It has become something of a cliché to say that social media is making us tribal. But what do self-styled tribespeople themselves think about social media, and how might they help us better understand the role of the internet in our current political moment? Drawing on in-depth ethnographic fieldwork among Jordan’s Bedouin, this talk will explore the varied but broadly intelligible ways in which Bedouin have domesticated social media to suit their needs.
Focusing on key concepts in Bedouin life (including tribalism, envy, and mercy), Hughes tries to move beyond deterministic models of technologies like social media to emphasise how social media reflects cultural values as well as preexisting political and legal frameworks. In particular, the talk will argue that social media is best understood as part and parcel of a global renegotiation of the state-society divide that both preceded the emergence of social media platforms and, in turn, feeds off of it. In this telling, the internet represents a new frontier that, like older frontiers, heralds both novel freedoms and novel forms of social control. Far from being a passive recipient of technologies from elsewhere, Hughes suggests that Jordan and the broader Middle East represent exciting sites of technological innovation.
Speaker: Dr Geoffrey Hughes
Geoffrey Hughes is a Senior Lecturer in Anthropology at the University of Exeter. His work is primarily concerned with how people in Jordan and the wider Middle East have engaged with various technologies for large-scale population management. His first book, Kinship Islam and the Politics of Marriage in Jordan, was based on 16 months of fieldwork in a mixed Palestinian-Jordanian village and involved fieldwork at the local Sharia Courts, Jordan’s Housing and Urban Development Corporation, and an Islamic Charity called The Chastity Society known both for its mass weddings and its publications about what it terms the country’s “marriage crisis.” His forthcoming book is entitled Social Media Tribes: Jordan’s Bedouin and the Margins of the State. Before becoming an anthropologist, he taught English for two years as a Peace Corps volunteer in a primary school in Jordan’s southern desert.
Date: Wednesday, 15 July 2026
Time: Amman 6 pm, London 4 pm
Location: CBRL Amman Institute and Online (Zoom)
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Registration:
- Click here to attend in person at the CBRL Amman Institute.
- Click here to attend online via Zoom.
