From Tobacco Revolt to Youth Rebellion

A Social History of the Cigarette in Iran

Bibliographic Data

ID9334426
AuthorsEsfandyar Batmanghelidj (corresponding author)
Year2014
Volume49
Issue1
Pages99-116
Publication date2014-11-05
Open AccessYes
TypeARTICLE
VenueIranian Studies (JOURNAL)
Journal identifiersISSN: 0021-0862 • E-ISSN: 1475-4819
PublisherCambridge University Press (CUP) (PUBLISHER)
DOI10.1080/00210862.2014.963995
OpenAlexW2056302155
LanguageEN
Citations received3
References cited31

Focusing on the cultural influence of the cigarette, this paper synthesizes a wide range of evidence to argue that the cigarette was a fundamental primer for Iran's encounter with modernity, especially as understood in the context of western influence. Applying the dramaturgical theories of sociologist Erving Goffman, it is argued that the cigarette is an instantiation of the “sign-equipment” of modernization used to refashion the identity and subjectivity of Iranian men and women. This refashioning has occurred in three distinct periods. In the first period (1860–1930), cigarette smoking was a habit adopted by the Persian elite in an attempt to mediate the encounter with European colonial figures. In the second period (1930–70), cigarettes were leveraged by Iranians who wished to be seen as upwardly mobile. In the final and contemporary period (1970–present), cigarettes have become ubiquitous among the adult population, but smoking itself has become the act of youth rebellion as experimentation occurs at increasingly young ages

Aesthetics · Art · Context (archaeology · Elite · Identity (music · Modernity · Modernization theory · Period (music · Political science · Politics · Population · Sociology · Subjectivity · Crime, Deviance, and Social Control · Demography · Gender Studies · History · Islamic Studies and History · Law · Philippine History and Culture