Memories of Home and Stories of Displacement: The Women of Artas and the "Peasant Past"

This article deals with the memory narratives of women from the West Bank village of Artas who were displaced as a result of the 1967 war and are today living in working-class neighborhoods of eastern Amman. Imbued with nostalgia, their narratives extol the values that had governed life in the village before their dispersal, values that have proved to be important for survival in exile. The “peasant past” remembered by these women is examined in the dual context of the history of Artas and the migratory itineraries of the women, many of whom were displaced for a second time during the Gulf War of 1990–91.

FALESTIN NAILI is a social historian/anthropologist interested in Palestine’s Ottoman history, collective memory, intercultural encounters, and millenarist visions of and projects in Palestine.