The Arab World

An insider's antidote to Orientalist fantasy, written by scholars who lived the reality. Elizabeth Warnock Fernea and Robert A. Fernea's 1987 Anchor Books paperback emerged from decades of anthropological fieldwork across the Middle East, offering American readers a corrective to media stereotypes just as the Iran hostage crisis and Lebanese civil war dominated headlines.

The Ferneas, who raised their children in Iraq and Egypt, present the Arab world's stunning diversity - from Moroccan souks to Gulf oil states, from Egyptian villages to Palestinian camps - through both scholarly analysis and personal narrative. Elizabeth's pioneering work on Middle Eastern women and Robert's studies of social change inform every page. The book tackles Islam, politics, modernization, and women's roles with nuance rare in Western discourse about the region.

Published during Reagan-era tensions that would escalate into Gulf Wars, this Anchor edition captured a moment when informed American voices tried to complicate the emerging "clash of civilizations" narrative. Essential for understanding a region perpetually filtered through Western anxieties rather than its own realities.