Hannah Waris ’20
Contributing Writer
Wendy Pearlman was captivated when she first heard about the protests raging across Syria during the 2011 Arab Spring.
The associate professor of political science at Northwestern University, who has been studying the Middle East for more than half her life, was initially surprised the protests had spread to Syria.
“I wanted to know how it happened, what it felt like,” Pearlman said, addressing the audience at a Tuesday lecture on her recently-published book, “We Crossed a Bridge and It Trembled: Voices from Syria.”
“I was convinced there was no better way to find out than to ask them [displaced Syrians] themselves,” Pearlman said.
Over the span of several years, as the conflict in Syria progressed, Pearlman interviewed over 300 displaced Syrians in Denmark, Germany, Jordan, Lebanon, Sweden, Turkey, the UAE and the U.S.
Initially, Pearlman was most interested in the specific moment of protest — what was it like for those who had experienced it? However, according to Pearlman, most interviewees felt incapable of explaining what the protests meant to them without sharing a wealth of context, talking Pearlman through both their personal and national histories leading up to the 2011 protests. “The moment of protest only made sense against the backdrop of history,” she said.
The stories that Pearlman’s interviewees told, she related to the audience, “began to coalesce into a collective narrative.”
Pearlman’s book, which was published this past June, is the culmination of her best efforts to express that collective narrative. The book — aside from a short introduction written by Pearlman herself — is told entirely through the voices of Syrian refugees.
Pearlman walked the audience through the five main threads that recurred in many of her interviewees’ stories and which her book is organized around.
The collective story of Pearlman’s book begins with the brutal history of Hafez al-Assad and Bashar al-Assad’s authoritarian regimes. For many of Pearlman’s interviewees, the 1982 Hama massacre, during which the Syrian government responded to an armed insurrection by the Muslim Brotherhood, killing tens of thousands of civilians, was one of the most salient memories of the al-Assad regimes. The event solidified the state’s authoritarian rule and spreading terror throughout the populace.
Eventually, the corruption and oppression by the Syrian government reached a breaking point decades later in 2011 when protests broke out among the people. “Revolution” represents the second thread outlined in Pearlman’s book. According to Pearlman, many of her interviewees said that the protests were so important because they finally “broke the barrier of fear,” as was a common Syrian expression, that had for so long prevented civilians from speaking out against the regime. “We entered a road with no return,” one interviewee said.
“War” represents the next stage of the Syrian story. As the regime responded to protests with widespread violence, more and more state and non-state parties became involved, and a “full-fledged, multi-sided war” emerged. Pearlman described the normalization of terror amongst the Syrian people, with interviewees explaining that even young children could distinguish between different types of missiles and bullets. War became “a part of the landscape,” Pearlman said. “It was ingrained into the rhythm of life.”
Widespread displacement and exile followed this phase of war. Millions of refugees, fleeing omnipresent violence and terror, scattered across the globe. According to the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees, there are currently more than 6.3 million Syrian refugees. Yet as Pearlman reminded the audience, there has been a dearth of empathy for Syrian refugees among Americans and others.
The last thread of Pearlman’s book relates her interviewees’ reflections on their uncertain futures. Not knowing when or if they will ever be able to return home has been a source of “existential instability” for many displaced Syrians.
At the close of her talk, Pearlman explained why she felt it was important to study Syrian testimonials. Pearlman explained that she intended for her book to be read by Americans, among whom she hopes to build understanding and empathy.
Because the facts of the war are constantly changing, Pearlman feels that one of the best ways to shape public opinion is to establish a foundation of empathy to guide people’s mindsets. There are no “easy solutions,” Pearlman admitted, “but in debating them, I hope we find solutions that are informed by empathy.”
‘The least we can do,” Pearlman said, quoting one of her interviewees, “is listen.”
