Dr. Mara Albrecht

seit Oktober 2014
Post-Doc-Projekt: “The SpaceTime of Urban Violence in the British Empire – The Riots in Belfast and Jerusalem”

Oktober 2014 – September 2022
Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin, Universität Erfurt

Oktober 2021 – März 2022
Forschungsstipendiatin an der Kolleg-Forschungsgruppe: “Religion and Urbanity: Reciprocal Formations” (FOR 2779), Max-Weber-Kolleg für kultur- und sozialwissenschaftliche Studien

April 2019 – März 2020
Stellvertretende Direktorin am Orient-Institut Beirut, Libanon 

2014
Promotion im Fach Geschichte, Westasiatische Geschichte: „Krieg der Symbole: Politische Parteien im Libanon (1975-2013)", Universität Erfurt
Betreuung: Prof. Dr. Birgit Schäbler

Oktober 2007 – Januar 2013
Wissenschaftliche Mitarbeiterin, Universität Erfurt

1999 – 2007
Magister in Nahostgeschichte und Politische Wissenschaften, Universität Hamburg 

The SpaceTime of Urban Violence in the British Empire – The Riots in Belfast and Jerusalem

Both Belfast and Jerusalem have the image of being cities of violence, contested by two groups that compete for political and spatial hegemony. Both cities are also characterized as divided, both on a material and a symbolic level. The roots of this division can be traced back to the era of the British Empire, especially to the riots in Belfast from the mid-19th to the early 20th century and the uprisings in Jerusalem during the British Mandate of Palestine. Both cities can be seen as a microcosm of a wider conflict about national identity and political supremacy, drawing elements of ethnic and nationalist strife into a confined urban space. While the interconnectedness of space and violence has been the focus of many studies of divided cities, this paper aims to introduce a spatio-temporal perspective on urban violence. Based on detailed royal commission reports that investigated the riots in both cities, the paper argues that the specific spatial configurations as well as the particular urban rhythms produced and shaped the practices of violence in both cities while the violence reproduced and reshaped the urban space and time. One focus is set on the impact of the rhythms of the urban (daily work cycles, weekly rhythms of prayer, annual commemorations and religious celebrations) on the pacing of communal violence, both in some cases becoming synchronized. The other focal point of the paper is the effect of the riots on urban space and time, constituting Belfast and Jerusalem as divided and anchored in time to these formative periods of violence. The spatio-temporal practices of violence permanently changed the urban space and time by imbuing particular places, dates, and time periods with symbolic meaning and by overlapping space and time with collective memories of violence.

• Nahostgeschichte
• Zeitgeschichte
• Gewaltforschung
• Raumforschung

Monografien
Krieg der Symbole. Politische Parteien und Parteikultur im Libanon (1975-2015), Münster: LIT Verlag, 2017 (Studien zur Geschichte und Zeitgeschichte Westasiens und Nordafrikas 1).

Artikel
Clash of Memories: Commemorating the Civil War in Lebanon. In: Public History Weekly 8 (2020) 6, DOI: dx.doi.org/10.1515/phw-2020-16551.

Akar, Bassel/Albrecht, Mara: Influences of nationalisms on citizenship education: revealing a 'dark side' in Lebanon, in: Nations and Nationalisms 23 (3), 2017, pp. 547-570.

Albrecht, Mara/Akar, Bassel: The Power of Remembrance: Political Parties, Memory and Learning about the Past in Lebanon, Zouk Mosbeh: Center for Applied Research in Education at Notre Dame University - Louaize and forum ZFD, 2016.

Einsatz im Nahen Osten: Die UNIFIL und die Maritime Task Force im Libanon, in: Gießmann, Hans-Joachim / Wagner, Armin (Hrsg.): Armee im Einsatz. Grundlagen, Strategien und Ergebnisse einer Beteiligung der Bundeswehr, Baden-Baden: Nomos, 2009, S. 361-371.

Libanon, in: Arbeitsgemeinschaft Kriegsursachenforschung (AKUF) / Schreiber, Wolfgang (Hrsg.): Das Kriegsgeschehen 2006. Daten und Tendenzen der Kriege und bewaffneten Konflikte, Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag, 2008, S. 161-169.

Libanon (Südlibanon), Arbeitsgemeinschaft Kriegsursachenforschung (AKUF) / Schreiber, Wolfgang (Hrsg.): Das Kriegsgeschehen 2005. Daten und Tendenzen der Kriege und bewaffneten Konflikte, Wiesbaden: VS-Verlag 2006, S. 148-153.