The discourse on identity in Palestinian refugee camps. The role of textual genres and representations
10.13125/americacritica/4938
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2532-6724
4938
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Pamela Murgia
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América Crítica
The discourse on identity in Palestinian refugee camps. The role of textual genres and representations
Text.Serial.Journal
https://ojs.unica.it/index.php/cisap
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Naciones Otras
2021-12-31
2021-10-12
2022-02-16
2022-02-16
149-157
1
Pamela Murgia
2021/12/31
10.13125/americacritica/4938
149
University of Urbino, Italy
2532-6724
2
157
The discourse on identity in Palestinian refugee camps. The role of textual genres and representations
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                                                                             doi: https://doi.org/10.13125/americacritica/4938




The discourse on identity in Palestinian refugee camps.
The role of textual genres and representations
Pamela Murgia1
1 University   of Urbino, Italy
E-mail: pamelamurgia01@gmail.com

Recibido: 08/09/2020. Aceptado: 13/03/2021.

Cómo citar: Murgia, Pamela. 2021. «The discourse on identity in Palestinian refugee camps. The role of textual
genres and representations». América Crítica 5 (2): 149-157. https://doi.org/10.13125/americacritica/4938


Abstract—Identity is an issue of primary importance within the Palestinian refugee camps in host countries.
In fact, it allows the preservation of cohesion and memory of communities that, most of the times, endure
harsh life conditions. In Lebanon, many Palestinian associations that are concerned with educating children
about “identity”, specifically “Palestinian identity”, not only to preserve the historical memory of their
community, but also to educate them as responsible citizens aware of the issues concerning life in the refugee
camp. The present work aims at presenting the work of three Palestinian associations operating in Lebanon
(Beit Atfal Assoumud/al Houle, al Jana, Najdeh) through the perspective of discourse analysis, in order to
understand the role of language in developing identity and transmitting knowledge. — Discourse analysis,
Palestine, identity, refugee camps, narrative.

Resumen—La cuestión de la identidad es un tema de importancia primordial dentro de los campos de
refugiados palestinos en los países de acogida. De hecho, permite preservar la cohesión y la memoria de
comunidades que, la mayoría de las veces, soportan duras condiciones de vida. En el Líbano, son muchas
las asociaciones palestinas que se preocupan por educar a los niños en la “identidad”, concretamente en
la “identidad palestina”, no sólo para preservar la memoria histórica de su comunidad, sino también para
educarlos como ciudadanos responsables y conscientes de las cuestiones que atañen a la vida en el campo de
refugiados. El presente artículo pretende presentar el trabajo de tres asociaciones palestinas que operan
en Líbano (Beit Atfal Assoumud/al Houle, al Jana, Najdeh) a través de la perspectiva del análisis del
discurso, con el fin de comprender el papel del lenguaje en el desarrollo de la identidad y la transmisión del
conocimiento. — Análisis del discurso, Palestina, identidad, campos para refugiados, narrativa.


    dentity has, especially recently, been a transdisci-     features that trace back to a unique identity. Ideological
I    plinary subject whose study benefited from contribu-
tions from different fields, such as anthropology, sociol-
                                                             groups perform this in terms of common goals, values,
                                                             instruments, attitudes (van Van Dijk 2000). National and
ogy, philosophy, linguistics.                                ethnic groups frequently rely on a common geographical
    In fact, the perception of identity is the fundamen-     and historical origin, and naturalize identity as essential
tal cohesive force behind the existence of social groups.    and a-historical (Barth 1969).
Groups define themselves on the ground of being dif-             The latest reflections on the question of identity, how-
ferent from the Other, “them”, and recognize common          ever, suggests a very different picture from that of a
150                                                                         América Crítica 5(1): 149–157, 2021. ISSN: 2532-6724

monolithic and fixed category. Social constructivism has                    Work Agency. Many refugees that arrived later are not
been fundamental to provide the perspective under which                     registered, and live in “gatherings”, urban settlements
identity has been recently framed: as not essentialist nor                  not registered within UNRWA. UNRWA manages basic
monolithic, rather multi-dimensional and historically sit-                  services, such as education and health.
uated. Thus, the present study considers the following                          Since 1989, the Lebanese state has withdrawn its au-
assumptions on identity as:                                                 thority over the camps, which are currently under the
                                                                            Palestinian Authority and local authorities.
• An historically situated process;
                                                                                Upon their arrival, Palestinian refugees met with very
• Negotiated and situated in interaction;
                                                                            different conditions. For example, people from the city
• Multi-dimensional, and different kinds of identity
                                                                            found it easier to settle in urban environments (Sayigh
  might be activated according to context;
                                                                            1981: 6-7).
• Informed by global identities which are socially con-
                                                                                It is fundamental to take into consideration the social
  stituted;
                                                                            context met by the refugees upon their arrival. In the case
• Relational;
                                                                            of Lebanon, the sectarian establishment is an unescapable
• Constructed through discourse;
                                                                            condition, where its demographic balance is strictly con-
• Strongly intertwined in domination dynamics and re-
                                                                            nected to political and social balance. Palestinians, being
  lations. (De Fina, Schiffrin, and Bamberg 2006: 1-3;
                                                                            a majority of Sunni, were considered as a possible threat
  Georgakopoulou 2006; Ribeiro 2006; Restrepo 2007:
                                                                            for the demographic balance, for adding to the number
  25-32)
                                                                            of Muslim Sunni in the Lebanese population. For this
As previously mentioned, identity is strongly connected                     reason, they were never given the citizenship of the host
with the representation of the Other: the connection be-                    country, and endure severe legal limitations.
tween narration, representation and power emerges espe-                         Some examples of these limitations can be taken by
cially in post-colonial studies. Constructing the image                     labour and property: Palestinians can’t practice a list
of the native in opposition to the European colonizers                      of 23 free professions, cannot be owners of houses and
served the purposes of colonization for a long time. The                    cannot transmit them as inheritance.
colonial representation of the native seeks to create a
figure which is posed in total opposition to the European                   T HE QUESTION OF PALESTINIAN IDENTITY
colonizer: it is portrayed as less rational, civilized, orga-               The state of the art concerning research on Palestinian
nized (Said 1989), somehow less “human”, in order to                        identity displays three main currents: the first is the chal-
delegitimize him and deny him the right to his own narra-                   lenge of tropes, such as the negation of a Palestinian iden-
tive (222; Sartre, 2004 [1961]). Whoever holds power, is                    tity before the Nakba2 or a total denial of its existence;
able to fully express his/her voice and, at the same time,                  secondly, explaining how Palestinian identity is repre-
to deny the same right to others. Thus, detaining power                     sented and narrated. The third current is concerned with
also means controlling narratives and representations.                      researching the Palestinian identity in a diasporic context
The settler colonialism system1 performed by Israel on                      (Hanafı̄ and Long 2010; Hanafı̄ 2010; Sayigh 1977, 1981;
Palestine uses the same techniques, such as imposing its                    Bjawi-Levine 2009; Pérez 2011; Hālidı̄ 2010).
perspective on the global narrative and trying to conceal                       Rashid Khalidi (2010: 193-194) challenges the myth
and deny Palestinian identity.                                              of the non-existent of Palestinian identity before the
                                                                            Nakba by providing a detailed history and insisting on
T HE SITUATION             OF    PALESTINIAN            REFUGEES            its continuity. He identifies the following phases:
IN L EBANON
                                                                             a. Before the First World War: this was the era of nation-
Palestinian refugees first arrived in Lebanon in 1948.                          alism and pan-nationalisms. The urban elites were
At present time, the refugees live in the camps which                           expanding and the middle class was rising; Pales-
they built upon their arrival and most of them are reg-                         tinian identity would overlap with Ottoman identity
istered at the UNRWA, the United Nations Relief and                             and Arab identity. These representations of identity
1 Settler colonialism is a form of colonialism which seeks to exploit       2 The Nakba, which in Arabic translates to “catastrophe”, is the
the territory and finally expel or repress local population, naturalising   day after the declaration of birth of the State of Israel. In fact, right
its presence in the colony as that of a native inhabitant, thus severing    afterwards, Israeli armies rallied Palestinian cities and villages, com-
(identity) ties with the land(s) of origin. For more information on this    pelling them to leave them and, for many of them, to become refugees
field of study, consult Veracini (2006, 2007, 2011) and Wolfe (2006).       in host countries.
Murgia, The discourse on identity                                                                                     151

   would, in turn, overlap with loyalties of sectarian and     tinian refugee camps, the work of Rosemary Sayigh
   the familiar nature.                                        (1977) must be mentioned. This study was led in 1975
b. Years of the British mandate: the concept of Pales-         in Beirut Camps and highlighted the different nuances
   tinian identity got stronger under the perspective of       of identity as they were perceived and expressed by the
   opposing British presence and arising presence of           camp residents. According to Sayigh, the most frequent
   Zionism. There was an increase in the alphabetiza-          descriptors of Palestinians, according to camp residents,
   tion and education levels and the educational system        were features concerning intellectual and social capabili-
   contributed to building a unitary sense of identity.        ties, such as being generous and being educated, which
c. After 1948. The trauma of dispossession, displace-          can be read also as a reaction to the hostile atmosphere
   ment and occupation is indeed a new factor of identity      that the Palestinian refugees would endure, at the time,
   cohesion, and refugee Palestinian are born outside          in Lebanon, whereas they would be easily discriminated
   Palestine.                                                  and subjected to ill stereotypes (15). The author con-
Many different identity layers overlap. This is not true       textualizes the results of the research in the social and
only for Palestinians, but other Arabs shared similar con-     normative context met by refugees in Lebanon, and how
ditions, with the exception of the Nakba on their land.        this would influence the perception of identity. Moreover,
    Khalidi (2010) explains how 1948 was the basis for         the identity of “refugee”, at the time, as connected to a
the creation of a common Palestinian and resistance dis-       state of passivity, was disregarded as a “false condition”
course, which included symbols that would be transmit-         and replaced by the “Palestinian, fighter, revolutionary”
ted up to present day discourses. After 1967, the P.L.O.       (12).
re-organized and operated as armed; many other Pales-              Recent studies are concerned with the perceptions
tinian movements were born subsequently.                       of Palestinian children of their identity. The studies of
    Palestine intended as a territorial unit and administra-   Hart (2002) and Bjawi-Levine (2009), for example, show
tive unit can be traced back to Ottoman documents of the       the way Palestinian children learn and elaborate their
first years of the 20th Century: in an article published by    national loyalties as being Palestinian, and perceive the
the review Thamarat al Funun, Najib ‘Azuri recommends          Jordanian citizenship and documents as something exter-
an expansion of the sanjak of Jerusalem as the “progress       nal which is not “felt” in such an intimate way.
of Palestine depend on this”. The sanjak was an admin-             The refugee camps in Lebanon constitute a particular
istrative division of Ottoman empire and the Jerusalem         case, as shown by Hanafı̄ (2010: 58-59). In fact, the
sanjak in the XIX century included Bethlehem, al Khalil,       nature of closed camps, in contrast with the open camps
Beersheba, Gaza, Jaffa, and for a brief period of time         in Jordan and Syria, is the cause of economic conditions
it was the capital of the vilayet called “Falastin”, Pales-    and labour issues which are more comparable to those
tine. Religion contributed to the feeling of unity: in fact,   undergone in the Gaza Strip camps than in camps in other
the jurisdiction of the Orthodox Greek church and the          host countries.
protestant Episcopate of Jerusalem regarded “Falastin”
                                                               A note on Palestinian cultural associations in Lebanon
as a united and sacred territory, regardless of Ottoman
administrative divisions (151).                                Lebanon hosts many foreign NGOs concerned with
    Elias Sanbar (2005: 12-15) researches Palestinian          refugees. However, Palestinian cultural associations exist
identity applying a perspective which considers identity       and operate efficiently on the territory. The associations
as a multiplicity of strata, to interpret in relation to the   that contributed to the present work are Najdeh, al Jana
present moment. According to his approach, different           (Beirut, but operating on the whole territory), and Beit At-
identity figures, which have been built through time, co-      fal Assoumoud through the association al Houleh in Burj
exist. He explicitly rejects the necessity to find a “point    al Shamali camp (Tyre). Al Houle, in Burj al Shamali. Al
zero in time”, an origin in order to constitute Palestinian    Jana conducted, in the early 1990s, a project concerned
identity, as the factors of cohesion prove to be variegated    with oral history and memory, which engaged children in
and complex. His perspective on identity escapes a mono-       many activities, such as interviews with the elders who
lithic representation in favour of a multi-dimensional and     had lived the Nakba and dramatizations. They produced,
dynamic representation.                                        together with other association, the book “I wish I were
    Moreover, both authors insist on the importance of         a bird” / “s.awt s.uwwarnā” (“The voice of our images”)
putting the discussion in context.                             in English and Arabic, which collected pictures, draw-
    For what concerns the studies on the identity in Pales-    ings, interviews and reports produced by the children. Al
152                                                                      América Crítica 5(1): 149–157, 2021. ISSN: 2532-6724

Najdeh recently conducted the project “Hawiyya”, “Iden-                    (Najdeh Association);
tity”, whose results were presented during the Day of the                • Transcripts of interviews conducted by children during
Refugee in 2017. The project was articulated in activities                 the project “Identity” (2013-2017) (Najdeh Associa-
dedicated to kindergarten children, school children and                    tion);
teenagers, and addressed issues concerning the work of                   • Drawings and texts produced by the children during
UNRWA3 , access to health services, education, radical-                    the researcher’s visits to the library (Sohail Sabbagh
ization, memory. Al Houleh, together with Beit Atfal                       Library, al Houlah Association, Burj al Shamali camp).
Assoumoud, provides a service of after-school activities
for children which include music and dance courses, recy-                A NALYSIS
cling, storytelling and reading; the children of al Houleh
                                                                         Learning about Palestine
have recently been involved in an exchange program with
an Italian elementary school in Rome and produced “Ma                    Although the present study is concerned with the work
che bella storia!” (What a beautiful tale!), a short-stories             of cultural associations, children do not learn about iden-
book published in 2017. Regarding the associations in                    tity only through this channel. According to educators
Burj al Shamali, the contact was provided by the Italian                 in Burj al Shamali and el Buss, although such projects
association Ulaia, that has been their partner for several               were not present when they were children, they, obvi-
years.                                                                   ously, talked about Palestine in the family. Children are
                                                                         exposed to a lot of images and symbols which refer to
M ETHODOLOGY                                                             Palestine and are visible all over the camp. For example,
                                                                         when Burj al Shamali was founded, the first refugees
The present work falls within the field of Discourse Stud-               settled in groups according to the village of origin and, at
ies, and focuses on how identity emerges in texts; the                   present day, the camp is indeed organized in areas which
research has been performed with a qualitative analysis                  recall this historical event: camp areas can be individu-
of narrative, categorization and positioning4 . For “cate-               ated by a map of Palestine painted on the walls, coloured
gorization”, De Fina refers to a “discursive process which               in red, with the village of reference signed on the map
is central in constitution and negotiation of categories”                accompanied by the caption: “I will return to. . . ” and the
and “(how) members of a culture organize experience”                     name of the village. Maps, flags, images of al Aqsa and
(De Fina 2018: 354-355). Telling about oneself becomes,                  other symbols of Palestine can be seen all over the camp
in this perspective, a social practice. The act of position-             and also in the environments attended by the children.
ing is relevant for identity studies whenever correlated to              During the celebration of the Nakba, for example, they
socially shared representations.                                         perform activities concerned with Palestine, its history,
    Finally, narrative is another relevant level of analy-               its geography, and the history of the camp, with maps
sis, because it is one of the salient genres in the corpus               of Palestine and of traditional costumes hanging from
(fiction, life stories, reports). For this reason, the nar-              the walls. Thus, children learn from an early age about
rative roles and schemas are the considered analytical                   Palestine and the village of origin of their family.
categories.                                                                  Associations seem to intervene in this context by pro-
                                                                         viding new ways to reflect about identity and being a
Corpus
                                                                         Palestinian living in the camp. For example, al Houlah
The corpus has been selected among the material col-                     engages children in activities concerned with education,
lected in Lebanon. The present analysis considers:                       culture and arts, but also practices of social responsi-
                                                                         bility, such as the recycling project5 . Al Jana provided
• A book: “I wish I were a bird / s.awt s.uwwarnā” (2010),              the children with instruments for narrating the daily life
  which is the result of a series of workshops followed by               in the camp and the life conditions, but also to collect
  the children with the associations al Jana and Najdeh;                 information that will be useful in order to preserve the
• The video “I am from there and I have memories”                        Palestinian memory and history. “Identity” project of al
                                                                         Najdeh employed concepts taken by social psychology,
3 “United Nations Relief and Work Agency”, created specifically for
the Palestinian refugees. UNRWA was designed to take care of basic       such as “self-identity” and “personal identity” in order to
needs concerning education, health, nurture.                             reflect on stable and changing elements of identity, other
4 To learn more about the use of “positioning” in determining identity
narratives, see De Fina, Schiffrin, and Bamberg (2006) and De Fina       5 The Project about recycling was conducted together with the Italian
(2018)                                                                   association Ulaia.
Murgia, The discourse on identity                                                                                               153

than prompt children to actively inquire and tell on the        report everything in their own words.
camp issues, such as health and education.                         Moreover, they often talk about children, which
                                                                makes them the protagonists of the narration.
Genres                                                             In pictures and drawings, children are frequently por-
                                                                trayed in the foreground. The camp is the second pro-
The texts include many different genres. For example,           tagonist, portrayed both as the background or on its
“I wish I were a bird” is a photographic journalistic re-       own, the environment where the activity of the narrator-
portage, and children present themselves as young jour-         protagonist develops, and a character itself.
nalists. In fact, they use most of the instrument of journal-
ism such as interviews, pictures, brief reports, collecting     Categories
of witnesses. Interviews are also a very frequent activity
                                                                The child-narrator identifies himself as a Palestinian and
in the Identity project, where children interviewed health
                                                                also assumes all of these identity nuances. Clearly, these
workers and teachers of UNRWA.
                                                                categories are not exclusive; in discourse, they may over-
    On the other hand, works of the children of Burj el
                                                                lap or emerge unevenly.
Shemali, made doing the activities at the library, were col-
lected in a different context. In fact, they are not planned
                                                                Refugee, life in the camp (lāg’iy and nāzih.)
texts, but they are produces contextually to the activity.
In this context, the role of image is fundamental, and text     The category of “refugee” is certainly one of the most
and image work as one.                                          frequently assumed categories. The children identify
    Information acquired by the children about Palestine        themselves in this category in a general sense and, at the
are processed into new texts which privilege a narra-           same time, create oppositions with other categories of
tive structure which start from the main narrative line,        non-Palestinian refugees:
the daily life of the camp refugee, especially the child              The term lāg’iy is used only for Palestinians; for
refugee, and extends to micro-stories (Georgakopoulou                 Syrians we use nāzı̄hin6 (Interviews with health
2006) concerned with moments, dreams, self-expression                 workers, Najdeh association)
of different kinds, and life stories of camp resident col-      Another category of differentiation is built on the basis
lected through interviews by the children. There are also       of accessibility to basic services:
products of fictional narrative (“the story of Mona”, I
wish I were a bird, p. 17), letters, drawings, the outcomes           Why does not a specialized hospital for Palestinian
                                                                      doctors exist?
of thematic activities (“Activity: we express what we
                                                                      (Interviews with health workers, Najdeh associa-
want to change”, I wish I were a bird, p. 101).                       tion)
    The video I am from there and I have memories, for
instance, is a mix of fictional narrative and documentary.      The collective identity of “camp residents” is another rel-
The protagonist, Umm Khaled, is about to leave abroad;          evant category. The camp is not only the place where one
while preparing her luggage, she recounts episodes from         lives its daily life but is also constitutes the community
her life regarding her family experiencing difficult mo-        of its inhabitants. In the following example, taken from
ments, all concerned with the legal limitations to Pales-       I wish I were a bird, a child interviews his father about
tinians in the camps, that made it difficult from them to       the civil war in Lebanon, and asks him: “How did the
benefit from basic services. In the end, her grandson joins     camp survive during the war?”. The whole community
her and convinces her to stay. This brief video deals with      is thus expressed through a metonymy, the camp, that
the themes of health rights, right to return, estrangement      is metaphorically represented as a subject and sentient
from native land, and memory.                                   being; as previously mentioned, a character in the narra-
                                                                tion.
Narrators and protagonists                                          A second evidence of this perception emerges in the
                                                                children’s drawings at Sohail Sabbagh, where the camp
The chosen textual genre have, as an outcome, that chil-        recurs as the background of all activities. When children
dren often assume both the roles of narrator and protago-       draw playing scenes or events relevant to their life (for
nist. When they are journalists and video makers, they
                                                                6 While the lāgi’y is the refugee, whose status has been recognized,
are narrators, which has the consequence to make them           the nazı̄h is the immigrant. This distribution of categories is not
play an agentive role within the discourse and social prac-     exclusive of the Palestinian perspective, but can be found as well in
tice: they do not only learn, but they “take the stage” and     Lebanese political discourse and media discourse.
154                                                                    América Crítica 5(1): 149–157, 2021. ISSN: 2532-6724

example the coming of the ice-cream seller), the physical                   Umm Khaled: Because we are based in Acca dis-
boundaries of the camp, like barbed wire, are represented                   trict. From here, Palestine will be closer when we
and naturalized in the scenario.                                            return.
                                                                            Grandson: Will we come back, grandmother?
Palestinian                                                                 Umm Khaled: Sure. It is our right to come back.

Children do not have direct experience of Palestine.                   Furthermore, references to Palestine are very often fo-
Nonetheless, any narration of Palestine is performed in                cused on the local. The formulation found in the previous
first person, even when concerning historical facts that               examples, which includes the village of origin and dis-
the child could not have possibly lived directly. The                  trict, is very frequent in the productions of children, who
Nakba, for example, is narrated by using a first-person                always know the place of origin of their family.
plural: “the Israelis have expelled us”, “I am from (name
of village)”, “I am from Palestine and I want to go back”.             1. Positioning
    A good example is the caption under a drawing of                   The activities of children, especially when oriented to a
the Dome of the Rock made by a child during Nakba                      journalistic approach, reveal a series of acts of “position-
commemoration in Burj al Shamali, that reads: “I am a                  ing” with respect to the following objects:
Palestinian girl. I love my country, Palestine, and I am
from Na’me in the Safad district. I hope I will go back to             • Institutions: the child expresses distrust. In the in-
my beloved country, Palestine”.                                          terviews, for example, there are frequent questions
    The children very often reproduce in their drawings a                regarding critical points of basic services, such as ac-
series of symbols which are connected to Palestine such                  cess limitations.
as the al Aqsa mosque, the flag, and refer to the state                • Rights. Children express their vision of rights. These
of dispossession and resistance by the means of sym-                     concern primarily the problems of the camp (child -
bols, such as Handala7 and the kuffiyyah, the traditional                refugee), such as unemployment. Another frequent
peasant headwear that became the symbol of Arab na-                      theme is children’s rights and the right of return for all
tional struggle first, and, in its checked version, of the               the Palestinian refugees.
Palestinian struggle. Children that attended the library
Sohail Sabbagh would sometimes reproduce this symbols                  2. Belonging
without any kind of prompt concerning Palestine, during                The term “belonging” (intima’) occurs frequently in the
activities just concerned with leisure drawing.                        texts, and is often also linked to the emotional sphere
    Being Palestinian is often associated with the voli-               (“(the sense of) belonging is the desire to return”, Intisar,
tional and psycho emotional sphere. Memories are also                  9/06/2017).
very important with being Palestinian. In I am from there                  The feeling of belonging, of being affiliated to a com-
and I have memories, memories are the focus of the                     munity, is often realized in terms of remaining in the
whole narration. The video opens with “here lives Umm                  camp and resist its difficult conditions. This emerges
Khaled, alone with her memories, and with the stories of               in the story narrated in I come from there and I have
her grandparents”. The theme of return and estrangement                memories and in other texts, in which personal charac-
from home is put into words by the protagonist: “(Umm                  ter features related to the resistance and resilience are
Khaled) I am sad. I am not from here, I am from there, I               promoted.
dream of going back”.
    The theme of the return to Palestine evokes a contrast             D ISCUSSION
between the hoped and desired life in the homeland and
actual life in the camp; it opens and closes the narra-                Identity and education of the individual
tion of the video, with the following exchange with the                The concept of identity is explicitly addressed during the
nephew:                                                                projects, and is treated as a subject to be discussed and
      Umm Khaled: I will stay here and I will not leave.               developed. The activities of the Palestinian associations
      Grandson: Why, grandma?                                          address the issue with two main objectives: first of all, to
                                                                       fill an educational gap where the curricula of UNRWA
7 Handala is a character created by the artist Naji Ali (1938-1987),
and represents a child walking away from the viewerwith his hands
                                                                       schools do not prove adequate in teaching history and
behind his back. The character’s face is never shown, as Handala is    geography of Palestine in their programs; secondly, to
supposed to turn to the viewer only when Palestine is liberated.       open up a space for cultural and social education, in order
Murgia, The discourse on identity                                                                                        155

to prompt the growth of children into responsible adults,         it is a constant background presence.
aware of the camp problems.
    According to Intisar, one of the coordinator of Na-           T IPICALIZATION
jdeh’s Identity project, the feeling of belonging is fun-
damental for the growth of the child and adolescent;              The identity represented by the children performs a func-
for example, an integral part of "practicing identity" be-        tion of "tipicalization", providing a picture of the typical
comes the act of seeking information on the problems of           life of the camp through the descriptions of the children
the camp and divulge them through the language of jour-           and episodes presented as emblematic of certain situa-
nalism, thus assuming an agentive role. In the Identity           tions.
project, for examples, are included initiatives concerned             In relation to the data collected, the process of build-
with radicalization and extremism, aimed at teenagers.            ing and tipicalizing the identity of the Palestinian refugee
    In the book I wish I were a bird, child labour and            child seems to develop along the following steps:
issues related to youth unemployment are some of                      1. Learning: history, geography and symbols of Pales-
the issues that emerge from interviews or from auto-              tine and resistance through stories and explanations re-
biographical narration of the children. Within the Sohail         ceived in the family, exposure to the symbols present in
Sabbagh library, cultural activities (music, reading, etc.)       the camp and in places frequented by children (schools,
are also based on an education of the individual "whose           associations’ venues), participation to public events, par-
weapons are culture" (quoting the library coordinator).           ticipation to activities organized by the associations.
It is therefore an instrument of social resistance and re-            2. Reproduction: children reproduce the symbols and
silience.                                                         narratives they have learned.
                                                                      3. Identification in history and historical trauma:
P ROPOSED CATEGORIES                                              children reproduce the narratives learned about the Pales-
                                                                  tinian people and the history of their family in the first
In general, identity is articulated according to various          person.
categories of belonging. A type of belonging concerns                 4. Reflection on identity as a concept: contributions
the cohesion of a community sharing a geographical ori-           provided by the field of psychology (personal identity
gin (Palestine), history (Nakba, expulsion from Palestine)        and identity of the self). In this phase, the previous
and cultural heritage (food, customs, literature, music,          elaborations on identity are integrated with other cate-
etc.). This clearly emerged during the activities orga-           gories and are subject to comparison with other refugees
nized for the recurrence of the Nakba in Burj al Shamali:         in Lebanon, other Palestinian refugees in other camps,
the history of Palestine and its geography become the             Lebanese population. They also integrate national, indi-
object of social and educational activities. For example,         vidual and social identity.
children were taught the geographical features of Pales-              5. Agentivity: in a context in which the Palestinian
tine, storytelling on the Nakba, creating bracelets with          refugee community is marginalized in the host country,
the colour of the Palestinian flag. So, in the first phase of     children take the stage by leading the narration, then re-
their lives, children learn and reproduce the Palestinian         elaborate and contribute to the construction of meaning
identity in its national aspect, concerning a community           concerning the areas of reflection on identity and life
that shares a common national background, land, and               in the camp. This is the result of activities that make
history.                                                          the child protagonist/narrator through the selection of
    In the case of the other projects, this first type of iden-   specific textual genres that allow the collection of in-
tity articulation is reconciled with another variation of         formation and their reproduction for divulging purposes
"belonging", where the volitional and mnemonic spheres            (reports, videos, interviews, collection of oral memories,
prevail: the desire to return, to be on the Palestinian land,     photographic reports).
the desire for freedom, the desire to see rights respected,           6. Social responsibility: the child learns that being
are defining features of Palestinian identity; moreover,          aware of his identity means learning and acting within his
the feeling of belonging is also transmitted along the sto-       – her own context to improve his condition and others’.
ries and memories of the elders who lived the Nakba.
    The camp is the common denominator of these two               C ONCLUSION
articulations. First of all, it is the focus in almost all the
texts (the children of the camp, the life of the camp);           The present study highlights different dimensions of iden-
from a graphic point of view, in the video and the book,          tity in which the child initially learns about Palestine in
156                                                            América Crítica 5(1): 149–157, 2021. ISSN: 2532-6724

different phases. First, this happens through the family       De Fina, Anna. 2018. “What Is Your Dream? Fashioning the
and school, and the visual stimuli present in the field             Migrant Self.” Language Communication 59:42–52. htt
space. The meeting with the associations promotes the               ps://doi.org/10.1016/j.langcom.2017.02.002.
elaboration on identity that develops in a knowledge of        De Fina, Anna, Deborah Schiffrin, and Michael Bamberg.
the Palestinian historical and geographical context and            2006. “Introduction.” In Discourse and Identity, edited
performs a function of compensation with respect to what           by Anna De Fina, Deborah Schiffrin, and Michael Bam-
                                                                   berg, 1–24. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
is proposed by school. First of all, the associations pro-
                                                                   https://doi.org/10.1017/CBO9780511584459.001.
pose an explanation of the theme of identity and a follow
up with an active reflection that leads the child to assume    Georgakopoulou, Alexandra. 2006. “Small and large identi-
                                                                   ties in narrative (inter)action.” In Discourse and Identity,
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more widespread and generalized; the role of education               Refugee Camp in Jordan.” Childhood 9 (1): 35–47. https:
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                                                               Khalidi, Rashid. 2010. Palestinian Identity: The Construc-
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tions conducted during a two-month stay in Lebanon             Pérez, Michael Vicente. 2011. “Identifying Palestinians: Pales-
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(Beirut-Tyre from May to June 2017) and is part of an
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