From Contexts, Charles Kurzman, Dalia F. Fahmy, Justin Gengler, Ryan Calder and Sarah Leah Whitson examine different aspects of the Arab Spring revolts. Western misconstructions of the Tunisian Revolution: Why was the 2011 Tunisian revolution perceived in France as a rerun of 1789, and why did Tunisian revolutionaries identify with an "Arab Spring" couched in terms of the European revolutions of 1848? Historian Guillaume Mazeau parses these mirrored constructs and how we view and skew revolutionary temporalities. Running from the Arab Spring: Syria isn't the only place with a refugee problem. Were the demonstrations in Egypt the largest mass protest in human history? An open letter by the Egyptian activist collective “Comrades from Cairo”: From Taksim to Tahrir, from Bulgaria to Brazil, we fight the same struggle against oppressive state structures that benefit only a tiny wealthy elite. Martina Sabra interviews Amel Grami: “The Arab revolutions have triggered a male identity crisis”. Shibley Telhami on his book The World Through Arab Eyes: Arab Public Opinion and the Reshaping of the Middle East. Molly Patterson reviews Is There a Middle East? The Evolution of a Geopolitical Concept. What is "Arabic" today, and is it really even a single thing?
