Assignment 5 | 32102 | North Africa & Southwest Asia |

Power & Politics

Instructions: Follow along with the worksheet, reading carefully. Fill in your answers with
bolded, colored, or highlighted text under the questions. Save the file as
“LastnameFirstInitial_ActivityX” and upload to Canvas. [example, FrazierE_Activity1].
This activity consists of before, in- and out-of-class portions to be completed before submitting.
These sections are marked according to color below. Please complete the before class material at
the beginning of the week, making sure to check the whole document for before class content.
This week’s module focuses on the region North Africa & Southwest Asia. We will be exploring
the theme Power & Politics through a focus on the Arab Spring uprising.
Remember, please mark your answers with highlighted, underlined, or colored text.

I. Introduction
This week’s module focuses on two regions: South Asia (SA) and the region sometimes called
“the Middle East,” the “Arab world” or the “Islamic World”. In this class, we will refer to this
region instead as North Africa & Southwest Asia (NASWA).
A NOTE ON TERMS: We choose to refer to this region by this term (NASWA) for several
reasons:
1. Not “the Middle East”: The term, “the Middle East” is commonly used in the media today to
refer to this region of North Africa & Southwest Asia. However, this is not a very useful term
from a geographic perspective, for example: the middle of where? East of where?
During the period of European colonialism, Western scholars, mapmakers and governments
referred to the rest of the world in relation to their own position on the globe. Whole regions
were labeled based on this European standpoint/perspective. For example, the area now known
as Turkey was called the “Near East”, whereas Southwest Asia received the name, “the Middle
East”, and much of what is now China, India, and the many countries of Southeast Asia was
known simply as “the Far East”.
The terms “near,” “middle” and “far” were referencing those places’ location relative to Europe
and the distance that one would need to travel from Europe to get to those places. Likewise, the
“east” part of these terms referenced the fact that the primary route from Europe to these places
was to travel to the East.
This type of labeling and thinking about the world can be understood as a form of
Eurocentrism, defined as a way of seeing the world that is focused on / privileges Europe’s
location and/or European culture as more central, important or in some cases, superior to the
people and cultures of other places.
2. Not “the Islamic World”: There are many countries in the NASWA region with large
populations of individuals who practice Islam. However, the biggest (largest populations)
concentrations of Muslims in the world are actually not found in NASWA at all. Muslims live in
countries all across the world, and there are countries with many Muslim citizens across regions
from Europe, to Africa, and in many Asian countries. Moreover, there are many Yazidi,
Christian, Jewish, and non-religious populations that live throughout this region. Thus, it’s not
really accurate or helpful to portray this region as “the Islamic World.”
3. Not “the Arab World”: We’ll talk more about this in future weeks, but the term “Arab” is a
word that refers both to an ethnicity and a language group. While there are many Arabs
throughout the region of NASWA, there are also many other ethnicities in large numbers (such
as Persian or Jewish people, for example).
From a geographic perspective, we recognize that the terms “Middle East” or “Far East” aren’t
very precise or helpful in describing the boundaries of a region. Instead, we typically will use
cardinal directions (North, South, East, West) and the names of the Continents (America, Asia,
Africa, etc.) to describe what region we are discussing. Likewise, to describe an entire region
based on a religious identity (“the Islamic/Muslim world”) or an ethnic group (“the Arab world”)
leaves out many other groups and cultures in that region. For all these reasons, we’ll call this
region “North Africa & Southwest Asia”.

II. North Africa & Southwest Asia | Theme: Power & Politics
Part 1. Understanding the Arab Spring
To understand the human and political geographies of North Africa and Southwest Asia today,
we need to understand a movement known as the Arab Spring. This term refers to a series of
protests that took place across many countries of this region, starting in 2010/2011.
First, watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Fgcd5ZcxDys&t=4s
1.a. What event sparked the Arab Spring? Why did this happen? What country did these
protests start in?
1.b. Why are these protests known as the Arab “Spring”? What are some of the reasons
why protests gained so much traction?
1.c. How did the internet and social media play a role in the Arab Spring?
1.d. Based on the video, how do you evaluate the outcomes of the Arab Spring? Did the
original protests trigger the kind of changes people were hoping to see? What are some of
the effects of the Arab Spring?
Part 2. Understanding Syria
One of the major conflicts started during the Arab Spring was the Syrian Civil war. Instead of
toppling the government, protests in Syria devolved into a bloody civil war that is still ongoing,
nearly a decade later.
Watch this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K5H5w3_QTG0
2.a. The government’s response to demonstrations in Syria was violent a repressive, triggering an
armed uprising from various rebel groups. There are many causes to this conflict – we will
break them down. Who are the Alawites?
2.b. In the conflict, there have been many different rebel groups. In 2013 (when this video was
made), the US and Europe were still hesitant to engage in the Syrian conflict. Why?
2.c. Now in 2020, the Syrian Civil war is still ongoing, President Bashar Al Assad is still in
power, and multiple groups are still fighting for control of territories in Syria.
Read this article: https://www.aljazeera.com/news/2018/04/14/why-is-bashar-al-assad-still-in-
power/
What are the main reasons, according to the article, that Assad has lasted so long?
Part 3. The Arab Spring… Again?
After the original protests toppled governments, died out, or sparked wars in countries across the
region, many observers began to think that the Arab Spring (with the exception of Syria) had run
its course. However, new protests in Lebanon and elsewhere have led analysts to question – is
the Arab Spring over?
We will watch this short video together in class, and then answer the following questions:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Lva6rOnpcr0&feature=youtu.be
3.a. What do you think? Is the Arab Spring over?
3.b. Why are these protests going on? What does the region need, according to the video?