Abstract
People create narratives of their maritime past through the remembering and forgetting of seafaring experiences, and through the retention and disposal of maritime artefacts that function mnemonically to evoke or suppress those experiences. The sustenance and reproduction of the resulting narratives depends further on effective media of intergenerational transmission; otherwise, they are lost. Rapid socio-economic transformation across Saudi Arabia in the age of oil has disrupted longstanding seafaring economies in the Red Sea archipelago of the Farasan Islands, and the nearby mainland port of Jizan. Vestiges of wooden boatbuilding activity are few; long-distance dhow trade with South Asia, the Arabian-Persian Gulf and East Africa has ceased; and a once substantial pearling and nacre (mother of pearl) collection industry has dwindled to a tiny group of hobbyists: no youth dive today. This widespread withdrawal from seafaring activity among many people in these formerly maritime-oriented communities has diminished the salience of such activity in cultural memory, and has set in motion narrative creation processes, through which memories are filtered and selected, and objects preserved, discarded, or lost. This paper is a product of the encounter of the authors with keepers of maritime memories and objects in the Farasan Islands and Jizan. An older generation of men recall memories of their experiences as boat builders, captains, seafarers, pearl divers and fishermen. Their recounted memories are inscribed, and Arabic seafaring terms recorded. The extent of the retention of maritime material cultural items as memorials is also assessed, and the role of individual, communal and state actors in that retention is considered. Through this reflection, it becomes clear that the extra-biological memory and archive of the region’s maritime past is sparse; that intergenerational transmission is failing; that the participation of state agencies in maritime heritage creation is highly limited; and that, as a result, memories current among the older generation have limited prospect of survival. These memories, recorded and interpreted here, identify the Farasan Islands as a former centre of the pearling industry in the Red Sea, and identify them and Jizan as open to far-reaching maritime-mediated cultural influences in an era before the imposition of the attributes of the modern nation-state.
Highlights
J Mari Arch (2016) 11:127–177 of state agencies in maritime heritage creation is highly limited; and that, as a result, memories current among the older generation have limited prospect of survival
It has facilitated the MARES Project research activity reported here, and other, maritime archaeological activity around the islands, but these have yet to find an outlet into public heritage activities
On the Farasan archipelago itself, informal activities continue to recall the past: a small number of individuals still pearl dive on a small scale and with marginal economic objective; the local boys’ primary school has assembled its own museum containing maritime artefacts; and several private individuals maintain collections of material culture related to the maritime past
Summary
“[W]e do not remember the past,” cautions the intellectual historian Allan Megill (2007: 54), “We ‘remember’ what remains living within our situations now.” For the communities of Saudi Arabia’s Farasan Islands ( )جزر فرسانin the southern Red Sea and in the nearby mainland port-city of Jizan ()جيزان, “what remains” is in a process of rapid diminution. On the Farasan archipelago itself, informal activities continue to recall the past: a small number of individuals still pearl dive on a small scale and with marginal economic objective; the local boys’ primary school has assembled its own museum containing maritime artefacts; and several private individuals maintain collections of material culture related to the maritime past It is in their active choices, entailing forgetting and remembering, disposing of and retaining, that intangible and material culture is—or is not—making the transition from what Aleida Assmann (2010: 335) calls its “original ‘place in life’” into the sphere of communal and familial recollection and retention, and into the realm of what might be called heritage. The present research was conducted at the port town of Jizan, capital of Jazan province, and on the three inhabited islands of the Farasan archipelago—Greater Farasan, Segid ()سقيد
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