The landscapes, cultures, and cuisines of deserts
in the Middle East and North America have commonalities that have
seldom been explored by scientists — and have hardly been
celebrated by society at large. Sonoran Desert ecologist Gary Nabhan
grew up around Arab grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins in a
family that has been emigrating to the United States and Mexico from
Lebanon for more than a century, and he himself frequently travels to
the deserts of the Middle East.
In an era when some Arabs and Americans have markedly distanced
themselves from one another, Nabhan has been prompted to explore their
common ground, historically, ecologically, linguistically, and
gastronomically. Arab/American
is not merely an exploration of his own multicultural roots but also a
revelation of the deep cultural linkages between the inhabitants of two
of the world’s great desert regions.
Here, in beautifully crafted essays, Nabhan explores how these
seemingly disparate cultures are bound to each other in ways we would
never imagine. With an extraordinary ear for language and a truly
adventurous palate, Nabhan uncovers surprising convergences between the
landscape ecology, ethnogeography, agriculture, and cuisines of the
Middle East and the binational Desert Southwest. There are the words
and expressions that have moved slowly westward from Syria to Spain and
to the New World to become incorporated—faintly but
recognizably—into the language of the people of the
U.S.–Mexico borderlands. And there are the
flavors—piquant mixtures of herbs and spices—that
have crept silently across the globe and into our kitchens without our
knowing where they came from or how they got here. And there is much,
much more. We also learn of others whose work historically spanned
these deserts, from Hadji Ali (“Hi Jolly”), the
first Moslem Arab to bring camels to America, to Robert Forbes, an
Arizonan who explored the desert oases of the Sahara. These men crossed
not only oceans but political and cultural barriers as well. We are, we
recognize, builders of walls and borders, but with all the talk of
“homeland” today, Nabhan reminds us that, quite
often, borders are simply lines drawn in the sand.
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Arab/American
Landscape, Culture, and
Cuisine in Two Great Deserts
by Gary Paul Nabhan
University of Arizona Pres,
2008
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a copy
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