Performing masculinity during mandate Lebanon in Marie al-Khazen’s photographs

Abstract

Marie al-Khazen (1899-1983) is an amateur photographer who took most of her photographs in the 1920s and 1930s in and around Zgharta, a village in the North of Lebanon. In this paper, I will analyze how gender — a category used to express differences between male and female individuals depending on a combination of naturally endowed and chosen attributes, abilities, appearances, and expressive codes —is represented socially and culturally in a number of her photographs through complex conventions and significations. How and in what way men inhabit al-Khazen’s photographs is the focus of this paper. These photographs were produced during a period that is often characterized as predominantly patriarchal. In most of the photographs selected for this paper, I will argue that, al-Khazen reflects this predominantly patriarchal ideology and will show how most of al-Khazen’s photographs prescribe to meanings of masculinity as heroic.

While analyzing the photographs, I consider the following question: How do representations of masculinity differ from representations of femininity in al Khazen’s photographs? Her position being behind the camera puts her in control of the image provided to us today. In other words, she is not a neutral mediator, but, rather, manifests control through her choice of the subject matter, the moments that she wanted to be salient in her life, the light and shadow, the objects in the foreground and background setting, the subjects’ positions within the space of the photograph and the ways in which these subjects perform their social relations to each other within a group. How do al-Khazen’s photographic decisions shape our understanding of gender relations in her photographs?

I will examine the ways photographs disseminate ideas and meanings by generating discursive notions on gender. Gender is explored as a category used to express differences between male and female individuals depending on a combination of naturally endowed and chosen attributes and appearances. The paper offers a scrutinized study of the photographs and the different ways manhood or rujuliyya, particularly in the rural areas in Lebanon, was culturally represented through an amplified masculinity. From having a moustache, smoking a cigarette, sporting tarabish to holding rifles, a plethora of props and accoutrement appeared in the photos to denote signs of virility.