is thus the reality for the women in the dialogue group
with whom I had the privilege of becoming acquainted. Contrary to these accepted
and polarized modes of addressing the conflict in mainstream Jerusalemite society,
the women, while safely ensconced within the social boundaries of the dialogue
group, displayed empathy for the others in the group.
Bar-Tal’s analysis is useful in that it describes the hegemonic perceptions of the
conflict and how these perceptions inform local strategies. Pursuing his line of logic,
if this polarized rhetoric has become a cultural characteristic of Israeli and Palestinian
society, it follows that participation in a dialogue group is extraordinary behavior, an
anomaly, a fact to which the women testified.
I hasten to point out that Bar-Tal is not suggesting that societies caught in a web of
intractability are inherently hostile. He has sought to explain how coping mechanisms
in stressful times have become ingrained in local conceptions of the in-group and the
out-group, these being products of the chronic nature of the conflict. There are
however some weaknesses20 in his analysis, which I find relevant to point out.
Bar-Tal ignores the fact that individual actors are able to resist these general coping
mechanisms, his focus being on society as a whole rather than on individuals. People
20
Bar-Tal also seems to be falsely equating the dichotomous structure of the discourse with the
structure of society. Clearly, Israeli and Palestinian societies are made up of more than two discrete
voices representing the conflict, to which my heterogeneous data bear witness.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
14
who live in places where protracted conflict defines the norm still have, despite dire
circumstances and structural limitations, a margin of influence on their lives
(Verderey 1994:39). That having been said, the reality of persistent conflict allows
only a narrow alleyway of agency within which actors can maneuver. It is important
also to note that the metaphorical width of these alleyways is relative, due to the
dynamics of power in Israel and Palestine (Rouhana 2001:18).
With the help of Bar-Tal’s and Vigh’s perspectives, I have claimed that Jerusalem, the
geographical context of my research, is defined by chronic conflict, where strategies
for dealing with crises have become ingrained in everyday life. Because these
strategies perform society-preserving duties, a lot is at stake if one seeks to challenge
the cosmology they represent. The women in the dialogue group live in and are part
of this dynamic, but for several hours every month or so, they stepped out of this
frame (Bateson 1972:184-188) of perception, and into another. It is now time to take a
closer look at the women’s experience within the frame of dialogue.
Talking about the Conflict:
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October 2009
15
Ritual & Liminality: The Group
_____________________________________________________________________
Dialogue at the NGO, though not a religious ritual act, was organized in a classic
Turnerian ritual structure, boasting the standard phases of separation, limen and
aggregation. As described earlier, the NGO’s leadership wished to facilitate a
“personal transformation” which would inspire the group participants to engage in
community projects promoting peace, leading to larger scale transformation.
A Turnerian Structure
After a careful selection process based on an application and interview, the NGO
invited the women to join the group. For the duration of group meetings the
participants were separated physically, but most importantly behaviorally, from
mainstream society, as dialogue with the out-group signified a deviation from
accepted local behavior. This defines them as “threshold people or limen personae”
(Turner 1969:95). Liminality is characterized by communitas, social ambiguity, group
equality, and an interruption of social laws (ibid: 106), qualities that the women
described in the interviews. After passing through the ritual, the “neophytes”
(1967:105) are reincorporated into society endowed with a new social status. This
new social status corresponds to the NGO’s goal for the group: to demonstrate “to the
wider community the tangible benefit to be gained by working together for common
goals”21. The NGO measures the success of their programs based on the extent to
which individual participants undergo change. Emotional or cognitive change did not
suffice; it was visible behavioral change, this ‘demonstrating to the wider
community’, that was the NGO’s desired goal (field notes).
To put it another way, they wished to inspire members of mainstream society to
undergo a personal transformation, facilitated through the ritual of dialogue, in order
21
Organization Project Proposal 2006
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
16
for them to subsequently re-enter society in the new social role of activist, in the
errand of co-existence and peace.
Frustration was apparent from the beginning however. The NGO director explained to
me at our first meeting, “We want them to do something, and all they do is talk.”
When I asked him why the women were so attached to each other, he exclaimed,
exasperated, “They’ve been through group therapy together!” Something like a ritual
was happening in the dialogue group, but it was not quite what the organization had in
mind.
Separation: The Neophytes
Based on the previous description of behavior in chronically conflicted societies, it
becomes clear just how exceptional the women in the dialogue group are.
Sympathizing with members of the rival society is viewed as anomalous behavior in
Israel and Palestine. In fact, there are local terms for such people; in Israel they are
referred to as “self-hating Jews”22In Palestine, they are called traitors (field notes).
Most of the women said that their immediate family was supportive of their being in
the dialogue group but that they did not talk about the program outside of these
circles. One Israeli-Jew in the group told me, “I can’t tell the people I work with. If
they knew, they would say, ‘oh, so you like the Arabs’.” One of the consequences of
Bar-Tal’s analysis is that the individual who does not subscribe to societal norms
makes herself vulnerable. Solidarity and identification with one’s in-group is
especially important in times of crisis (Bar-Tal & Rouhana 1998:29) and since Israel
and Palestine are in a permanent state of crisis, the women have clearly crossed into a
potential social danger zone.
Liminality
By joining the program, the women became a discrete group, separate for the duration
of dialogue sessions from the rest of society and its normative rules for behavior. But
what was it like in the group? In our interviews, the women described feelings and
22
See bibliography for web source.
Talking about the Conflict:
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October 2009
17
perceptions similar to Turner’s description of liminality, which I will present in the
following.
Communitas
“(…) neophytes tend to develop an intense comradeship (…)” – Turner
1969:128
There was a powerful sense of attachment to the group, and although the Storytelling
phase had long ago ended, they were opposed to closing the group. Esther
commented, “Gevalt!23 if I suggest we close the group.” Joanna said that the idea of
closing what she once referred to as a “support group,….fills [her] with dread.”
Others said it did not matter how many people came, or where they met, as long as
they continued.
Their clear emotional attachment to the group members and the facilitators is a classic
characteristic of communitas (Turner 1969:95). Interestingly, Esther suggested that
they continue to meet on their own, but this was not a popular strategy. Esther and
Alina were what Turner would refer to as “instructors” or “elders”, and one of them
needed to be there, if the space should be perpetuated (1969:100-101). The women
spoke of their great affection for Esther and Alina but at the same time asked me to be
discrete about their criticisms, saying “I don’t want them to get their feelings hurt.”
(Joanna, Israeli-Jew)
Group Equality
“Secular distinctions of rank and status disappear (…)” – Turner 1969:95
Group equality is another characteristic of liminality (ibid:106). The women often
commented that they could identify with the other members because, “They are
women. They are the same. It is the same suffering. We are equal on that point.”
(Makirim, Arab- Muslim Palestinian). One of the dialogue meetings that I attended
was about birth traditions in the three religions. The discussion was relaxed, defined
23
“Gevalt” is Yiddish/German and means literally “violence”. It is however used as an exclamation to
express powerful feelings, such as disbelief, surprise or disgust.
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October 2009
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by curiosity and the occasional excursion into bawdiness. I noted a friendly
atmosphere, where the women were comfortable enough “to kiss one another”
(Joanna, Israeli-Jew). Awareness of a shared female experience created a sense of
equality, where the women were able to identify with one another as mothers, wives
and daughters (Rana, Arab-Palestinian).
Social Ambiguity
“(…) they are betwixt and between the positions assigned by law, custom,
convention (…)” - (Turner 1969:95)
Also social ambiguity denotes liminality. By behaving in ways that contradicted norm
expectations, the women temporarily abandoned patterns of behavior branding them
as adversaries. Social ambiguity enabled the women to behave atypically in
comparison to the ethno-national norm expected of them outside of the group (Turner
1967:95). Being friends, communicating and sharing intimacies with members of the
out-group is not mainstream behavior.
Time
“We are presented, in such rites, with a moment in and out of time” (Turner
1969:96)
Some of the women spoke of an altered time perception while at group meetings.
Deborah, an Israeli Jew, said that it was “nice that there is a space where time doesn’t
matter.” The facilitators did not impose a time limit on the women’s storytelling.
Some of them spoke for a whole dialogue session (ca. three hours) or even continued
their stories in the next session. It was not allowed to interrupt the narration, questions
and discussion being permitted only when the story had been told. This also
harmonizes with Turner’s description of the limen (ibid:96).
The group was extraordinary and separate from the norm, and the women described
the group dynamic in ways that seemed to fit the liminal criteria. But were they
having “open and frank exchanges,” the postulated ritual catalyst leading them to a
new social role?
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
19
Talking about the Conflict – A Definition Please
“It is important in this fragmented and walled society. These kinds of meetings
help. We really need the contact.” – Rana, Arab Palestinian
The cardinal point for dialogue groups, such as the one I became acquainted with, is
that participants in some way break down social barriers and talk about the conflict
estranging them (Saunders 1999:82). I wanted to know what kinds of conversations
the women engaged in and so, inquiring into the nature of their dialogue seemed to
me to be a reasonable method to employ. That having been said, it was slightly
maddening that, although my informants said they wanted to contribute to a peaceful
resolution to the Israeli-Palestinian conflict and they were active members in a
dialogue group, “open and frank exchanges”, or talking about the conflict, seemed to
be something they avoided. Thus, my task to uncover what kind of interaction they
had, was informed by their motivations for avoiding bellicose topics.
“We didn’t discuss the conflict. It was so explosive- it would blow us up.
Two-thirds [of the conversation] was not about the conflict, otherwise the
group wouldn’t have lasted as long.” – Joanna, Israeli-Jew
“We don’t talk about politics. Maybe we wouldn’t be such good friends if we
talked (…).” – Makarim, Arab-Muslim Palestinian
“We speak about history. Jewish side didn’t know about bad behavior from
the soldiers. (…) Gypsy people don’t talk about politics.” – Hajar, GypsyMuslim Palestinian
The women clearly stated that, on the one hand they did not talk about the conflict,
while implicitly or explicitly referring to dialogue group discussions where the
conflict was the topic. It began to dawn on me that talking about the conflict was not
just a neutral description of an activity that one did or refrained from doing.
Remembering de Certeau’s explanation of space and subjectivity, talking about the
conflict clearly meant different things to different people.
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A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
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October 2009
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For some, talking about the conflict referred to politics and was a form of activism. If
politics was not the actual topic of discussion, this gave them reason to state that they
did not talk about the conflict. For others, talking about the conflict meant discussing
topics that made them feel angry, fearful or guilty. Such upsetting topics had been
approached, but not often, leading these women to claim that they had avoided talking
about the conflict. For a third group, talking about the conflict was something that
threatened a unique forum for friendship and opportunity. Again, these kinds of topics
were discussed from time to time, if it could not be avoided, leading the third group of
women to claim that, they, too, did not talk about the conflict.
A triad: An ethno-national perspective
Arab-Muslim Palestinians
These three groups and their definitions of talking about the conflict, which I have
just described, can be demarcated along the lines of ethno-nationality. For ArabMuslim Palestinians, activism was a central reason for participating in a dialogue
group, coloring their perceptions of what talking about the conflict entailed. With
regards to Palestinians, ‘activism’ has often been equated with terrorism24. In the
context of the dialogue group, I refer to activism as utilizing the meetings as a forum
where women could tell members of the out-group of the perceived injustices to
which the narrator’s in-group was subjected, in the hopes of bringing about change.
Makarim, a Palestinian Arab-Muslim, explained to me,
“I told my colleagues in the group [about the checkpoints]. They know, but
sometimes they see it in the TV, but I am more near to them than the TV and
they feel with me.”
24
See bibliography for web source.
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October 2009
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Makirim wanted her Jewish colleagues to know how difficult it was to pass through
the checkpoints in order to get to work at the school where she was headmistress 25.
Hers was a real life story told by a person whom they knew, not just an impersonal
excerpt from the evening news. Telling her story in this personal manner was her way
of showing how unreasonable and dehumanizing Israeli sanctions and control were
for traditional and peace-loving Palestinians like herself. It was a form of activism.
Rana explained that she did not believe in violence, but that she believes in
provocation. She told me that in a dialogue session she “talked about meeting a man
in Jenin who organized a suicide attack…. I’m not into changing people, I just want to
show my side.” Rana, a secular and well-educated divorcée, wanted to challenge the
Jews in the group by telling them about her personal connection to a man whom the
Jews would call a terrorist. She wanted to show that a woman, with whom many of
the Jews in the group identified in terms of lifestyle, could sympathize with suicide
bombing as a reasonable form of resistance. Her story, though very different from
Makirim’s, was also a form of activism.
Israeli-Jew
For others, talking about the conflict referred to a discussion that was emotionally
explosive, to borrow Joanna’s metaphor. These women referred to discussions in the
group that were upsetting, such as whether the Israeli occupation of Palestinian areas
and treatment of Palestinian people could be called a Holocaust, or, Alina’s (the
Palestinian-Israeli facilitator) suggested discussion topic: “How was sending Israeli
boys into the army morally different from Palestinian mothers sending boys as suicide
bombers”.
These
kinds
of
topics
“sent
the
Israelis
into
a
tail-spin,”
26
(Esther) compelling some to consider leaving the group. For these women, if a topic
25
Makarim lives in Jerusalem. In order to get to the town where she works, which is within the
Palestinian Authority, and home again, she has to pass through an Israeli checkpoint. The place where
she works is a ten minute drive from where she lives in Jerusalem, but since the building of the
separation wall, she can only enter the PA at one particular place, lengthening her daily commute by
one hour each way. She also told me that she was frightened by the soldiers at the checkpoints, saying,
“they think we’re all terrorists” and, “they would not help me”.
26
All Israelis are required to spend two-three years in the army. Young people, ca. eighteen years of
age, usually join right after they have finished high school, explaining the use of the term “boys”.
Similarly, there has been a history of Palestinian young men volunteering as violent activists or suicide
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
22
had been upsetting because it inspired feelings of anger, fear or guilt, it would be
categorized as talking about the conflict. If the stories told of personal suffering or
loss and inspired feelings of empathy, they were not registered as talking about the
conflict, but as a story of a woman’s personal experience.
The Israeli-Palestinian conflict is often portrayed as a struggle between two parties. In
the women’s dialogue group, there was however a third group, whom I will call the
In-Between Women. These were the participants who, for one reason or another, felt
that they did not thoroughly belong with the Israeli-Jews or the Arab-Muslim
Palestinians.
In-Between Women
For Amina, the Circassian-Muslim Israeli, going to group meetings meant having a
free space where she could speak her mind, away from her village where the men
were “orthodox about women, not politics”. Saja, an Aramean-Christian Palestinian,
described, as Amina did, that at the dialogue meetings she was free and “encouraged
to do things [she] wouldn’t have done before.” Also Hajar, a Gypsy-Muslim
Palestinian said that the women in the group “encourage women to be strong”. These
three participants did not fit the hegemonic Palestinian or Israeli mold. Saja tellingly
asked, “How can you give to a society if you feel you don’t belong? ”
All three women experienced discrimination by other Arabs or Muslims because they
did not belong to the same ethnic or religious group as other mainstream Palestinians.
Saja told me how her children were teased in school because they did not have
Muslim names. At the same time, the In-between Women were not accepted into
Israeli society because they either were Muslim or Arab, their Arabic accents and lack
of Hebrew proficiency positioning them in relation to and excluding them from
mainstream Israeli society.
bombers, as an act of resistance to what they refer to as the Israeli Occupation. “Children” is also a
common word used in this context.
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A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
23
For these women talking about the conflict meant threatening a valuable, friendly and
supportive forum where they felt they could express their opinions and meet people
who were encouraging and helpful to them. The Palestinian facilitator Alina related a
story to me about being in East Jerusalem27 with the group. Saja had apparently
commented to her about all of the garbage on the streets, heralding their entrance into
this predominantly Palestinian section of the city.
“Saja would think three or four times about saying this [in the group]- not
because of fear of hurting the others- but because of what she could lose.”
Gain and loss ushers in another aspect of what kind of dialogue Storytelling facilitated
and how this related to the relatively narrow alleyways of agency mentioned earlier. I
will follow up on this topic shortly.
Summing up, a definition of talking about the conflict can be located within three
ethno-national categories. Identifying these categories is helpful in understanding
what perception the women had of dialogue as a peace-building tool.
Analytically, it was the first step towards understanding how the gears of the
storytelling machine functioned. The NGO wanted the women to have open and frank
exchanges, but this is not quite what was happening. The kind of dialogue that was
meant to transport the women through a ritual process, was not taking place. Another
pattern guiding the women’s stories became discernable, where suffering and loss was
a universal theme. It seems therefore that I have exhausted the classic Turnerian ritual
metaphor, making it necessary to utilize other tools in order to unearth a deeper layer
of analysis.
27
East Jerusalem is a predominantly Palestinian area. The streets are markedly dirtier and in worse
repair in comparison with the western part of the city. This is part of an ongoing and more deeply
rooted conflict about how Palestinian residents of Jerusalem are represented in the municipality. See
bibliography for website details.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
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A Need for Other Terms
Before I present this alternate pattern of communication mentioned in the above, I
wish to elaborate on the analytical tools I will be using in the next section. So far, I
have been making use of Turner’s original ritual terminology. As introduced earlier,
these terms inspired further development in ritual theory and terminology. Catherine
Bell refers to a social act that is ritual-like as “ritualization,” making a connection to
Turner’s work with ritual-like acts in modern societies, unavoidable (1982). She
writes that such acts are defined through their relationship to the norm (1992:90),
similar to Turner’s discussion of the liminoid, leading me to suggest that ritualized
acts occur within a liminoid space. This perception has allowed me to delve deeper
into the social mechanisms steering the dialogue group.
Because of the relational definition (Bell 1992:74) discussed above, ritualized acts
serve to confirm social norms by displaying behavior that is differentiated from and
related to the norm (Turner 1982:33; Bell 1992: 27; Sjørslev 2007:17, Geertz
1973:127). My data suggests that, although the framework of ritualization is inverted
due to the crisis-defined norm in Jerusalem, the Turnerian content of the liminoid,
such as communitas, social ambiguity and play (among other things) stays the same.
In other words, my data has turned Turner’s theory on its head. This does not mean it
has been disproved, but simply that his logic has been upended. As established, the
norm in Israel-Palestine is crisis, making the mechanisms that people use to deal with
this reality, normal behavior. As mentioned earlier, normal is often associated with a
positive quality, but it can also refer to that which is standard and unexceptional (Vigh
2008:11). Embracing the latter definition, the normal “order” (Sjørslev 2007:15) in
Israel-Palestine is defined by disorder, and that which is orderly is perceived as being
in disorder. Applying this logic to my field, the dialogue group clearly belonged
within the realm of the abnormal. Interestingly enough, Turner likens the liminal state
to crisis (Turner 1982: 46). With crisis defining the norm, I have inverted his
perspective, showing the liminoid state found in the dialogue group to be
characterized by peace, instead of crisis. Remembering that Turner saw the liminoid
state as a space for play and pretending (ibid), I suggest that the dialogue group was a
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
25
space where the women could ‘play peace’. With these analytical tools in hand, let us
dig to the next layer.
Duality: An emotional perspective
Moving away from the ethno-national triad, another model of duality, establishes a
connection between talking about the conflict and empathy-inspiring dialogue, the
harbinger of the liminoid. Digging a layer deeper into what talking about the conflict
meant to the participants, I discovered that it was not so much who told a story and to
which ethno-national group they belonged, but what kinds of feelings those stories
evoked in the listener that created or challenged the liminoid space. Telling a story in
such a way that caused the listeners to identify and feel empathy with the narrator
appeared to be a popular strategy, whereas telling a story in such a way as to evoke
feelings of anger, guilt or fear, challenged or threatened the liminoid space. Esther
explained to me,
“The personal is the political (…). My defenses don’t go up when you tell me
a story. If you confront me directly, I get defensive and block.”
The personal certainly is political, as we are all political beings (Volkan 1985:220),
but what mattered was if the information was conveyed in an effort to invoke feelings
of empathy or if the information was meant to challenge or provoke. These
communication strategies disregarded social ethno-national borders and were
universal for all of the women. One particular story told by a Israeli-Jew woman
called Ayala, was mentioned by all of the women in the interviews. It was her story of
loss and her challenge to the Palestinians in the group, which led me to this
perspective of duality.
“There is a woman, she lives as a widow. She got only a girl, only. She told us
a story about how she lost her husband in the war - in the Syrian - and she was
asking about her husband, where he is. They didn’t find him in the beginning.
So when you understand her, you feel she was suffering as a woman. She was
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
26
so sensitive about her story, she cried, cried, a lot.” - Makarim, Arab-Muslim
Palestinian
According to Esther, Ayala joined the dialogue group because she wanted to find a
forum where she could talk to Palestinians about her loss, but the Palestinians in the
group had apparently not been willing or able to do this. I never got to speak to Ayala
because she left the group before my project began and refused to be interviewed by
me. Esther was convinced that she left because of the women’s unwillingness to talk
about her loss, a problem that mentioned in our interviews.
“[She] waited for them to address the issue. I feel that the personal issue is the
most important, not the political. They said ‘We know about war and killing;
we don’t know about kibbutz’[28]. None of them were willing to discuss her
loss.” – Adira, Israeli-Jew.
Esther remarked, “In the beginning, the Palestinians were volunteering to talk and the
Jews weren’t. This supports the idea that the Palestinians were there to talk and the
Jews were there to listen.” But Ayala’s story was not about listening, it was a form of
personal activism, similar to Makirim’s story about checkpoints or Rana’s
provocation about suicide bombers. Ayala challenged the Palestinians to react to her
personal loss. Reminiscent of Geertz’s interpretation of Slametans (1973:142-169),
her story was an example of how ritualized behavior with its rules and structures -in
this case dialogue- did not work. This anomaly gave me some insight.
From an emotional, rather than the ethno-national perspective, talking about the
conflict was split into two parts: a) modes of communication that reminded the
women of the mainstream discourse of dehumanization and b) its opposite, that which
evoked feelings of empathy and constituted the liminoid space. Ayala’s story was too
close to the mainstream discourse, as it directed a challenge to and potential blame at
the Palestinians in the group and did therefore not work as ‘playing peace’.
28
Ayala had lived on a kibbutz for many years and some of the Palestinians wanted to hear about her
lifestyle, as they did not know much about it.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
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Unspoken Rules & Narrow Alleyways
And so there was a catch to talking about the conflict. The liminoid space of the
dialogue group was created through the kinds of conversation that inspired friendship,
empathy, opportunity and some forms of activism. It enabled the women to “play”
peace (Sjørslev 2007:15; Turner 1982:46). But if a story inspired feelings of anger,
fear or guilt, if participants felt they “needed to be careful about what [they] exposed
about [their] personal lives” (Rana, Arab-Palestinian), the interaction became stunted,
as the Palestinian’s lack of reaction to Ayala’s story about her husband’s death
exemplifies.
Although the women had different perceptions of what talking about the conflict
entailed, empathy stories became the common denominator and framework that
defined the dialogue group as a liminoid space. As long as topics were presented
within this framework, the Palestinian women could tell about victimization and
structural discrimination, such as Makirim’s story about the separation wall and her
daily meetings with Israeli soldiers and checkpoints. The Jewish women could listen
to this kind of story, as opposed to discussions about whether the Jews were “doing a
Holocaust on them” (Joanna, Israeli-Jew), without feeling threatened. They could also
utilize this liminoid space as a forum for sharing their motherly worries for their
children in the army and be met with reactions of sympathy and understanding by
their Palestinian colleagues. As Makirim said to me, “At the end of the day, we are
women. I have a son. You have a son. We do not want them to be killed. So women
can fight for their sons.” Similarly, this framework enabled the In-between women to
speak relatively freely and establish contact to what they saw as powerful members of
Israeli society, who could and to some extent did, help them.
Power
They only had to play by the unspoken rules, which according to Deborah (IsraeliJew) was a kind of manipulation, “making it clear that we should feel something
specific.” Manipulation or not, this is what defined the liminoid space and enabled a
forum to emerge that was far from the cleaved discourse they were used to in their
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
28
lives outside of the dialogue group. It would be easier to state that the women
sometimes got along and at other times did not, just as in any other social gathering of
people with opinions. But there were strings attached. Bell writes that ritualized acts
are ways of negotiating authority (1992:8). Not only did these unspoken rules
determine the way empathy could be accessed, but they also determined the way that
suffering should be defined and expressed. This implies a rather powerful authority,
which can only be attributed to those defining the rules. This was the facilitators’ task,
and their relationship was like miniature scale model of the conflict between Palestine
and Israel, where who makes the rules is asked on all levels. Although this is an
important aspect of the dialogue group, my errand here is to discuss how the women
maneuvered within this context, rather than to dissect power relations in the Middle
East, and so I will return to the unspoken rules in the group.29
Telling the right story
I have suggested that the implicit authoritative guidelines for dialogue also stipulated
how suffering should be defined and expressed. Adira was particularly irritated with
how Fatima chose to tell her story:
“She told her story in like ten minutes. Soldiers came and took her house. We
tried to dig, but that was it…. You bring a story, which is like a bomb and you
don’t understand that it hurts you. You tell me a story that is the most
important story, the tragedy of your life caused by my people and you don’t
see that this is a problem? Her body language told me that it wasn’t an
important story.” – Adira, Israeli Jew
The wish to share a story, however, does not necessarily correspond to a wish to be on
the receiving end of sympathy and affection. Fatima’s family was forced to leave their
29
The facilitators’ role in the dialogue group, power relations between the two women and how this
related to conflict resolution as a field and the fundamental issues informing the conflict, introduces
patchwork of interrelated topics that demand attention. However, due to the scope of this paper, I will
not elaborate upon this important perspective.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
29
home and all of their possessions in what Palestinians refer to as Al Naqba, or the
catastrophe30. She commented:
“My story was one in a thousand. I was astonished that they asked so many
questions (…). A lot of people in the group have a lot of problems. You would
feel sorry for them. I don’t have any problems (…). I’m stable. I don’t have to
tell my story.” – Fatima, Palestinian Christian
My talk with Fatima revealed a powerful sense of pride in her family’s
accomplishments, despite the hardships they had endured. She made of point of
telling me how she and her sister had gone to the best schools and how their father
had provided well for them. “Ambitious” was a characteristic she used to describe her
family and she did not seem particularly interested in or in need of sympathy.
Nancy Scheper-Hughes’ research on the TRC31 in South Africa revealed that
“applying all the modern therapeutics of trauma: PTSD[32], victim narratives,
forgiveness, ‘closure’ and reconciliation (…) stripped them of their identities, not to
mention of their glory” (2008:41). This “Euro-American trauma model” (ibid) is
reminiscent of the storytelling method used in the women’s dialogue group, where
suffering was the legitimizing factor in a personal narrative.
As a result, some women felt that their stories were unsuitable: Adira claimed, “It
sounds like idealistic bullshit to tell my story on the background of their stories (…).”
Amina confided, “I was ashamed to tell my story. I thought it was wrong. ” It was as
if loss was some kind of cultural currency that could be traded in for sympathy,
affection and assistance. In order to gain access to this kind of treatment, the women
had to tell stories of suffering that evoked a specific emotional reaction in the
listeners. These rules did not allow the narrator to demand, but only to implicitly
30
Al Naqba corresponds to what the Jews call The War of Independence in 1948 after the United
Nations declared Israel’s right to form a state. (Scham et al 2005)
31
TRC is the acronym for “Truth and Reconciliation Commission” set up by the South African
government to “heal the nation” (Scheper-Hughes 2008: 41) after the atrocities of Apartheid. There is a
tradition among Palestinian peace activists to lean on the ideology behind TRC, bolstering their own
arguments towards Israel regarding human rights violations (Rouhana 2001).
32
Post Traumatic Stress Disorder
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
30
suggest the need for help. Being a victim became a powerful tool, which gave access
to emotional commodities such as empathy. Esther told me that all of the women had
had either abusive parents or had lost a parent when they were children. “There was a
lot of loss in their stories. Maybe there was a need to share that loss.” The fact that the
women’s losses could be translated into skill and flexibility was not a perspective that
she had considered before.
I have established that playing by the unspoken rules of dialogue entailed telling
empathy-evoking narratives. This may not count as “frank and open exchanges”.
What effect did the dialogue group seem to have on the women’s perceptions of their
out-group?
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October 2009
31
Back in the Norm
___________________________________________________________
Storytelling about Storytelling
One of the compelling aspects of my data is that it could be accurately described as
storytelling about storytelling. The first kind of storytelling referred to the actual
Storytelling sessions. The second kind pertained to the stories the women told me in
our interviews. Our meetings took place for the most part in the women’s homes
where they shared their everyday reflections on dialogue with me while I sat in their
quotidian living rooms, pilfering sweet qahwe, salty nuts and an otherwise varied diet
of perspectives that they offered me.
The women seemed to have one metaphorical foot in their past experiences of how
they experienced the dialogue group and the other in the present, with me, as we
spoke about their memories of dialogue and their lives outside of the group. In this
way, the women joined me in my anthropological and vaguely schizophrenic
endeavor of interpreting social phenomena where one must simultaneously be and be
aware of the actor and the observer (Hastrup 1999: 166).
While the women spoke of their powerful emotional attachment to the group, they
also told me what they thought about the other women in the group, the facilitators,
the NGO, the conflict and their wishes in life, exemplifying the fact that interviews
can also function as participant observation (Rubow 2003). Not only was I collecting
data about the ritualized act of dialogue, but I was also generating data about their
lives and perspectives outside of the group. I was surprised that many of the women,
despite having known each other for over two years, having spent many hours
together sharing intimate and personal stories, made generalized and negative
comments about the other women in their out-group. It became clear to me that as a
whole, they had not undergone the personal transformation that the NGO had hoped
for.
Talking about the Conflict:
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October 2009
32
“Maybe they should look into their own people instead of blaming us (…) [I
nodded]. You need to be careful; you’re not objective!”– Joanna, JewishIsraeli
“The Muslims in the group are civilized. I never met people like this….
Muslims take advantage.” – Saja, Aramean- Christian Palestinian
“They don’t have a book in their home. Its not in their culture.” – Aliyah,
Israeli-Jew
“I don’t see that the Jewish are doing anything wrong.” – Amina, CircassianMuslim Israeli
“The Israelis are some other kind of human being. Free denial. Israelis are
worse than Palestinians in terms of denial.” – Rana, Arab-Palestinian
“Saja, I trust her feelings, but when I visited her, her son had a picture of
Achmadinejad[33] on his wall.” – Aliyah, Israeli-Jew
“The more Arabs that are in Israel, the more dangerous.”– Deborah, JewishIsraeli
As illustrated in the previous section, the women were eager to engage in dialogue in
which they could feel and show empathy. Having established that this kind of
dialogue represented an inversion of mainstream discourse in Israel and Palestine, it
follows that the private conversations that I had with the women, outside of the
liminoid zone, brought us full-circle, as the above provided comments exemplify.
Harkening back to my initial presentation of terminology, I held that the liminoid is
defined dialectically, functioning, according to Turner, as a “creative anti-structure”
to an otherwise highly ordered social framework (Bell 1992:21). For this reason, Bell
33
Achmadinejad is the Iranian president and is known for his anti-Israel politics, Holocaust denial and
support of groups like Hizbollah and Hamas, which call for Israel’s destruction, just as Achmadinejad
does. See bibliography for web source.
Talking about the Conflict:
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October 2009
33
claims that ritualized acts are not effective tools for “resolving or disguising conflicts”
(ibid: 37). Inspired by Mary Douglas, Bell concludes that ritualized acts serve to
control, rather than change (ibid: 178), contradicting the NGO’s goals. Similarly, in a
classic study of conflict and ritual, Max Gluckman stated that rituals “functioned as a
kind of safety valve that formally arranges the diffusion of social tensions….”
(Gluckman in Bell 1992:172). Remembering that in this inverted field, peace is a kind
of rebellion these acts do not address the points of contention directly, but ‘play’
rebellion (Gluckman 1963), rather than really doing it.
This brings us back to Bar-Tal’s description of the ethos of conflict. Israeli and
Palestinian societies have developed mechanisms that help members deal with the
stress of living in chronic crisis, which manifest themselves as the highly ordered
social structure to which Turner referred. By ‘playing peace’ or buying into the
unspoken rules defining the liminoid space, which involved specifically avoiding
topics of discussion that challenged and provoked, they were also accepting the
dialectical premises of ritualized behavior. As a result, by engaging in the kind of
dialogue illustrated in this paper, the women were contributing to the perpetuation of
the dehumanizing discourse present in mainstream Israeli and Palestinian societies
rather than dismantling it.
Thus, my separation of these two spheres, the liminoid and the norm, has been an
artificial one, for the purpose of analysis (Geertz 1973:89). Geertz suggests that “the
world as lived and the world as imagined, fused under the agency of a single set of
symbolic forms, turns out to be the same world.” (Geertz in Bell 1992: 27) The
women ‘played’ peace because real peace was not there, just as it was absent from the
reality they returned to when they left the dialogue sessions, and from the reality in
which I met them for interviews.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
34
Alternative Tendencies
I have made an effort to illustrate how the dialogue group ended with the opposite
effect than intended because this seemed to be an obvious problem with the program.
This has meant that I have neglected the glimmers of hope and change that were also
a part of dialogue.
Firstly, it is with a heavy heart that I offer these criticisms of the dialogue group,
because those involved, participants, administration and facilitators alike have made a
discernable effort to influence the situation positively. Secondly, in dialogue the
women tried to maneuver themselves into what I have described as a liminoid space,
but this, perhaps, fortuitously, did not always work. Intermittently experiencing
dialogue that addressed emotionally challenging topics made a big impression on the
women. It is thought-provoking that Adira suggested they “would be real friends
when [they were] ready to hurt each other”.
They did hurt each other at times and some of their comments suggested that small
changes may have occurred.
“Joanna used to live in a settlement. She is now involved in tours of East
Jerusalem for teachers and went to a Peace Now demonstration [34]. Sowing a
seed takes time. Participants may change slowly; they may not even be aware
of the changes.” - Esther
“I felt that I am a racist. I’m reminded of my prejudice. I am one of those that
look down. I never look at them like normal people. This is what the Israelis
do to us. Someone like me is part of her misery.” Rana, Arab-Palestinian
about Hajar, a Gypsy-Muslim Palestinian.
34
East Jerusalem is a predominantly Palestinian area that Jew normally do not frequent. Peace Now is
an Israeli peace activist group which advocates, among many things, the so-called two state solution.
See bibliography for web details.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
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October 2009
35
“They know nothing about the nice people. I am ashamed. Only they know the
bad people on the other side.” – Makirim, Arab-Muslim Palestinian about
Palestinian views on Israeli-Jews
Although the women did not move through the ritual of dialogue to re-appear in a
new social status of activist as the NGO had hoped for, they did challenge themselves
by attempting to understand the Other’s perception as far as their own selfpreservation mechanisms would allow (Saunders 1999: 82). Most of the women said
that they had not had contact with members of their out-group before participating in
this dialogue group. This means that some topics and perspectives had been granted a
position in the women’s perceptions that may not have had a channel before. This is
positive.
It is also positive that the women could sometimes show their doubt about their
positions on the conflict. At the last dialogue meeting I attended, Saja was able to
express her confusion, feeling safe enough not to pick sides or to fall back on an
empathy-evoking strategy. On a rainy December evening during the Gazan war, she
told the group:
“In my home there are different feelings. Everybody have different. My
husband would say, I don’t have no mercy for these people ….You know, I’m
the 3rd generation here…Grandfather was the only one that survived the
Turkish attack on the Aramaic people [35]. And let me say, it was very
suffering hearing my grandfather talking about the war. And I don’t really
want to hear my husband has no mercy for people being killed.… He sees the
suffering, but he has no mercy.…And this is where I get the mixed feelings.
I’m unstable now. I don’t know what to think now.
Esther: He’s angry that the Palestinians are dying or he thinks it doesn’t
matter?
35
Late in the Ottoman Empire, Turks, supported by other local Muslims, attacked the Aramaen
(Assyrian) people, resulting in genocide. See bibliography for web source.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
36
Saja: (quietly) He thinks it doesn’t matter…. Because he knows that the
Turkish have killed our people, they knew about our people and they deserve
this…. He sees this like a revenge, maybe, I don’t know…. Everybody in my
family thinks different….I really have mixed feelings for this. I don’t know
what to feel for it. It’s hard from both sides to be killed. It’s not right. It’s not
right.”
But until dialogue participants challenge each other, are willing to hurt each other and
show their ambiguity, allowing dichotomous perceptions of the conflict and the
perceived enemy to dissipate, dialogue in this ritualized form will continue to
persistently hurl back the image of an infected and tragic conflict in which the
beholder finds herself.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
37
Concluding thoughts
I have led the reader through a maze of perceptions, which started with the claim that
conflict resolution dialogue may be understood as a ritualized act. I went on to
describe how the context of chronic crisis in Jerusalem means that a dehumanizing
and polarized rhetoric defines the norm discourse in both societies. This ethos of
conflict is part of a society-preserving mechanism, which helps individuals to cope
with living in and with intractable conflict. This perspective had some theoretical
consequences for my analysis, leading me to suggest that ‘played peace’ and
empathy, exemplified in the women’s reluctance to talk about tough conflict-related
topics in the dialogue group, represented an inverted mirror image of the norm
discourse. I have thus concluded that, although dialogue was meant to dismantle these
conceptions, in the women’s dialogue group, they were perpetuated.
In conclusion, I would like to offer a final perspective on the field of conflict
resolution dialogue in Israel-Palestine. One approach attempts to facilitate
identification with the perceived enemy, often called “seeing the human face of the
enemy”36 leading ideally to changes within society (Maoz et al 2002:935, Saunders
1999: 83-84, Bar-On & Kassem 2004:293). This is clearly the approach that the
women’s dialogue group adopted.
However, it is not necessary to identify or empathize with one another, in order to
make policy changes that reflect democratic and humanistic values37.
“Placing the emphasis on individual healing without attending to the larger
social and political context simply misses the target and becomes the dubious
privilege of those who can afford to deny, avoid, or overlook the need for
political change and its social implications.” (Rouhana 2001: 9)
It is imperative that participants of conflict-resolution dialogue are encouraged to
confront and challenge. This needs to be a clear goal in facilitation and practitioners
36
37
See bebliogrpahy for web details
See also: Suleiman 2004, Halabi & Sonnenschein 2004. Details in bibliography.
Talking about the Conflict:
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October 2009
38
need to be trained to take on this cumbersome and draining task (Maoz et al
2002:956).
Rouhana ushers in the topic of political change. It seems unfair to me to ask
politically non-influential civilians, the victims of this struggle, to effectuate
infrastructural change. His criticism leads me wonder whether dialogue programs like
the one I have attempted to present in these pages, are a desperate attempt at having
some impact in an environment where the real power holders, politicians and leaders,
seem to have shirked their responsibilities and abandoned their people.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
October 2009
39
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Footnotes with web sources:
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6. http://www.behindthename.com/ - accessed May 17, 2009.
7.
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%20Society/gatekeeping.doc/ - accessed May 17, 2009
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19. http://www.ir-amim.org.il/Eng/?CategoryID=242 - accessed May 17, 2009.
23.
http://www.zionism-israel.com/log/archives/00000621.html - accessed May 17, 2009.
25.
http://www.mfa.gov.il/MFA/MFAArchive/2000_2009/2001/3/Ramallah+as+a+Center+of+Te
rror-+Background+Informa.htm - accessed May 17, 2009.
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_a_salam.asp - accessed May 5, 2009.
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36. http://www.aga-online.org/downloads/de/news/attachments/Vortrag_Bruessel.pdf accessed March 28, 2009
37. http://seedsofpeace.org/about/mission - accessed May 17, 2009.
The front page illustration is a map of Greater Jerusalem, published by Ir-Amim: www.iramim.org.il - accessed May 17, 2009. I have used it as my cover because accurate maps are
hard to come by in Israel. The tourist maps that are handed out in stores in West Jerusalem do
not include Palestinian areas, which are simply grey areas without any names, symbols or
appellations.
Talking about the Conflict:
A Ritual Analysis of Conflict-Resolution Dialogue in Jerusalem
By Adrienne Mannov
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45
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