Mandana E Limbert
Biographic Data
| ID | 181276 |
|---|---|
| NAME | Mandana E Limbert |
| GIVEN NAMES | Mandana E |
| FAMILY NAME | Limbert |
| SIGNATURE | LIMBERT M E |
| AFFILIATIONS | Queens College, CUNY |
| ORCID | 0000-0003-4310-1955 |
| VERIFIED | Yes |
| TOTAL WORKS | 14 |
| TOTAL CITATIONS | 29 |
| AUTHOR COUNT | 14 |
| EDITOR COUNT | 0 |
| FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2001 |
| LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR | 2025 |
| H-INDEX | 2 |
Homeland Is Where the Soul Resides
This article examines conflicting notions of political home or homeland (waṭan) in the early twentieth-century Western Indian Ocean. In a period of colonial consolidation and shifts in trans-oceanic mobility, determining political belonging took on urgency for both British officials and Omani intellectuals and migrants. This article examines how, in contrast to both anti-colonial nationalists and British colonial officials, homeland in Omani reli…
Life Worlds of Middle Eastern Oil
Studies how oil has shaped the societies and cultures of the modern and contemporary Middle EastProposes a new research agenda for the study of oil's varied lives in the modern and contemporary Middle EastIncludes 13 case studies, including 2 photo essays by leading artists and designersTakes a thematic approach to promote interdisciplinary thinkingPresents contributions from leading historians and anthropologists, world-renown artists, curators …
Escape from Zanzibar
In January 1964, on the heels of its formal independence from Britain, the East African island of Zanzibar exploded in a violent uprising ousting the Al-Bu Saidi sultan—an Omani by descent—and his primarily “Arab” government. Though early reports of the revolution did not indicate targeted attacks against Arabs, it soon became clear that thousands of Arab-identified residents—settlers—were killed, mostly in rural areas. 1 Others, including some f…
Trade, Mobility, and the Sea
Trade, mobility, and the sea—as concepts and practices—have, in the last several years, been the focus of superb and fascinating scholarly work. This essay explores some of the themes and arguments linking, and dividing, a body of work that has reinvigorated and shifted conversations about the Middle East toward a recognition of the significance of the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean for our understanding of colonial and economic history. As w…
“If You Catch Me Again At It, Put Me to Death”
Liquid Oman
This paper explores how different natural resources figure in temporal imaginings. I ask: how do oil and water come to frame the relationships and chronologies of transformation and, more particularly, of causality? In order to understand visions of environmental futures, not only might we need to attend to the forms of planning, expectation, and prognosis that shape knowledge or senses of the future, but we may also consider how and why causalit…
Marriage and the Management of Place in Southern Arabia
Caste, Ethnicity, and the Politics of Arabness in Southern Arabia
Limbert’s essay explores the notion of Arabness. It argues that Indian Ocean experiences, histories, and debates present an alternative perspective to the one dominant in Egypt, Iraq, and the Levant. In particular, it suggests that even as late as the twentieth century, Arabness in the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean circuit, which had a different history from that of Northern Arabia, was conceived more as a caste-like or class notion than an …
“If You Catch Me Again at It, Put Me to Death”
This chapter recounts the capture of the slave ship Yasmeen by the HMS Vulture. Documents from the capture illuminate details concerning the journey of the slaves and slave ships across the Indian Ocean, transactions conducted by slave dealers, British actions during capture, liberation of the slaves and prosecution of the ship, bureaucracy before the vice-admiralty court, and integration of the slaves into non-slave economic and commercial life,…
In the Time of Oil
This compelling historical ethnography explores how people in Bahla, an oasis town in the interior of Oman, experienced dramatic transformation in their lives following the discovery of oil in the late 1960s, and now grapple with the prospect of this resource's future depletion.
In the Ruins of Bahla
This article examines the ruins of the former structures of rule in a medium-sized town in the Sultanate of Oman. It explores how people in Bahla relate to and perceive the ruins of forts, walls, and neighborhoods that had helped maintain order in the previous era and that are being transformed in the new state. While the fort has changed from local and regional political-military center to national museum, helping shape more abstract and imperso…
Nostalgia for the Modern
The Sacred Date
This article explores the sacredness of dates in an Omani town. It examines how dates are neither incarnations of the divine like fetishes nor representations of the divine like idols. Rather, dates are considered gifts of God that embody and index a quality of God (his generosity) and are central to everyday life. As such, the mundane - through the appreciation of this gift in sociability and care for date palms - is suffused with appropriate pi…
The Senses of Water in an Omani Town
Social Text - 68 (Volume 19, Number 3), Fall 2001
Caste, Ethnicity, and the Politics of Arabness in Southern Arabia
Limbert’s essay explores the notion of Arabness. It argues that Indian Ocean experiences, histories, and debates present an alternative perspective to the one dominant in Egypt, Iraq, and the Levant. In particular, it suggests that even as late as the twentieth century, Arabness in the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean circuit, which had a different history from that of Northern Arabia, was conceived more as a caste-like or class notion than an …
The Senses of Water in an Omani Town
Social Text - 68 (Volume 19, Number 3), Fall 2001
Trade, Mobility, and the Sea
Trade, mobility, and the sea—as concepts and practices—have, in the last several years, been the focus of superb and fascinating scholarly work. This essay explores some of the themes and arguments linking, and dividing, a body of work that has reinvigorated and shifted conversations about the Middle East toward a recognition of the significance of the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean for our understanding of colonial and economic history. As w…
The Sacred Date
This article explores the sacredness of dates in an Omani town. It examines how dates are neither incarnations of the divine like fetishes nor representations of the divine like idols. Rather, dates are considered gifts of God that embody and index a quality of God (his generosity) and are central to everyday life. As such, the mundane - through the appreciation of this gift in sociability and care for date palms - is suffused with appropriate pi…
Liquid Oman
This paper explores how different natural resources figure in temporal imaginings. I ask: how do oil and water come to frame the relationships and chronologies of transformation and, more particularly, of causality? In order to understand visions of environmental futures, not only might we need to attend to the forms of planning, expectation, and prognosis that shape knowledge or senses of the future, but we may also consider how and why causalit…
The Senses of Water in an Omani Town
Social Text - 68 (Volume 19, Number 3), Fall 2001
In the Ruins of Bahla
This article examines the ruins of the former structures of rule in a medium-sized town in the Sultanate of Oman. It explores how people in Bahla relate to and perceive the ruins of forts, walls, and neighborhoods that had helped maintain order in the previous era and that are being transformed in the new state. While the fort has changed from local and regional political-military center to national museum, helping shape more abstract and imperso…
Nostalgia for the Modern
The Sacred Date
This article explores the sacredness of dates in an Omani town. It examines how dates are neither incarnations of the divine like fetishes nor representations of the divine like idols. Rather, dates are considered gifts of God that embody and index a quality of God (his generosity) and are central to everyday life. As such, the mundane - through the appreciation of this gift in sociability and care for date palms - is suffused with appropriate pi…
In the Time of Oil
This compelling historical ethnography explores how people in Bahla, an oasis town in the interior of Oman, experienced dramatic transformation in their lives following the discovery of oil in the late 1960s, and now grapple with the prospect of this resource's future depletion.
“If You Catch Me Again at It, Put Me to Death”
This chapter recounts the capture of the slave ship Yasmeen by the HMS Vulture. Documents from the capture illuminate details concerning the journey of the slaves and slave ships across the Indian Ocean, transactions conducted by slave dealers, British actions during capture, liberation of the slaves and prosecution of the ship, bureaucracy before the vice-admiralty court, and integration of the slaves into non-slave economic and commercial life,…
Caste, Ethnicity, and the Politics of Arabness in Southern Arabia
Limbert’s essay explores the notion of Arabness. It argues that Indian Ocean experiences, histories, and debates present an alternative perspective to the one dominant in Egypt, Iraq, and the Levant. In particular, it suggests that even as late as the twentieth century, Arabness in the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean circuit, which had a different history from that of Northern Arabia, was conceived more as a caste-like or class notion than an …
Marriage and the Management of Place in Southern Arabia
Liquid Oman
This paper explores how different natural resources figure in temporal imaginings. I ask: how do oil and water come to frame the relationships and chronologies of transformation and, more particularly, of causality? In order to understand visions of environmental futures, not only might we need to attend to the forms of planning, expectation, and prognosis that shape knowledge or senses of the future, but we may also consider how and why causalit…
“If You Catch Me Again At It, Put Me to Death”
Trade, Mobility, and the Sea
Trade, mobility, and the sea—as concepts and practices—have, in the last several years, been the focus of superb and fascinating scholarly work. This essay explores some of the themes and arguments linking, and dividing, a body of work that has reinvigorated and shifted conversations about the Middle East toward a recognition of the significance of the Arabian Peninsula and Indian Ocean for our understanding of colonial and economic history. As w…
Escape from Zanzibar
In January 1964, on the heels of its formal independence from Britain, the East African island of Zanzibar exploded in a violent uprising ousting the Al-Bu Saidi sultan—an Omani by descent—and his primarily “Arab” government. Though early reports of the revolution did not indicate targeted attacks against Arabs, it soon became clear that thousands of Arab-identified residents—settlers—were killed, mostly in rural areas. 1 Others, including some f…
Life Worlds of Middle Eastern Oil
Studies how oil has shaped the societies and cultures of the modern and contemporary Middle EastProposes a new research agenda for the study of oil's varied lives in the modern and contemporary Middle EastIncludes 13 case studies, including 2 photo essays by leading artists and designersTakes a thematic approach to promote interdisciplinary thinkingPresents contributions from leading historians and anthropologists, world-renown artists, curators …
Homeland Is Where the Soul Resides
This article examines conflicting notions of political home or homeland (waṭan) in the early twentieth-century Western Indian Ocean. In a period of colonial consolidation and shifts in trans-oceanic mobility, determining political belonging took on urgency for both British officials and Omani intellectuals and migrants. This article examines how, in contrast to both anti-colonial nationalists and British colonial officials, homeland in Omani reli…
History (10 works) · Global Maritime and Colonial Histories (8 works) · Geography (7 works) · Political science (7 works) · Law (6 works) · History (5 works) · Middle East and Rwanda Conflicts (5 works) · Philosophy (5 works) · Archaeology (4 works) · Indian ocean (4 works)