Gene 592 (2016) 239–243Contents lists available at Science

Gene 592 (2016) 239–243
Contents lists available at ScienceDirect
Gene
journal homepage: www.elsevier.com/locate/gene
Review
The Arab genome: Health and wealth
Hatem Zayed
College of Health and Sciences, Biomedical Sciences
Department, Qatar University, PO Box 2713, Doha, Qatar
E-mail address: [email protected]
http://dx.doi.org/10.1016/j.gene.2016.07.007
0378-1119/© 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.
a b s t r a c t
a r t i c l e i n f o
Article history:
Received 21 June 2016
Accepted 3 July 2016
Available online 5 July 2016
The 22 Arab nations have a unique genetic structure, which
reflects both conserved and diverse gene pools due to
the prevalent endogamous and consanguineous marriage culture
and the long history of admixture among dif-
ferent ethnic subcultures descended from the Asian, European,
and African continents. Human genome sequenc-
ing has enabled large-scale genomic studies of different
populations and has become a powerful tool for studying
disease predictions and diagnosis. Despite the importance of the
Arab genome for better understanding the dy-

namics of the human genome, discovering rare genetic
variations, and studying early human migration out of
Africa, it is poorly represented in human genome databases,
such as HapMap and the 1000 Genomes Project.
In this review, I demonstrate the significance of sequencing the
Arab genome and setting an Arab genome
reference(s) for better understanding the molecular pathogenesis
of genetic diseases, discovering novel/rare var-
iants, and identifying a meaningful genotype-phenotype
correlation for complex diseases.
© 2016 Published by Elsevier B.V.
Keywords:
Arab countries
Human genome sequencing
Whole exome sequencing
Consanguinity
Endogamous marriage
Novel genes
Novel variants
Contents
1. Introduction . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 239
2. The Arab world. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
2.1. Inbred Arab communities and rare variants discovery . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 240
3. The Arab genome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
3.1. Discovery of novel disease-causing genes and the Arab
genome . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
3.2. Arab efforts in genome sequencing . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 241
3.3. The Arab genome and the “Out of Africa” theory . . . . . . . .

. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
3.4. Benefits of sequencing the Arab genome . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
4. Conclusion . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
Disclosure declaration . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
References . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 242
1. Introduction
The completion of the Human Genome Project (HGP) in April
2003
provided a wealth of information to scientists and clinicians.
Subse-
quently, the world has witnessed rapid evolution in the field of
human genetics and genomics (Lander et al., 2001; Venter et
al.,
2001). Initially, the focus of the HGP was to catalog the
protein-
expressing genes, which are now estimated to include
approximately
20,000 to 25,000 coding genes (International Human Genome
Sequencing Consortium, 2004). However, the hard work of
decoding
the function of many genes and their precise genotype-
phenotype cor-
relation in disease development remains.
From the publication of the first draft of the human genome,
there
has been fierce competition to develop sequencing technologies
that
are faster, more efficient and cheaper and to make the price of
human

genome sequencing more affordable. Thus far, whole
genome/exome
sequencing has provided outstanding insights into the frequency
and
incidence of novel variants in the human genome that are
associated
with disease phenotypes. This information provides
opportunities to
different populations in the world to be able to map the
sequence vari-
ants that might be unique to their own individuals and that
might be re-
sponsible for genetic disorders in their specific populations. For
this
purpose, the HapMap (human haplotype mapping) Project was
240 H. Zayed / Gene 592 (2016) 239–243
launched in 2002 (International HapMap Consortium, 2003);
this pro-
ject has identified a considerable number of genetic variants,
providing
extensive catalogs for genetic variation. The HapMap Project
has also
served as the basis for genome-wide association studies
(GWAS). In
particular, the HapMap Project has contributed to the successful
map-
ping of more than 100 genomic regions that are associated with
genetic
diseases (International HapMap Consortium, 2003).
As an extension of the HapMap Project, the 1000 Genomes
Project
was launched in 2008 through international concerted efforts

(Buchanan et al., 2012). This project aims to sequence the
whole ge-
nomes of 1000 unidentified individuals from Europe, America,
Africa,
and Asia, and will add information to the single-nucleotide
polymor-
phism (SNP) database already cataloged by the HapMap Project
and
provide a rich resource for both SNPs and structural variant
haplotypes.
Although this information will allow researchers to learn more
about
many genetic variants and genetic diseases, unfortunately, the
Arab ge-
nome is greatly under-represented in the international efforts of
such
genomic studies; specifically, it is not included in the HGP,
HapMap Pro-
ject, or 1000 Genomes Project. There is no doubt that the
importance of
the Arab genome sequencing is significant and that this genome
thus
should not be omitted from the diverse collections of genomes
that
have already been sequenced. Therefore, I am focusing this
review on
elaborating upon the importance of the Arab genome and the
potential
contribution of the Arab genome to the genomic sciences.
2. The Arab world
The Arab world includes 22 Arabic-speaking countries (Fig. 1).
Ac-
cording to the World Bank latest classification for 2015
(http://data.

worldbank.org), the Arab countries include high-income
countries
(HICs) such as Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Saudi Arabia, Qatar,
and the
United Arab Emirates; middle-income countries (MICs) such as
Algeria, Egypt, Iraq, Jordan, Lebanon, Libya, Morocco,
Palestine, Sudan,
Syria, and Tunisia; and low-income countries (LICs) such as
Comoros,
Djibouti, Mauritania, Somalia, and Yemen. These countries
occupy a
Fig. 1. Arabic speaking countries accordi
(Source: http://www.arabic-keyboard.o
large area that extends from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to
the Arabi-
an Sea in the east, and the Arab population is approaching 0.5
billion.
This region has been extensively exposed to many successive
invaders
from Turkey, Rome, and Europe as well as to traders and
immigrants,
thus contributing to mixing of the ethnic demographics of the
popula-
tion. However, the HICs, which include countries with the
highest
Gross Domestic Product (GDP) per capita worldwide
(http://data.
worldbank.org), spend less than 0.2% of their GDP on scientific
develop-
ment (Giles, 2006). This phenomenon has led to the
immigration of
many Arab scientists into the West to look for better
opportunities.
However, recently, biomedical disease-based research has
received spe-
cial attention from Arab governments, with the aim of

improving the
understanding and treatment of common diseases afflicting the
Arab
population. Various attempts have been made by Saudi Arabia
and
Qatar in particular to establish a research infrastructure, but the
prog-
ress has been significantly slow relative to the amount of capital
infused
into such programs, and the benefits of such investments might
take
significant time to yield results. In this manuscript I will refer
to the
“Arab genome” as the genome of the 22 Arab countries.
2.1. Inbred Arab communities and rare variants discovery
There are 955 genetic diseases that have been identified in
Arabs, of
which 586 (60%) are reported to be recessive diseases
(http://www.
cags.org.ae). Arabs have one of the highest rates of
consanguineous
marriage worldwide, reaching up to ~70%, with an extreme
prevalence
of first-cousin marriage (Tadmouri et al., 2009), These factors,
together
with the endogamous marriage culture and large family sizes,
are re-
sponsible for the spread of genetic diseases in Arab countries,
with a
high prevalence of rare diseases (Teebi and Teebi, 2005).
Endogamous
marriages approach 100% in many Arab countries, and
especially the
Gulf States (i.e., Bahrain, Kuwait, Oman, Qatar, Saudi Arabia

and the
United Arab Emirates). For example, women in Saudi Arabia
are
prohibited from marrying men other than Arab men from the
Gulf
countries without special dispensation from the king
(http://web.
ng to the latest WHO classification.
rg/arabic).
241H. Zayed / Gene 592 (2016) 239–243
archive.org/web/20120614045804/http://travel.state.gov/travel/c
is_
pa_tw/tw/tw_931.html), and men must acquire a government
permit
to marry a foreign woman. This law is applicable to the six Gulf
States
and is due to deeply entrenched, centuries-old traditions that
strongly
favor marriage within the same Arab subcultures. In addition,
this mar-
riage culture is still on the rise; for example, consanguineous
marriage
rates in Qatar increased from 41.8% to 54.5% in just one
generation
(Bener and Alali, 2006).
Although a large number of rare variants still have unknown
clinical
significance because of the limitations of current technologies,
which
can be attributed to the need of large number of individuals
harboring
these variants that are largely untested by high-density SNP

arrays.
Therefore, studying inbred communities such as Arab
communities is
an ideal scenario to understand the effect of genetic variants on
the
human genome. In this regard, genetic analysis of the Arab
genome is
considered to be a goldmine for genomic scientists who are
looking
for a more discernible correlation between the genotype and the
pheno-
type of genetic diseases, and particularly complex disorders and
rare ge-
netic disorders. The inbreeding nature of many Arab
communities and
the commonness of the conservative marriage culture might
predict a
wide class of complex disorders, especially if the causative
variants are
rare and the most identified genetic variants causing the
complex dis-
eases in humans are partially recessive (Bittles and Black, 2010;
Rudan
et al., 2003). In this regard, Arabs represent an ideal population
for bet-
ter understanding the pathogenesis and prognosis of recessive
diseases,
which are yet to be elucidated. Although the consanguineous,
endoga-
mous Arab culture seems to predict a conserved pool of genes
among
Arabs, the structure of the Arab genome became diversified
over time,
mainly due to admixing of the genome with those of different
ethnic
groups descended from Africa, Asia, and Europe (Teebi and

Teebi,
2005), which provide another opportunity for understanding the
dy-
namic of the Arab genome and the “out of Africa” migration
theory.
3. The Arab genome
Although the Arab region is considered to be a hot spot for
medical
and clinical genetic studies, (Nat. Genet., 2006) Arabs have
been slow
to explore their own genome. This reticence might be due to the
follow-
ing reasons: (1) in most Arab countries, it is not yet affordable
to se-
quence a genome, even for clinical diagnostic reasons, despite
the
continual diminishing costs of next-generation sequencing
technolo-
gies; (2) research is not considered to be a necessity in most
Arab coun-
tries, mainly due to economic reasons; and (3) there is a dearth
of well-
trained scientists in genomics. As a consequence, there is a lack
of infor-
mation related to molecular pathogenesis and poor knowledge of
both
the genotype-phenotype correlation of genetic diseases and the
gene
variants that are responsible for the spread of these diseases that
are
segregating in the Arab genome. This is the case even for the
most dev-
astating diseases, such as diabetes and cardiovascular disorders,
which

compromises the level of the health care provided to the Arab
popula-
tion. Therefore, Arab governments must prioritize seeking the
means
to understand the complexity and dynamics of the Arab genome,
espe-
cially in countries that are able to afford the costs of genome
sequencing.
Consistent with this concept, a genomic revolution has been
ignited in
the Arabian Peninsula, especially in the Gulf States of Saudi
Arabia,
Kuwait, and Qatar, as the US Encyclopedia of DNA Elements
(ENCODE)
project and the Arab genome initiatives, represented by the
Saudi
Human Genome Project (SHGP) (http://shgp.kacst.edu.sa/site),
the
Qatar Genome Project (QGP) (Al-Mulla, 2014), and the Kuwaiti
Genome
Project (KGP) (Thareja et al., 2015), aim to systematically and
compre-
hensively analyze and catalog the genetic variants and
haplotypes that
are associated with health and disease. These efforts are
expected to
help in the identification of novel disease associated gene
variants.
The initiatives also aim to derive reference genome(s) sequence
for dif-
ferent subpopulations of different ancestries in Kuwait.
Although Arab
scientists are a decade late in sequencing the Arab genome, this
sequencing is expected to contribute to knowledge related to
migration
genome ancestry, genome evolution, genome dynamics,

mapping of
rare disease-associated variants, and novel disease associated
gene
discovery.
3.1. Discovery of novel disease-causing genes and the Arab
genome
Inbreeding is associated with an increased disease risk based on
in-
creased homozygosity at many genetic loci (Rudan et al., 2003)
and
leads to a high probability of shared ancestry between randomly
select-
ed Arab individuals and longer runs of homozygosity, this is an
ideal
way to map rare disease susceptibility loci among highly
consanguine-
ous families in inbred Arab communities. A representative
example
was provided by Verge et al. (1998), who analyzed an inbred
Bedouin
Arab community who has a long history of first-cousin
marriage, they
analyzed a large Arab family of 248 individuals living in Israel
that had
19 relatives affected with type 1 diabetes who carried rare
predisposing
haplotypes to type 1 diabetes that were not found in other
families. In-
terestingly, the researchers discovered a novel susceptibility
locus
(IDDM17; MIM#603266) for type 1 diabetes, which was
mapped to
chromosome 10 (10q25.1). Another example is the
identification of a

novel locus that was defined by the TMEM107 mutation through
se-
quencing 25 families with the rare, ciliopathic Meckel-Gruber
syndrome
(Shaheen et al., 2015), and another study that successfully led
to the
discovery of six novel candidate genes which found to be
associated
with embryonic lethality in Saudi Arabian consanguineous
families
(Shamseldin et al., 2015).
The whole exome sequencing (WES) was also successful to
reveal a long list of novel candidate genes among
consanguineous
Arab families, including, but not limited to, identifying 69
genes
which are linked to recessive diseases in 143 multiplex Saudi
fami-
lies, which was not previously associated with genetic diseases
(Alazami et al., 2015). Diagnostic WES has also been able to
identify
several novel disease-associated genes among 149 probands that
be-
long to highly consanguineous population in Qatar, with various
Mendelian phenotypes but mainly neurocognitive (Yavarna et
al.,
2015). In a study of 18 consanguineous Arab families with
Meckel–
Gruber syndrome (MKS), WES revealed a likely pathogenic
mutation
in three novel candidate MKS disease-causing genes (C5orf42,
EVC2,
and SEC8) (Shaheen et al., 2013). The ARL6IP6 gene was
identified as
a novel candidate gene for a syndromic form of CMTC in a

Saudi con-
sanguineous family (Abumansour et al., 2015). Therefore, the
Arab
genome carries significant potential in advancing the fields of
clinical
and medical genetics.
3.2. Arab efforts in genome sequencing
The SHGP is a 5-year project launched in December 2013 that
in-
volves a partnership between the SHGP and Life Technologies
(http://
shgp.kacst.edu.sa/site). The aim of the project is to sequence
100,000
Saudi genomes that represent both normal and disease
conditions to
identify Saudi-specific genetic variants that are linked to high-
incidence genetic diseases in Saudi Arabia, such as diabetes,
deafness,
cardiovascular disorders, cancer, and neurodegenerative
diseases
(Abu-Elmagd et al., 2015). The SHGP's specific mission is to
establish a
genotype-phenotype correlation for genetic disease and to create
a
foundation for personalized medicine, in which treatment will
be devel-
oped based on the DNA blueprint of each Saudi individual. This
ap-
proach will reduce the cost of health care, as the health care
expenses
related to human genetic disease are greater than $30 billion
annually
in Saudi Arabia (http://shgp.kacst.edu.sa/site).

A few days after the SHGP announcement, Qatar announced its
in-
tention to launch the QGP and a plan to sequence the genomes
of all
Qatari citizens (~300,000) (Al-Mulla, 2014). Similarly to the
SHGP, the
QGP seeks the future protection of Qatari citizens from the
spread of ge-
netic diseases due to the deep-entrenched culture of
endogamous and
242 H. Zayed / Gene 592 (2016) 239–243
consanguineous marriage by understanding the genomic make-
up of
the Qatari population, and integrating the sequencing
information into
clinical care for Qatari individuals. The data collected from the
genome
sequencing will be used as a platform for developing
customized molec-
ular diagnostics approaches to Arabs (Zayed and Ouhtit, 2016),
help to
create the foundation of personalized medicine in the Arabian
Peninsu-
la, and are expected to advance prenatal screening, genetic
counseling
for disease-carrying individuals in Qatar. QGP has already
started its
pilot phase by sequencing 3000 Qatari citizens
(http://www.qatar-
tribune.com/viewnews.aspx?d=20151214&cat=nation2&pge=5).
Computational analyses aimed to decode the Qatari genome and
map
the genetic variants which are unique to the Qatari individuals,

are sup-
ported by generous competitive funding from Qatar Foundation
(https://www.qf.org.qa). These sequencing data are kept in
electronic
medical records which will be an integral part of the Qatari
National
Health Service.
The KGP is an initiative to determine the genetic diversity of
the
main ethnic groups that constitute the Kuwaiti population,
namely,
Saudi Arabians, Bedouins, and Persians, ascribing their origin
to dif-
ferent regions of the Arabian Peninsula and West Asia (modern
Iranians). Thus, this project is the first to report a reference
genome
resource for the population of Persian ancestry in Kuwait
(Thareja
et al., 2015).
3.3. The Arab genome and the “Out of Africa” theory
The modern Arab gene pool exhibits a very interesting genetic
structure: it has numerous pockets of inbred communities due to
the prevalence of consanguineous unions, conserved pools of
ge-
nomes due to widespread endogamous marriage, and a mixed
gene
pool due to the history of Arab nations and the admixture of the
ge-
nomes of different ethnic groups with those of people from
Europe,
Africa, and Asia. This diversity is important in terms of
understand-
ing genome evolution and dynamics, answering the “Out of
Africa”

human migration question, and providing insights into the
migra-
tion routes of early modern humans from Africa to Eurasia. The
pri-
mary African origin of all modern human populations is well
known, but the routes of human migration out of Africa are still
un-
certain. One potential route is through Levant. Although the
North
African background is mainly stemmed from Near East/Arabian
Pen-
insula, the genomic ancestry of the Arabs of North Africa
supports an
African genome background due to the historical mixing with
sub-
Saharan African genome (Henn et al., 2012). Another potential
route is to the South, across the Arabian Peninsula, which is a
nexus of Asia, Africa, and Europe (Kopp et al., 2014).
Interestingly,
Fernandes et al. (Fernandes et al., 2012) focused in
disentangling be-
tween the impact of several waves of migration into Arabian
Penin-
sula in terms of contribution of African input and provided a
proof
that Arabian Peninsula could be the first staging post in the
spread
of modern humans from Africa to the rest of the world.
Interestingly, sequencing of just 13 exomes and 2 full genomes
in
Kuwait revealed ancestral genomic signature traces stemming
from
Asia, Europe and Africa (Alsmadi et al., 2014; Alsmadi et al.,
2013).
Egypt is an Afro-Asian Arab country that shares the

Mediterranean Sea
with European countries (Fig. 1), and it has been proposed as a
potential
source of the exodus of the African genome to Eurasia (Pagani
et al.,
2015) according to geographical, archaeological, and genetic
evidence.
African genomic components have been mapped (Pagani et al.,
2015);
however, most of the analyzed Egyptian haplotypes were
genetically
similar to those of modern non-Africans. The study concluded
that
Egypt was a potential gateway for the migration of the African
genome
to the rest of the world. Therefore, comparing the Egyptian
genomes
with European ones supports the exit route, where Ethiopian
genomes
compared with Arab genomes addresses southern route of the
out-of-
Africa migration.
3.4. Benefits of sequencing the Arab genome
Given the frequent spread of genetic diseases in Arab countries,
reaching reference genome(s) reflecting the diversity and
population
structure of Arab countries will serve as an example for other
communi-
ties with comparable population structures and will have many
bene-
fits, including, but not limited to, (1) serving as a vital tool for
the
identification of novel variants; (2) serving as a baseline for
further ge-
nomic epidemiological studies in Arab nations; (3) serving as a

useful
foundation for cohort and case-control genetic studies that aim
to char-
acterize the genetic etiology of genetic diseases; (4) improving
genetic
counseling for individuals with genetic disorders; (5) serving as
a plat-
form for future GWAS; (6) advancing translational medicine in
the
fields of personalized medicine and pharmacogenomics,
allowing med-
ications to be individualized to Arab patients and Arab
responses to
drugs to become well understood; (7) allowing the study of
inbred
Arab communities, and specifically the Bedouin population,
thus serv-
ing as a valuable tool to facilitate the discovery of rare and
novel gene
variants and novel genes; this information is very important to
better
understand the molecular pathology of complex diseases/traits
and is
expected to shed light on other genetic risk factors related to
gene-
environment interactions and epistasis as well as many other
genetic
risk factors with major importance in genetic disease
development,
and (8) serve as a historical tracing tool for population
migration.
The ultimate goal of the Arab genome is to create a database of
the
DNA variation in the Arab population and to make it available
to clini-

cians and researchers in Arab countries who seek to increase the
power of disease prediction, to understand gene drug
interactions, to
study the Arab population substructures, to improve
understanding of
the nature of Arab genetic diversity, and to trace population
migration.
All of these endeavors will contribute to one major aim, which
is to im-
prove patients' quality of life by improving overall health care
and sav-
ing lives. However, translating the outcome of the results of the
Arab
genome into effective clinical practice is a challenging task that
will re-
quire concerted efforts by both policymakers and scientists to
imple-
ment effective strategies in the health care sector and to make
funding
available to allow such programs to continue.
4. Conclusion
Arabs are an ideal population for genetic studies, with a diverse
genet-
ic structure, ranging from inbred communities to a diverse gene
pool
that includes elements from Europe, Asia, and Africa. This
feature renders
the Arab population a rich source of information that would be
of
global benefit. This emphasizes the value of a consensus Arab
genome
reference(s) which will positively impact the future directions
of person-
alized medicine. Using genomic sequencing technologies,

numerous rare
variants and novel genes have been identified in Arab families,
mainly
with consanguineous marriage history. The outcome of the
SHGP and
QGP are soon to be released, which will pave the way of a
future consen-
sus Arab genome reference(s). Therefore, there is an urgent
need for data
sharing, both locally and internationally, which dictates the
need for the
development of mechanisms and standards to facilitate this
sharing.
Disclosure declaration
Hatem Zayed declares no conflict of interest.
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This link is http://www.qatar-
tribune.com/viewnews.aspx?d=amp;catation2&pge=,",The
Arab genome: Health and wealth1. Introduction2. The Arab
world2.1. Inbred Arab communities and rare variants
discovery3. The Arab genome3.1. Discovery of novel disease-
causing genes and the Arab genome3.2. Arab efforts in genome
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ConclusionDisclosure declarationReferences
English Composition I: Persuasive Essay Worksheet
Johnny Andino
Keiser University
English Composition
Mr. Johnson

In order to complete this assignment, respond to each prompt
alongside the symbol
The following questions will ask you to consider the following
elements necessary to compose your essay.
· Thesis statement
· Supporting claims
· Sources
· Opposing view
· Audience
· Goal (conclusion)
To compose your thesis statement, follow this example
Topic MINIMUM WAGE: Should the minimum wage be raised
from its current $7.25 per hour?
Argument: I think it should not be raised.
#1 Reason that supports your argument: Increasing the minimum
wage per hour is not a solution to eradicate poverty
#2 Reason that supports your argument: Increasing the wage
limit also means that the economy risks saturation
#3 Reason that supports your argument: Increasing the minimum
wage limit also affects the skill level that companies require
when hiring.
Compose your thesis statement:

Minimum Wage should not be raised because increasing the
minimum wage has numerous adverse effects on the economy
and the people. The current minimum wage limit has been
beneficial to many people in the United States. Despite there
being a lot of low-income individuals, they can still afford
necessities to run their lives
Write your topic sentence #1 here
Increasing the minimum wage per hour is not a solution to
eradicate poverty. People understandably feel oppressed by the
standard income rate. However, this is the best solution to
stabilizing an economy.The current $7.25 wage per hour is
enough at the moment. Consideration for increasing the wage
will eventually be put up at some point. However, the process is
gradual as it is subject to numerous algorithms. An abrupt
increase in the minimum wage limit per hour pushes most
companies out of businesses.
Write your topic sentence #2 here
Increasing the wage limit also means that the economy risks
saturation. When there is a lot of cash flow in the economy, the
price of goods consequently increases to balance the economic
scale. Therefore, even with low-income people earning highly,
the cost of living will be too high for them to afford. The result
is an increased level of poverty and a wide gap between the
poor and the rich.
Write your topic sentence here #3
Increasing the minimum wage limit also affects the skill level
that companies require when hiring. When companies are forced
to pay their employees highly, they result in raising the bar in
terms of qualifications. High academic qualifications and many
years of experience will be a requirement for hiring members of
the staff (Gorry & Jackson, 2017). Most young people under the
age of 24 will be shut by the move as they have no years of
experience nor high academic qualifications.
Identify, summarize and align your sources.

Source (APA reference) #1:
Bradley, D. H. (2017). The Federal Minimum Wage: In Brief.
This source supports the sentence #1 because increasing
minimum wage can cause many companies to go out of business
as they will require more funds to pay the salaries.
Gorry, A., & Jackson, J. J. (2017). A note on the nonlinear
effect of minimum wage increases. Contemporary Economic
Policy, 35(1), 53-61.
This source supports sentence #2 because increasing minimum
wage will increase the gap between rich and poor and therefore,
it will cause unbalance when comes to lifestyle. There will be a
high rise in terms of security in that at the end they have to earn
a living and therefore, when there is no balance between the
poor and rich in terms of wage there is a high crime rate for the
society. The source points out the disadvantages of raising
wages when also comes to high cost of living.
Gorry, A., & Jackson, J. J. (2017). A note on the nonlinear
effect of minimum wage increases. Contemporary Economic
Policy, 35(1), 53-61.
This source supports sentence #3 as it says that increasing the
minimum wage will affect the skill set that companies consider
when hiring. This is because at the end the company has to
make profit and therefore, thy have to raise their skills
proportional to the wages. This scenario will actually result to
unemployment for the youths who have newly graduated. It
therefore make sense that increase of the wages affects not only
the company but also the clients. I therefore, reject the proposal
of increasing the wages unless there is a convincing reason to
do. Secondly, unless there is an assurance that when the wage is
increased, it does not interfere with the company and the
employers.
A persuasive essay presents a debatable topic. State the

opposing view to your position.
The opposing view of this topic is that the minimum wage
should be increased in order to improve quality of life. The
perception of better life should be accompanied with increase
wages does not add up. This however has caused a lot of
misinformation and has resulted to increase in cost of living.
Define your audience. Audience is not the instructor or your
peers (necessarily) but the persons or group you would like to
convince that your position is valid and should be considered.
Audience of this essay are the persons who think that the
minimum wage should be increased.
In the conclusion, you will restate the main argument. What is
the goal of your essay? Write a statement that communicates the
outcome or change you would like to see based on your
argument.
The minimum wage should not be increased as it will adversely
affect the economy. It will increase the gap between rich and
poor and many people will less skill set will become jobless.
1Department of Animal Biology-Anthropology, University of
Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
2Department of Biological Sciences, Yarmouk University, Irbid,
Jordan.
3Department of Medical Laboratory Sciences, Jordan University
of Science and Technology, Irbid, Jordan, and Department of
Biology,
Faculty of Science, Taibah University, Saudi Arabia.
4Department of Psychiatry and Clinical Psychobiology,
University of Barcelona, Barcelona, Spain.
*Correspondence to: Pedro Moral, Biodiversity Research
Institute, Department of Animal Biology-Anthropology,

University of
Barcelona, Avenida Diagonal no. 643, 08028 Barcelona, Spain.
E-mail: [email protected]
KEY WORDS: alu insertion polymorphisms, jordan, bedouins,
population genetics.
Human Biology, Spring 2014, v. 86, no. 2, pp. 131–138.
Copyright © 2014 Wayne State University Press, Detroit,
Michigan 48201
Human Diversity in Jordan: Polymorphic Alu Insertions
in General Jordanian and Bedouin Groups
Daniela Zanetti,1 May Sadiq,2 Robert Carreras-Torres,1 Omar
Khabour,3
Almuthanna Alkaraki,2 Esther Esteban,1 Marc Via,4 and Pedro
Moral 1*
abstract
Jordan, located in the Levant region, is an area crucial for the
investigation of human migration between
Africa and Eurasia. However, the genetic history of Jordanians
has yet to be clarified, including the
origin of the Bedouins today resident in Jordan. Here, we
provide new genetic data on autosomal
independent markers in two Jordanian population samples
(Bedouins and the general population) to
begin to examine the genetic diversity inside this country and to
provide new information about the
genetic position of these populations in the context of the
Mediterranean and Middle East area. The
markers analyzed were 18 Alu polymorphic insertions
characterized by their identity by descent, known
ancestral state (lack of insertion), and apparent selective
neutrality. The results indicate significant

genetic diffferences between Bedouins and general Jordanians
(p = 0.038). Whereas Bedouins show a
close genetic proximity to North Africans, general Jordanians
appear genetically more similar to other
Middle East populations. In general, these data are consistent
with the hypothesis that Bedouins had an
important role in the peopling of Jordan and constitute the
original substrate of the current population.
However, migration into Jordan in recent years likely has
contributed to the diversity among current
Jordanian population groups.
The State of Jordan emerged in 1946 as the Hashemite Kingdom
of Transjordan when Britain and France divided the Middle East
after World War II. Since 1948 it has offficially been
known as the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan. Jor-
dan is a predominantly Arab nation, whose capital
and largest city is Amman. It is located on the East
Bank of the Jordan River and the Dead Sea and
borders Palestine and Israel states to the west, Syria
to the north, Saudi Arabia to the south and east, and
Iraq to the northeast.
Because of its position in the Levant region,
Jordan represents one of the major pathways for
human movement. Since antiquity, traders tra-
versed this area carrying products from the lands
of the Indian Ocean basin to Syria, to be distributed
from there to other parts of the Mediterranean
world. Jordan was a crossroads for people from
all over what is known today as the Middle East.
Because of its strategic position connecting Asia,
Africa, and Europe in the ancient world, Jordan
was a major transit zone and thus an object of

132 ■ Zanetti et al.
contention among the rival empires of ancient
Persians, Macedonian Greeks, and many others
(Salibi 1998).
Current inhabitants of Jordan are mostly Arab
descendants of Transjordan or Palestine, and Bed-
ouins, part of a predominantly desert-dwelling
Arabian ethnic group traditionally divided into
tribes. Historically, the inhabitants of this desert,
which spreads northward into Syria, eastward
into Iraq, and southward into Saudi Arabia, were
Bedouin pastoralists (Salibi 1998). Today around
98% of the 7.9 million Jordanians are of Arab
origin, along with other small minorities such as
Circassians (1%) and Armenians (1%). Culturally,
the offficial language is Arabic; in terms of religion,
over 92% of the people are Sunni Muslims, around
6% are Christians (mostly Greek Orthodox, but
some Greek and Roman Catholics, Syrian Ortho-
dox, Coptic Orthodox, Armenian Orthodox, and
Protestant denominations), and the remaining 2%
are Shia Muslim and Druze populations (Central
Intelligence Agency 2013–2014).
Historically, the term “Bedouin” has denoted
both a nomadic way of life and a group identity.
Bedouins were the original settlers in the Middle
East. From the Arabian Peninsula, their original
home, they spread out and now live in desert
regions of all the countries between the Arabian
Gulf and the Atlantic. The Arab conquest of North
Africa in the seventh century AD caused a wide
dispersion, such that today the Arab culture is

extended over North Africa and beyond.
The availability of historical and ethnical in-
formation about Jordanian peoples (Salibi 1998)
contrasts with the lack of information about
the genetic background of these groups. As far
as we know, previous genetic information about
Jordanian populations includes two studies on
uniparental markers analyzed in Bedouins and
general Jordanians (Flores et al. 2005; González et
al. 2008) and a survey of a reduced number of Alu
insertions, fewer than those analyzed in this study,
in a sample of the general Jordanian population
(Bahri et al. 2011). Variation in the uniparental
markers (Y-chromosome and mitochondrial DNA)
underlines the genetic outlier position of Bedouins,
whereas general Jordanians are relatively close to
the neighboring Middle East groups.
To provide new insight from autosomal gene
variation about the distinctiveness of Bedouins
suggested by uniparental markers, this study geno-
typed 18 autosomal Alu insertions in two diffferent
Jordanian samples: one of individuals of Bedouin
origin and the other of considered as representative
of the general Jordanian population. The main
objective was to test whether autosomal markers
confirm the previous population diffferentiation
within Jordan revealed by uniparental markers. The
secondary objectives were to determine the degree
of genetic heterogeneity in Jordan, the genetic
position of Bedouins and general Jordanians in
the general context of the Mediterranean and the
Middle East areas, and to provide new data about
the potential influence of Bedouins, as representa-

tives of Arab origins, in North Africa.
In this study 18 Alu insertion markers were se-
lected because they are a useful tool for population
studies on the basis of their identity by descent,
known ancestral state, and selective neutrality
(Cordaux et al. 2006; Cordaux and Batzer 2009).
The potential usefulness of specific Alu loci as
ancestry-informative markers has been explored
to detect diffferences between populations and to
estimate biogeographical ancestry (Luizon et al.
2007). Polymorphic Alu insertions have also been
used in several studies tackling many historical
and demographical questions (González-Pérez et
al. 2010; Terreros et al. 2009).
Materials and Methods
Samples and Markers
A total of 96 blood samples from healthy unrelated
individuals of both sexes, collected from diffferent
regions of the north, center, and south of Jordan,
were classified into two groups: Bedouins (n =
43) and general Jordanians (n = 53). Collection,
classification, and DNA isolation of all samples
were carried out by researchers at Yarmouk Uni-
versity. All participants were selected because their
relatives were born in Jordan for at least three gen-
erations. The general Jordanian group was mostly
sampled in Jordanian cities, such as Amman and
Irbid. The Bedouin samples were collected from
the Badia desert in collaboration with the Jordan
Badia Research and Development Center. These
samples were classified according to the towns
or village in which the subject and the subject’s
parents and grandparents were born, as well as

Polymorphic Alu Insertions in Jordanian and Bedouin Groups ■
133
the last names of the families and the tribes they
belong to. All subjects signed an informed consent,
and the study was approved by the ethical commit-
tees of the University of Barcelona and Yarmouk
University. The protocols and procedures used in
this research were in compliance with the Declara-
tion of Helsinki.
Genomic DNA was extracted from blood cells
using a Blood DNA Midi Kit (Omega Bio-Tek,
Norcross, GA) according to the manufacturer’s
procedure. Eighteen human-specific Alu polymor-
phic elements (A25, ACE, APOA1, B65, CD4, D1,
DM, FXIIIB, HS2.43, HS4.32, HS4.69, PV92, Sb19.12,
Sb19.3, TPA25, Ya5NBC221, Yb8NBC120, and Yb-
8NBC125) located on 10 diffferent chromosomes
(Chr 1, 3, 8, 11, 12, 16, 17, 19, 21, and 22) were typed
by PCR amplification and electrophoretic analysis.
Primers and amplification conditions have been
previously described (Batzer and Deininger 1991;
González-Pérez et al. 2010; Stoneking et al. 1997).
Positive and negative controls for the polymor-
phisms examined were included in all PCR runs.
Statistical Analyses
Standard human population genetic parameters
were obtained. Allele frequencies were estimated
by direct counting. Hardy–Weinberg equilibrium
was assessed by an exact test based on the Markov
chain method (Guo and Thompson 1992) using Ge-

nepop, version 4.2 (Rousset 2008). Heterozygosity
values by locus and population according to Nei’s
formula (Saitou and Nei 1987) were calculated using
Genetix version 4.05 (Belkhir et al. 1996–2004). Dif-
ferences in allele frequency distribution between
the two Jordanian samples and, in general, between
all pairs of populations were assessed by an exact
test based on Fisher’s exact probability test using
the Genepop software.
Genetic distances (Reynolds’s distance) and hi-
erarchical analyses of molecular variance (AMOVA)
were estimated using Phylip, version 3.69 (Tuimala
2006), and Arlequin, version 3.5 (Excofffier et al.
2005). Genetic relationships among populations
were assessed by a principal component (PC) plot
using the FactoMineR package of R ( Josse 2008).
Comparisons with Published Data Sets
To evaluate the genetic position of Bedouins and
general Jordanians in the Mediterranean and the
Middle East areas, two comparative analyses were
carried out, based on population data available in
the literature. The main analysis focused on the
whole Mediterranean area using 18 polymorphic
Alu insertions in 16 populations, as indicated in
Figure 1. These populations comprised three Span-
ish regions (southern Spain: Andalusia; northern
Spain: Asturias; central Spain: Sierra de Gredos),
southern France (Toulouse), Turkey (Anatolia
Peninsula), Greece (Attica region), five Mediter-
ranean islands (Sardinia, Corsica, Sicily, Crete, and
Minorca), and five Berber groups from Morocco,
Algeria, and Egypt. The Moroccan samples came

FIGURE 1. Geographic location of the populations analyzed in
the study: populations analyzed using 18 Alu (circles) and
populations analyzed using the only eight Alu insertion
polymorphisms available in the literature (crosses). 1: Amizmiz
Berbers
(AMBE), 2: Middle Atlas Berbers (MABE), 3: Northeast
Moroccan Berbers (NEBE), 4: Southern Spain, 5: Central Spain,
6:
Northern Spain, 7: France, 8: Corsica, 9: Sicily, 10: Greece, 11:
Crete, 12: Turkey, 13: Syria, 14: Iran, 15: United Arab
Emirates, 16:
Baharain, 17: Cyprus, 18: Siwa Berbers (Siwa), 19: Mzab
Berbers (Mzab), 20: Sardinia, 21: Menorca.
from High Atlas (Amizmiz Berbers), Middle Atlas
(Berbers from the Khenifra region), and northeast
Moroccan Berbers (Bouhria area). Other Berber
samples were Mzab from Algeria and Siwi from the
Siwa Oasis in Egypt (González-Pérez et al. 2007,
2010).
To obtain a geographically more comprehensive
data set in the Middle East, a second comparative
analysis adding samples from Iran, Cyprus, United
Arab Emirates, Syria, and Bahrain was performed.
This analysis was based on data from only eight Alu
markers available in the literature (Bahri et al. 2013;
González-Pérez et al. 2010; Romualdi et al. 2002;
Stoneking et al. 1997).
Results

Alu insertion frequencies and gene diversities in
Bedouins and general Jordanians are shown in
Table 1. The highest insertion frequencies corre-
spond to the Ya5NBC221 locus in Bedouins (0.941)
and to the APOA1 locus in general Jordanians
(0.950); the lowest frequency values are found
in the HS2.43 locus (0 in Bedouins and 0.08 in
general Jordanians). As expected, the lowest gene
diversity values correspond to loci showing ex-
treme allele frequencies: Ya5NBC221 (H = 0.112) in
Bedouins, APOA1 (H = 0.096) in general Jordanians,
and HS2.43 in both Bedouins (H = 0) and general
Jordanians (H = 0.149). The highest diversity values
corresponding to loci with frequencies close to 0.5
were B65 and TPA25 (H = 0.506) in Bedouins and
TPA25 (H = 0.500) in general Jordanians.
The test for Hardy-Weinberg equilibrium,
after Bonferroni correction, indicates significant
deviations only for D1 (p = 0.0000) and FXIIIB (p =
0.0000) in general Jordanians. Chance is the most
likely explanation for this departure because there
is no particular reason to expect a Hardy-Weinberg
deviation for these markers, and the deviations are
not shared by the two population samples.
Comparison of the two Jordanian samples
shows that the average gene diversity in general
Jordanians (0.366 ± 0.142) is only slightly higher
than in Bedouins (0.349 ± 0.146). In general,
Table 1. Alu Insertion Frequencies, Gene Diversities, and p-
Values of Hardy-Weinberg (H-W) Equilibrium in Bedouins
and General Jordanians

Locus Bedouin General_Jordan Frequency Range
N Insertion Heterozygosity H-W N Insertion Heterozygosity H-
W High Low
DM 25 0.640 0.470 0.187 37 0.405 0.489 0.048 Siwa (0.356)
Sicily (0.674)
HS4.69 42 0.452 0.501 0.530 50 0.440 0.498 0.011 Mzab
(0.287) Bedouin (0.452)
HS4.32 38 0.776 0.352 0.059 51 0.824 0.294 0.638 Centr al
Spain (0.493) General_Jordan (0.824)
Ya5NBC221 34 0.941 0.112 1.000 41 0.939 0.116 0.121
Southern Spain (0.725) Northern Spain (0.978)
Sb19.3 42 0.750 0.380 1.000 53 0.755 0.374 0.259 AMBE
(0.613) Sardinia (0.945)
HS2.43 38 0.000 0.000 <0.001 50 0.080 0.149 0.261 Bedouin
(0) Sardinia (0.171)
Sb19.12 43 0.267 0.396 0.133 53 0.274 0.401 1.000 Mzab
(0.135) Central Spain (0.4)
B65 40 0.500 0.506 0.536 48 0.563 0.497 0.140 Siwa (0.150)
Crete (0.647)
Yb8NBC120 33 0.394 0.485 0.270 43 0.430 0.496 1.000 Si wa
(0.023) AMBE (0.569)
YbNBC125 41 0.134 0.235 1.000 53 0.226 0.354 0.048 Siwa
(0.065) General Jordan (0.226)
PV92 27 0.241 0.373 0.613 35 0.143 0.248 0.526 Sicily (0.079)
MABE (0.368)

D1 39 0.385 0.479 0.005 51 0.412 0.489 <0.001 United Arab
Emirates (0.08) Sicily (0.474)
FXIIIB 43 0.302 0.427 1.000 52 0.298 0.423 t0.001 Iran (0.214)
Turkey (0.584)
A25 43 0.105 0.190 0.372 53 0.132 0.231 0.575 Syria (0)
Central Spain (0.175)
CD4 37 0.797 0.328 0.616 43 0.663 0.452 0.041 Crete (0.593)
Bedouin (0.797)
TPA25 38 0.487 0.506 0.204 49 0.551 0.500 0.251 Siwa (0.317)
NEBE (0.661)
APOA1 38 0.868 0.232 0.098 50 0.950 0.096 0.100 Siwa (0.84)
France (0.981)
ACE 42 0.202 0.327 0.657 53 0.387 0.479 0.772 Bedouin
(0.202) Central Spain (0.467
Average heterozygosity 0.349±0.146 0.366±0.142
Abbreviations: N: number of chromosomes; AMBE: Amizmiz
Berbers, MABE: Middle Atlas Berbers, NEBE: Northeast
Moroccan Berbers, MZAB: Mzab Berbers. Variation ranges are
given according to data
from reviewed literature for populations represented in Figure
1.
the Jordanian frequencies and gene diversities
show values within the variation range of other

Mediterranean populations. Extreme values
were found only for HS2.43 and ACE in Bedou-
ins, corresponding to the lowest frequencies in
the literature revised, and for HS4.69 and CD4 in
Bedouins and HS4.32 and Yb8NBC125 in general
Jordanians, which are the highest values in the
literature revised. Allele frequency comparisons
show significant diffferences across all 18 loci (p
= 0.038; 36 df ) between Bedouins and general
Jordanians. Locus-by-locus comparisons indicate
significant diffferences for DM (p = 0.015), HS2.43
(p = 0.01), and ACE (p = 0.005) markers.
Concerning population relationships, the PC
analysis based on the whole set of Alu insertion
polymorphisms in 16 populations indicates that
the two first axes account for 49.31% of the total
genetic variance (Figure 2). The first axis (33.76%
of the total variance) clusters Bedouins along with
North African samples with a certain separation
from the rest. Within this group, the Siwa Oasis
sample appears in the most distant position. The
second component underlines the separation
of the Western Mediterranean samples (central
Spain, France, north of Spain, Corsica, and Sicily)
from Eastern Mediterranean groups (Greece, Tur-
key, Crete) and general Jordan. When the analysis
was repeated to remove the efffect of the Siwa Oasis
sample (data not shown), the observed pattern was
substantially the same. Population relationships
within Jordan indicate that the Bedouins, closer
to North Africans, show an intermediate position
between these populations and Eastern Mediter-
raneans, whereas general Jordanians cluster with
Eastern Mediterranean populations. Results from

both genetic distance analysis and AMOVA sup-
port the distribution revealed by the PC analysis.
Thus, the average Reynolds genetic distance of
Bedouins to the remaining populations (31 × 10–3)
is of the same order of magnitude as the average
distance among all the populations (32 × 10–3),
whereas the distance of general Jordanians to
Middle Eastern populations (23 × 10–3) is lower
than that corresponding to Bedouins (28 × 10–3;
Table 2).
The hierarchical analysis of the allele fre-
quency variance, classifying the populations into
two groups (North Africa plus Bedouins, and all
others) indicates a significant variation between
the two groups, as plotted along the first PC axes
(FST = 3.4%, p < 0.001; FCT = 1.6%, p ≤ 0.001; FSC =
1.8%, p < 0.001). Likewise, the population distribu-
tion associated with the second PC component
is also supported by the AMOVA results. In this
case, the genetic variance between the three
population groups formed by North Africa plus
Bedouins, Middle East plus general Jordanians, and
FIGURE 2. PC plot of 16
populations from the
Mediterranean area based on
the variation of 18 Alu insertion
polymorphisms.
135

Western Mediterranean also indicates statistically
significant variation (FST = 3%, p < 0.001; FCT = 1.2%,
p ≤ 0.001; FSC = 1.8%, p < 0.001).
A second comparison, partial because it is
based on the variation of only eight Alu markers but
including a wider number of populations (21; PC
analysis population plot not shown) also separates
Bedouins from general Jordanians. However, in this
case, the relative position of the two Jordanian
samples versus other populations shows some
diffferences compared with results of the previous
analysis. For instance, the general Jordanian group
tends to be closer to Western Mediterranean than
to Middle East populations.
Discussion
This study provides the first comparative genetic
analysis between two Jordanian ethnic groups
selected according to strict and reliable criteria,
Bedouins and general Jordanians, by analyzing 18
autosomal Alu insertion polymorphisms. In gen-
eral, Jordanian allele frequencies and gene diversity
estimates show intermediate values within the vari-
ation range of other Mediterranean populations.
Compared with previous data, Alu frequencies
in general Jordanians are substantially similar to
those previously reported for a partial subset of Alu
markers (10 of the 18) in a Jordanian sample (Bahri
et al. 2011), except for two Alu markers: D1 (p = 0.02)
and HS4.32 (p = 0.006). These few diffferences could
be related to the potentially diverse origin of the
individuals sampled in each case.

Concerning diffferentiation within Jordan, this
study indicates a significant diffference between
Bedouins and urban inhabitants of Jordan (p =
0.038). Of the 18 autosomal insertion markers,
three are statistically diffferent: DM (p = 0.015),
HS2.43 (p = 0.01), and ACE (p = 0.005). Consider-
ing the relatively small sample size, the genetic
diffferences point to a clear separation between
these two groups. This could be related to the fact
that in recent times urban areas have been subject
to several external influences but Bedouins have
conserved their own genetic background because
of their nomadic and isolated lifestyle. In fact,
among all the considered populations in the com-
parative analyses, Bedouins appear to be the most
diverse group, in contrast to general Jordanians,
who cluster with other Middle Eastern groups.
However, we should not ignore the fact that the
Table 2. Reynolds’s Genetic Distances Estimated among All 18
Populations using 18 Alu Insertion Markers
Bedouin GJ Greece Crete Turkey Asturias C_Spain Andalusia
Balearic_I France Corsica Sardinia Sicily AMBE MABE NEBE
MZAB Siwa
Bedouin —
GJ 0.023 —
Greece 0.028 0.023 —
Crete 0.028 0.019 0.008 —
Turkey 0.027 0.028 0.005 0.009 —

Asturias 0.029 0.012 0.014 0.016 0.019 —
C_Spain 0.039 0.034 0.024 0.029 0.035 0.017 —
Andalusia 0.034 0.019 0.027 0.024 0.023 0.016 0.030 —
Balearic_I 0.026 0.020 0.012 0.007 0.012 0.015 0.026 0.019 —
France 0.020 0.018 0.011 0.014 0.014 0.009 0.016 0.021 0.016
—
Corsica 0.028 0.026 0.008 0.012 0.011 0.016 0.018 0.024 0.008
0.011 —
Sardinia 0.029 0.030 0.026 0.022 0.028 0.027 0.034 0.034 0.025
0.017 0.020 —
Sicily 0.023 0.018 0.017 0.016 0.022 0.015 0.023 0.028 0.016
0.013 0.010 0.033 —
AMBE 0.027 0.017 0.039 0.034 0.041 0.030 0.048 0.025 0.031
0.039 0.043 0.052 0.035 —
MABE 0.028 0.020 0.025 0.023 0.026 0.022 0.033 0.019 0.027
0.028 0.036 0.033 0.040 0.018 —
NEBE 0.024 0.022 0.024 0.023 0.024 0.023 0.042 0.023 0.022
0.031 0.030 0.038 0.036 0.017 0.012 —
MZAB 0.034 0.036 0.045 0.037 0.042 0.042 0.050 0.033 0.036
0.045 0.049 0.035 0.059 0.027 0.010 0.020 —
Siwa 0.076 0.085 0.105 0.101 0.102 0.087 0.084 0.077 0.091
0.091 0.094 0.075 0.100 0.102 0.065 0.083 0.057 —

Abbreviations: AMBE: Amizmiz Berbers, GJ, general
Jordanians, MABE: Middle Atlas Berbers, NEBE: Northeast
Moroccan Berbers, MZAB: Mzab Berbers.
markers analyzed (number and/or low mutation
rate) may be not powerful enough to uncover
relatively recent demographic events. In this way,
the small inconsistencies in the relative genetic
position of the two Jordanian samples with respect
to other populations found in the two analyses
using diffferent numbers of Alu loci (18 vs. 8) most
likely reflect the role of chance when few mark-
ers are used to characterize human populations.
In any case, the genetic diffferentiation observed
between Bedouin and general Jordanians using 18
Alu insertions polymorphisms is consistent with
the diffferentiation reported from the mitochon-
drial DNA and Y-chromosome uniparental loci in
two recent studies (Flores et al. 2005; González
et al. 2008). Assuming that Bedouins represent
the original substrate of current-day Jordanians,
the diffferentiation found between them and the
general Jordanian group could be explained by
a higher Mediterranean influence in the general
population due to Jordan’s position as a crossroads
since ancient times and/or the recent contribution
of immigrants in the last half of the twentieth
century.
In a Mediterranean context, Bedouins seem to
be closer to North African groups, whereas general
Jordanians tend to group with North Mediterra-
neans, especially with the easternmost popula-
tions. Greater genetic proximity of Bedouins and

North Africans could be explained by the impact of
Arabic expansion into North Africa in the seventh
century. However, the outlier position of the Egyp-
tian sample from Siwa, also acknowledged in other
studies (Athanasiadis et al. 2007), together with the
significant lack of Alu data in most points of North
Africa, does not allow definite conclusions.
In summary, this Alu population analysis re-
inforces the genetic distinctiveness of Bedouins,
suggesting that they had an important role in the
peopling of Jordan and probably constitute the
original substrate of this population. Their relative
genetic proximity to North African groups supports
the idea that they share the genetic background of
the populations that spread the Arab culture into
North Africa. The genetic diffferentiation found
between the two groups of current Jordanian
population could be attributed to some extent
to a relatively recent contribution of immigrants
coming from neighboring areas. However, this
conclusion needs to be confirmed with additional
markers to avoid random efffects associated with
the use of a low number of markers.
acknowledgments
We thank all participants who provided blood samples and
Mr. Nawras Al-Jazi from Badia Research Program Jordan for
facilitating sample collection in the remote southern regions
of Jordan. This work was supported by Programa de Coop-
eración Interuniversitaria e Investigación Científica grants
A/023616/09 and A/030982/10 from the Agencia Española
de Cooperación Internacional para el Desarrollo, and by
the CGL-2011-27866 project to the participant Yarmouk and

Barcelona Universities. D.Z. was supported by Master & Back
grant AF-DR-A2011B-48666-25399/2011.
Received 21 January 2014; revision accepted for
publication 3 June 2014.
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City and cosmology: genetics, health, and urban living in
Dubai
Aaron Parkhurst
Department of Anthropology, University College London
(UCL), London, United Kingdom
ARTICLE HISTORY
Received 28 September 2017
Accepted 9 October 2017
ABSTRACT

In light of increasingly high rates of diabetes, heart disease, and
obesity among citizens of the Arabian Gulf, popular health
discourse in the region has emphasised the emergent Arab
genome
as the primary etiological basis of major health conditions.
However, after many years of public dissemination of genomic
knowledge in the region, and widespread acceptance of this
knowledge among Gulf Arab citizens, the rates of chronic
illness
continue to increase. This paper briefly explores the clash
between
indigenous Islamic knowledge systems and biomedical
knowledge
systems imported into the United Arab Emirates. It presents
vignettes collected from interviews and participant observation
in
Dubai as part of nearly four years of ethnographic research,
completed as part of the author’s doctoral work on ‘Anxiety and
Identity in Southeast Arabia’. Rather than radically informing
health
seeking behaviours among many UAE citizens, the emphasis on
the
‘Arab Genome’ has instead reconfirmed the authority of
Bedouin
cosmological understandings of disease, reshaping the language
that people use to engage with their bodies and their health.
Local
cosmology remains a powerful discursive element that often
operates in contention, in sometimes powerfully subtle ways,
with
novel health initiative regimes. For many people in the region,
genomic information, as it is often discussed and propagated in
the
UAE, shares an intimate relationship with ideas of fate and
national
identity, and sometimes serves to mitigate the increasingly

uncertain terms of engagement that people share between the
body, their health, and rapidly changing urban landscapes.
KEYWORDS
Genetics; medical
anthropology; chronic illness;
fate; urban anthropology
Introduction
The underlying premise of this article extends from a simple,
but profound anthropologi-
cal critique in the practice of biomedicine in different societies.
That is, when policy plan-
ners and health professionals try to think through ideas of
behaviour change that
accompany much of the discourse on obesity, diabetes, heart
disease, and global health in
general, they need to take into account people’s perceptions or
ideas of their ability to cre-
ate bodily change for themselves in general. Medical
anthropology has long emphasised
the role of cultural landscapes and idiosyncrasies in producing
powerful regimes of both
CONTACT Aaron Parkhurst [email protected]
© 2018 Informa UK Limited, trading as Taylor & Francis Group
ANTHROPOLOGY & MEDICINE, 2018
VOL. 25, NO. 1, 68–84
https://doi.org/10.1080/13648470.2017.1398815
http://crossmarksupport.crossref.org/?doi=10.1080/13648470.20
17.1398815&domain=pdf
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0762-0929
http://orcid.org/0000-0002-0762-0929

mailto:[email protected]
https://doi.org/10.1080/13648470.2017.1398815
http://www.tandfonline.com
illness and health, and alarming rates of chronic illness across
the globe re-illuminate the
systematic neglect of culture in policy planning and debate
(Napier et al. 2014). How is
agency constructed in ‘health seeking behaviour’, and what are
the wider social factors
that inform ‘health seeking behaviour’?
This paper is informed from long-term field-work in Dubai that
focused on these ques-
tions of health seeking behaviours and how they relate to local
ideas of fate, agency, and
genes. Further to these ideas, however, Dubai provides a unique
context to think through
many forms of chronic illness that become propagated through
individual habits and
behaviours. From questions that emerge in my recent inquiries
on the human body and
urban environments, this paper explores an anthropological
problem presented by the
body in the city, namely, the disruption of the stable
relationship between the human
body and the environment. Genetics, as a concept, becomes an
explanatory model that
men and women in Southeast Arabia utilise to speak towards
this disruption.
The ethnographic data used in this paper was collected as part
of nearly four years of
anthropological fieldwork in Dubai and Abu Dhabi, in which I
lived and worked as an

anthropologist (February 2007–October 2010). It forms part of a
larger body of work on
the relationship between globalisation, chronic illness, and
tradition within Southeast Ara-
bia, undertaken as my doctoral research. The research was
conducted in many social and
medical spaces, but primarily in participants’ homes, caf�e’s,
and other intimate social
spaces. Part of this ethnography was also conducted in clinical
settings, involving partici-
pant observation in three mental health institutions (one in Abu
Dhabi and two in Dubai),
and two nutrition clinics in Dubai. My anthropological research
began as a project study-
ing mental health and the stigmatisation of mental illness in the
Emirates, as well as
men’s health issues in the country in general. The current focus
on diabetes and genetics
emerged from concerns from both local health authorities and
from Emirati lay persons.
During my time in the Emirates researching chronic illness,
Emiratis in general spoke
often and openly about their engagement with genetics, and both
their deep love and anx-
iety of the city. These themes comprise the focus of this paper.
The research methodology consisted primarily of participant
observation and inter-
views conducted in both Arabic and English. Unless otherwise
stated, the dialogue pre-
sented in this paper was conducted in English. Most of the
discussions between my
participants and myself were qualitative, open ended
engagements, though many inter-
views directed participants to discuss their understandings of
genetics, the city, or both.

Participants were recruited in a wide number of contexts: some
participated in discussions
as part of formal discussions in clinics; others were recruited
through participant observa-
tion in Dubai, and we met in their homes, caf�e’s, or places of
work in which I had access
and permission to conduct fieldwork. Still others were part of a
support network in my
Arabic education. Most of the participants that inform the
ethnography of this paper, and
with whom I became close, were men. This is partly due to the
nature of the overarching
research questions on men’s mental and physical health issues
in the Emirates, but it is
also due to the social structures of the country. While women
participated in general
interviews in public health spaces, I only had ethnographic
access to men in more per-
sonal and private social spaces. The participants of whom this
paper concerns are almost
all Emirati citizens living in Dubai, with the exception of some
perspectives from Euro-
American health professionals working in the city. Citizenship
in the UAE is still
informed from tribal affiliation. Many Emirati in Dubai and Abu
Dhabi are members of
ANTHROPOLOGY & MEDICINE 69
different branches of the Bani-Yas tribe, a large and powerful
kinship group that enjoys a
long history in the Arabian Peninsula. However, there are also
many who trace their line-
age through other large tribes. Emirati tribal leaders (sheikhs)

often draw upon Bedouin
identity in public discourse in Dubai, though the label of
Bedouin is rather fluid. While
different families in the Emirates have diverse historical
backgrounds and histories that
shape their experience of the developing Emirati cities, this
paper draws upon shared
understandings of the body and cosmology that unify the
citizens of the Emirates.
Diabetes in the Emirates
The predominant blood sugar disorder discussed in this paper is
Diabetes Mellitus Type 2.
This condition is categorised through the inability of the body
to respond to insulin prop-
erly, and usually develops in adulthood. There are many risk
factors that are known to
contribute to Diabetes Mellitus Type 2, henceforth often
referred to in this paper as sim-
ply ‘diabetes’, but most salient in public health narratives are
those risk factors that corre-
late diabetes to obesity (Body Mass Index of 30 and higher),
personal diets, behaviours,
and habits. Diabetes is well-understood as contributing
profoundly to a wide-range of co-
morbidities. Because of its relationship with obesity, they are
often discussed in unison by
health officials in Dubai.
The experience of diabetes in Dubai is often explained through
narratives of ‘energy’.
Those who have the condition complain of not having any
energy to go shopping, or go
to work, and sometimes complain that they do not have the
‘energy’ to go outside, as the

heat of Dubai’s oppressive climate stifles them. This is
especially frustrating for those who
are told their condition is tied to inactivity. The experience of
diabetes, however, is highly
variable in Dubai, especially as the condition presents itself in
increasingly younger indi-
viduals. It often first presents itself as a major problem when
people have other ailments
or are treated for other conditions. The experience of the
condition remains confusing for
many of the people with whom I spoke, especially for younger
individuals (in their late
20s or early 30s). They were aware, and even fearful, of the
cardiovascular risks that the
condition informs, and they all had personally known others
whose death at an early age
due to cardiovascular disease was informed by diabetes. While
they felt the physical effects
of the chronic illness, and indeed, some had been diagnosed
after an initial diabetic attack,
their social lives, in their own terms, had yet to be grossly
impacted by the disease. As a
result, it was difficult for many people to narrate their current
suffering beyond physical
sensation. As I will discuss later, for many the condition was
considered with some ambiv-
alence. In this regard, when I spoke with people about the
experience of living with diabe-
tes, they often turned the discussion away from their own lives,
and instead borrowed
pathology as an opportunity to think through other aspects of
their society.
Diabetes, and even obesity in general, is often seen by Emiratis
in the UAE as a condi-
tion brought about by modernity. The Arabic term for diabetes

in the Emirates is ‘da3 al-
suker’ and translates literally as ‘disease of sugar’. However,
the Latin term ‘diabetes’ is
used ubiquitously in both Arabic and English discourse. In this
regard, its immediate rela-
tionship to food and drink consumption is disrupted, allowing
for more fluid and com-
plex understandings of the origins of the condition. Long-term
medical professionals in
the UAE remember and recognise the historical development of
blood sugar discourse in
the country. For example, a German physician who had
practiced in the country for
70 A. PARKHURST
20 years explained, ‘There was an idea, and I still come across
this, that we [here he refers
to himself, and other Euro-American expatriates] brought some
of these conditions with
us. Sometimes people might say ‘you made this problem so you
fix it’, and I had no idea
what they were talking about’. The physician later came to
understand that his patients
were referring to the idea of Euro-American immigrants as
perceived agents of disease, or
at least associating these expatriates with the conditions of
change and foreign influence
that bring sickness. ‘My father thinks these things’, a friend
explained to me. ‘He thinks
diabetes is a conspiracy from Israel or something like this’. I
asked why. ‘Well, people
didn’t have this problem, … nobody used to have Diabetes. Or
maybe they had it, I think,

but nobody knew about these things. So they blamed everyone
else. And now we know it
is genetic, but even now some people don’t believe that’.
There is great complexity embedded in these ideas. Israel, here,
is understood to be in
partnership with American and European governments to
subvert Arab society, though
these ideas are not shared by everybody. There is also an
attempt to understand how dia-
betes developed so quickly in the rapidly growing city. Other
logics concern immigration
as a direct process of pathology. In this regard, diabetes is seen
less as something that
develops from habits, and instead is partially socially
constructed as something caused by
ambiguous pathogens that accompany immigration. Others see
Euro-American expan-
sion as an agent of corruption, if not a direct agent of disease.
The complex consequence
of these commercial and social infiltrations on the human body
is a trend seen in many
areas of the world, and has been given the moniker
‘cocacolonisation’ (see Leatherman
and Goodman 2005). In the past, diabetes was not known to be a
problem, and suddenly,
one day it was. According to the International Diabetes
Federation (IDF), during the cul-
mination of my fieldwork, The Emirates had the second highest
rates of diabetes in the
world, behind the small Pacific island nation of Nauru (IDF
2010). This trend remains
strong. Current data from the IDF holds that nearly 1 in 5 adults
in the UAE is currently
afflicted with diabetes, and the country’s rates of diabetes are
rising faster than both its

neighbours in the Arabian peninsula and in the world at large
(IDF 2015). If these rates
continue, the prevalence of diabetes is expected to double
within a generation.
My participants do not use the term ‘cocacolonisation’, but they
are aware of these
forces of commercial and social intrusions, and they see these
processes centred in
the city, namely, Dubai. My friend Ali, for example, spoke
often about the problems that
the city posed and the dilemmas it caused for him and his peers.
Ali explains, ‘There are
some people who just think it would be better if everyone
(foreign) left, and there are
other people who are afraid of what will happen if everybody
leaves’. ‘What do you think’,
I ask him. ‘I think like most people we love people to come here
and we love to share our
country. But maybe some people are meant to come live here,
maybe some people should
only come visit. Smaller is ok too, all these towers… It will be
good to slow down, or else
people (locals) will never leave their homes, and the people
coming here will be bored,
and they will stop coming… people are becoming very selfish…
. [We] do not have to do
much. We need to be better’. At other times, he and his peers
would complain about the
fast food that they and their children consumed, or the amount
of TV their family
watched, always wildly gesturing to the streets. The city then
becomes tied to indigenous
understandings of modernity and disease, and is understood to
be mapped upon the
human body. The body and the city is, in many ways, still a

developing subject of analysis
in social science, though it has an emerging collection of
thought in a range of disciplines
from geography and anthropology to psychoanalysis. While
architectural planning has
throughout centuries borrowed upon human corporeality to
understand the form of
streets, buildings, townships and cities (see Vitruvius and De
Vinci, for example), philoso-
phers and artists near the beginning of the last century began to
recognise the metropolis
as a new grounding for human culture and corporeality (e.g.
Mumford 1934; Metropolis
1927). In a different vein, other thinkers in anthropology and
geography conceived of the
body and society as mirrors for each other (Douglas 1966), and
the city, specifically, as a
metaphor for the human body in which stable urban landscapes
inform cultural under-
standings of the body and identity (Sennett 1994). In this way,
space, place and the body
become concretely joined. What Sennett identified is how urban
spaces become norma-
tive, seemingly stable lived experiences for those who live
within them. Yet, he also shows
how this normative experience of urban-ness belies the reality
of the city as a highly unsta-
ble, and profoundly fluid and dynamic space. It is a
transformational entity in its own
right that shares an anthropologically reciprocal relationship
with the human body: the

city-cum-body is constructed by the body, much as people
embody the dynamic forces of
the city (ibid).
In discourse on diabetes, obesity, and heart disease, social
scientists have long argued
for a more holistic view of the body in relation to society to
think through health seeking
behaviour (see Edwards 2012; Paul 2005; Mendenhall et al.
2010). Specifically, in order to
create changes and shifts in health delivery and demographics,
especially in a context
such as London or Dubai, policy planners need to think beyond
what a health authority
might be able to issue, and think additionally about the
pragmatics and lived experience
of people as they try to move through their daily life. In terms
of diet and exercise, this
has implications for public transport, daily commutes, housing
prices, and a wide range
of socio-economic policy and practice. In this regard, city
politics and urban management
in the US and UK, for example, have informed urban
neighbourhood demographics, the
distances between an individual’s work and residence, the
pragmatics of daily travel, and
opportunities to create and utilise time for activities beyond
income production and
household maintenance. These aspects of quotidian city life are
mapped onto the human
body in the form of chronic illness (Church et al. 2011;
Cetateanu and Jones 2014; Bur-
goine et al. 2014; Bourgois 2011). The structural limitations of
urban living often provide
daunting hurdles to prevention of chronic illness, but there is a
psychological aspect to

health behaviour and practice that is sometimes ignored. That is
the sense of futility many
people express and experience in thinking through how they
might work upon their
bodies.
Diabetes and fate
Obesity and diabetes are made complex in Dubai, as they are
medical categories that are
often fraught with ambivalence, and they are not always seen as
unhealthy body categories
in the city and country at large. This is certainly not unique to
this region of the world (see
Randall 2011, or Popenoe 2003, for example). One of the issues
that contributes to high
Body Mass Index and high rates of blood-sugar disorders in
Southeast Arabia that is not
discussed in this paper is the perception of these conditions as
normative or healthy, and
in the case of obesity, sometimes desired. However, as
discussed in the section above, dia-
betes, specifically, is often understood as a condition of
modernity, a sudden product of
72 A. PARKHURST
‘modernisation’. This is evidenced by my participants in a
number of ways. One concern
from locals is the idea of Western imperialism as an agent of
disease. The widespread idea
of diabetes in the region grew in similar terms to the influx of
foreign immigration, prod-
ucts, and ideas. This type of modernity also brought more

robust systems of medicaliza-
tion into the country. Very few in the Emirates were diagnosed
with diabetes before the
invitation towards foreign development, and so it is rather
reasonable to deduce that it is
a ‘Western’ illness category that expatriates brought (and
continue to bring) into the
country. This perception is made complicated by discourse that
links Western material
and social imports to cultural pollutants, if not direct agents of
disease. American
designed fast-food industries, expensive villas, sport-utility
vehicles, mass media, and
even increased longevity become objects vacillating between
desire and danger. All these
vacillating objects were tied to urbanising processes, and the
city is perceived to be the
locus of these goods. In this regard, the desert was often looked
upon as a safe haven. As
one of my participants proudly advertised, ‘I make my family
go camping to the desert
every month usually because it is the best thing to grow up
right… It is like a medicine’.
Though, even then, my friend’s ‘tent’ was fitted with modern
amenities. Vacillation, as
theorised by Ghassan Hage (2010).
occurs because we do not always know what we want and we
often want contradictory
things… we can say that vacillation is when there are many
incompatible things giving mean-
ing to our lives and we find ourselves pursuing them despite
their incompatibility. What is
important, though, is that vacillation is not just a movement
between various states of being;
rather, it is a state of being in itself. (Hage 2010, 152)

My participants often describe themselves in this way, torn
between desires for conflicting
interests and identities. Some defined the city as ‘a place where
people don’t know how to
not want things’. The desire for both modernity and tradition,
and the perceived futility
of pursuing both, creates conditions of uncertainty that my
participants expressed often.
The city becomes a vessel for this uncertainty, and becomes tied
to other categories of
ambiguity more closely associated with the body; namely,
genetics.
As Kilshaw has demonstrated in her ethnography in Qatar
(Kilshaw 2015), the Qatari
state’s dedicated mission to become ‘modern’ borrows
significantly on the role of genetics,
but this is often in contention with the way that local Qataris
‘themselves understand and
incorporate genetic knowledge into their lives’ (Kilshaw, this
issue). Institutionalised
genetic sequencing and testing programmes speak towards a
local desire to bring Qatar
forward as a global leader in healthcare, and they become
representative of a ‘modernity’
of which Qatari citizens are very proud. Yet, balancing these
desires with traditional
emphasis on inheritance makes genetic dissemination very
complex, and in some ways,
ironic (Kilshaw 2015, this issue). In the context of Dubai, the
imports described above
bring both comfort and ‘corruption’, and are problematically,
though not necessarily
falsely, tied to conditions that are often ethnographically also
attributed to genetics, such

as ‘misbehaving children’ (in terms of autism spectrum),
depression, and, saliently, diabe-
tes. All these categories are, then, often understood as diseases
brought by the West. Some
speak of diabetes as a result of a loss of traditional value and
culture or religion. For exam-
ple, I met a participant who insisted that soft drinks, and
specifically Coca Cola, were
ruining the health of the city (indirectly invoking the idea of
coca-colonisation discussed
above), which is something he and I agreed on to a degree. He
asserted, however, that if
locals drank more coffee, as was considered traditional, then the
diabetes epidemic could
be annihilated. There may be some medical truth to this,
depending on the ways and the
amounts coffee is consumed. However, my participant’s concern
was not with the physi-
cal and chemical properties of the drink. The harmful long-term
effects of soft drink con-
sumption are not always perceived to stem from the ingredients
of the products: sugar,
corn syrup, or, perhaps, colouring compounds. Rather, it is the
nationalism of the prod-
uct, and its cultural disruption that is understood to be poison
for the human body. ‘Coca-
colonisation’, then, is a useful but limited concept in the region
as it directs analysis of
health seeking behaviour away from the individual and places it
within wider systems of
structural imbalance. My participants do often recognise that

coca-cola, as a ‘material’,
leads to Diabetes, but this ‘material’ takes on different meaning
depending on its source.
In this regard, sugar is good when it is used to make local
products, and bad when it is
imposed upon those who fall within Euro-American patterns of
consumption.
Parallel to local understandings of foreign influence are
increasingly prevalent public
discourse on genetics. Within popular imagination, there is a
widely-held perception of
genetics as diabetic aetiology; that is, genes are largely, if not
wholly responsible for diabe-
tes. For example, where I was discussing aetiology with one of
my participants, I was
speaking about genetic susceptibility for type 2 diabetes, a
‘gene’ for diabetes, and he was
speaking of ‘Al Djinn’, those ambiguous agents of the desert,
usually frustratingly amoral,
that are known to influence the world of humans and disrupt
human agency. I am careful
to note that he probably does not mean this literally, that genes
and Djinn are one and
same. Or, if he does, it remains speculative. However, in many
regions of Southeast Ara-
bia, genes and Djinn, as ambiguous categories of nature and
fate, do borrow each other’s
language, if not further synonymy. It is a recognition that the
sands and vastness of the
Rub al Khali, the vast desert that lies across the Southeastern
Arabian peninsula, and the
human body were both their own cosmologies, populated by
cosmological agents that can
affect one’s life and well-being.

In this way, genes have been incorporated into indigenous
cosmology. The language
and rhetoric that my participants apply to discourses of fate are
often re-appropriated to
help them think through genetics and other biomedical body
knowledge. While I do not
have the space in this paper to unpack the complex construction
of ‘fate’ itself in Dubai,
my larger ethnography has shown that fate is a language of
uncertainty in Dubai, but is
often incommensurable and sometimes even congruous with
deep personal agency (Par-
khurst 2014). In thinking through the body in the city, and the
body of the future, fate
becomes a rhetoric that is helpful to situate oneself in the
conditions of vacillation I have
described above. In relationship to disease, other
anthropologists have shown how Islamic
conceptions of fate are better understood as languages for
structural imbalance. Sherine
Hamdy’s work in Egypt, for example, shows how fate is
invoked by some as mechanism
to take action and meaning within systems of political failure
and structural violence
(Hamdy 2008, 2009). In contrast to traditional perceptions of
‘Islamic fate’ by colonialist
thinkers, my participants often invoked strong sentiments of
personal cultivation and cos-
mological futility simultaneously. Because of its place in
religion and other systems of
social relations, fate, as locally defined as submission to God, is
proudly locally owned as a
marker of identity, yet is practiced with ambivalence. Processes
of modernity and urbani-
sation as understood by my participants, because of their own
ambiguity, and because of

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