The Monstrous Flesh: collective bodies and the State-Form in Modern Mesopotamia

Iman Ganji

doi:10.1590/2237-266085311

Abstract

Abstract: The Middle East is in chaos. Having been described as monstrous, the Islamic State (ISIL) has been defeated only to come back as a chronic guerrilla style insurgency and the shadow of further conflicts that are still looming in the region. The following article takes up this situation through the concept of the biopolitical monster as the common body of resistance and struggle, exploring the liberatory aspects of this concept in terms of organization and political autonomy, and argues that ISIL has more in common with the State-form than with the monstrous. Discussing the colonial and neo-colonial aspects of the situation, the case of Kurdish Northern Syria will be presented in contrast to the ISIL. It continues to argue for a social monstrous flesh as the performative body of contemporary protest movements, tracing back the rhizomatic etymologies of monster to Aristotle and early Islamic philosophers, drawing inspirations mainly from the tradition of immanent thought and its contemporary thinkers such as Foucault, Deleuze, Guattari, and Negri.

Highlights

An ancient-like barbarity; a monster of non-civilization: this is how the image of the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) has been formed through media reports
It is said that monsters come from hell, but one may still wonder about the nature of the monster and of the subject naming it
The monster could be a Leviathan, the one that announced, “everything under heaven belongs to me” (Job 41: 11), that declared the natural commons as its property, and that was summoned to fill the mythical foundations of the modern Nation-State and its era of public/private dichotomy

Summary

Form in Modern Mesopotamia

ABSTRACT – The Monstrous Flesh: collective bodies and the State-Form in Modern Mesopotamia – The Middle East is in chaos. The following article takes up this situation through the concept of the biopolitical monster as the common body of resistance and struggle, exploring the liberatory aspects of this concept in terms of organization and political autonomy, and argues that ISIL has more in common with the State-form than with the monstrous. Discussing the colonial and neo-colonial aspects of the situation, the case of Kurdish Northern Syria will be presented in contrast to the ISIL It continues to argue for a social monstrous flesh as the performative body of contemporary protest movements, tracing back the rhizomatic etymologies of monster to Aristotle and early Islamic philosophers, drawing inspirations mainly from the tradition of immanent thought and its contemporary thinkers such as Foucault, Deleuze, Guattari, and Negri.

Introduction

Natural Bodies versus Monstrous Bodies

The Case of the Islamic State

Rhizomatic Etymologies