LITERATURE AND NATION IN THE MIDDLE EAST

arabic poetry, nationalism and social changeSecond, as an esteemed verbal medium, poetry was well-equipped to ennoblethe nation through creative use of language and imagery. Poems could evokeideals such as cultural pride and heroism, and thereby give the abstract conceptof the nation a glorified, imaginative substance.Third, and in the colonial context, poetry could be a useful tool in anticolonial,nationalist activity. By relying on metaphor, allusion and symbolism,poetry could be politically charged and possibly escape government censors in away that the prose essay, with its more forthright language, could not.Fourth and finally, as a respected art form that had strong ties to culturaltradition, poetry could make social change seem more palatable, or lessominous. Poets had the authority and prestige to call for new developments,such as railway travel and girls’ schools, that would transform social practicesand lifestyles. By welcoming and guiding change in the early twentieth century,poets showed a faith in constructive social reform and progress that was asimportant to Asian and African nationalisms as the goal of political liberation.The following pages elaborate and illustrate these ideas about poetry,nationalism and social change, by focusing on the history and development ofArabic culture in the Northern Sudan. 1 Starting with the assumption thatpoetry played pivotal roles in Sudanese culture, and that its history can thereforereflect wider social and political trends, this essay assesses the influence ofpoetry on incipient Sudanese nationalism in the early twentieth century, as wellas its continuing relevance in the decades that followed.In certain general respects, Sudanese Arabic culture before the twentiethcentury resembled its counterparts in other low-literacy societies: traditions oforal poetry thrived in both rural and urban settings, while writing had limiteduses and audiences. Yet within its own setting, Sudanese Arabic had evolvedover several centuries in response to local conditions. Some basic points aboutSudanese history can help to explain the distinctive features of its Arabic cultureand its position in the region.Arabic and Islam first came to the Sudan together, in the early Islamic era,through waves of Arabian nomadic migration (Hasan 1967). In the riverainNorth (roughly, from the border with Egypt to the Gezira region south of theNile junction), Arabic and Islam spread slowly among indigenous peoples,partially supplanting Nubian languages, and displacing Christianity and localreligions (Adams 1977). Around 1500, the region’s first Islamic state took root,with the founding of the Funj sultanate at Sennar on the Blue Nile. By thistime, too, itinerant Sufis had begun to convert more widely, from the Red Seainland to Darfur and beyond (O’Fahey and Spaulding 1974, McHugh 1994).Soon Islamic culture spread farther than Arabic culture; that is, people embracedIslam and became acculturated to Muslim practices without becoming Arabised.Three hundred years had passed after the founding of the Funj sultanate— 163 —www.taq.ir