Seyyed Jamal Vaez and the Aljamal newspaper in Iran

Abstract

It is usually the intellectuals who first become aware of or develop novel ideas and hence acquire a desire for social change. In order to transmit their new perceptions and desire for change to the masses, they develop a sense of mission to communicate their vision effectively to the public. To mount a social movement these change-oriented intellectuals must either adapt the existing media of public communication to their purpose or adopt suitable new ones. The aim of this article is to discuss the development of the media during the constitutional movement in Iran. Between 1905 and 1911 there was a series of protests against internal corruption, misgovernment and foreign influence, which led to the establishment of a constitutional system of government.1 Informing, agitating and guiding the public was an integral part of the movement. Contact with the West played an important part in the awakening of the constitutional leaders. The ideas of democracy and equality before the law had come from the West. After recognizing the need to arouse the people, some liberal intellectuals sought the assistance of the preachers who were trained to deliver homilies and sermons from the pulpit and in some cases were themselves liberal and pro-Western. Others tried the newspaper, a recent innovation that had come from the West. Our guiding hypothesis for the examination of both the Islamic pulpit and the newspapers during the constitutional movement in Iran is that during a social movement, the need for public communication increases. We intend to examine the adaptation that some intellectuals brought about in an existing medium of public communication, the Islamic pulpit, in response to this need. We want to know in what ways the pulpit changed as a communication medium during the constitutional movement, and how effectively it performed its function in informing, agitating and guiding the public. Further, we would like to investigate briefly the relationship between the pulpit and the new medium, the newspaper. Did the pulpit facilitate the emergence and the acceptance of the newspaper? To provide specific issues and concrete illustrations for our discussion, we concentrate on one well-known preacher of the constitutional period and a newspaper that emerged from his pronouncements from the pulpit.