Past Continuous: The Chronopolitics of Representation in Syrian Television Drama

Abstract

Syria serves as a leading producer of the musalsal [dramatic miniseries], a key Arabic-language mass cultural form. With its dark realism and biting humor, Syrian drama has become a primary mode of sociopolitical commentary for both producers and audiences, given the restrictions on journalistic and academic expression and the absence of participatory politics in most Arab polities. Drama creators deploy a range of temporal strategies to comment on social and political conditions. A reflexive, intertextual chronopolitics runs through serials produced before and during the Syrian conflict that began in 2011. The question ‘what went wrong?’ preoccupies musalsal makers, and their works frequently foreground their belief that Syrian society is ‘going backwards.’ For example, in historical genres of television serials, idealized images harken back to perceived golden ages of cosmopolitanism, throwing the contemporary condition into bitter relief. Makers of dramas set in the present invert this technique, locating the sources of contemporary ills in past mistakes and historical injustices, revealed in flashback, dialogue, and voiceover. Through a technique of narrative allochrony, drama creators also highlight their understanding of modernity’s lapses, depicting select practices, mores, and attitudes as out of sync with what they see as contemporary values. These dramatic depictions of the past and present all point to a failed national project and a derailed modernity. Their creators seek to counter what they deem as a flawed political and social evolution, one that they believe has led to deterioration in the region and a devastating war in Syria.