Afterlives of Urban Muslim Asia: Muslim Perspectives on Non-Muslim Minorities in Aleppo, and Life Histories of Aleppine Armenians in Kuwait, 2022-2024

Predominantly Muslim urban centres in Asia – such as Aleppo, Herat, Kabul and Bukhara – have historically been home to sizeable communities of ethno-religious minorities, including Jews, Christians, Sikhs and Hindus. Yet it is widely accepted that conflict and large-scale migrations over the past century, of minorities and Muslims, has led to 'decosmopolitisation'. Scholarship on the migrant communities that identify with these cities tends to reinforce this perception of decosmopolitisation.

The hypothesis of this research project is that interreligious relations actually persist, but often unrecognised, in older and newer diasporic contexts, and in appeals to a shared urban heritage. This comparative research programme analyses the ways in which both everyday living and projects of the imagination invoke urban imaginaries, and the extent to which these transcend (or reinforce) religious, sectarian, national and ethnic boundaries. Its empirical focus is on the experiences of ethno-religious minorities and the extent to which legacies of cosmopolitan urban life remain a vital aspect of the cities' Muslim populations.

This data collection relates to the Aleppo strand of the project. Questionnaires in Arabic were distributed electronically to Muslim residents and former residents of popular / working-class (sha‘bi) quarters of Aleppo through an Arab Muslim former resident of the Hilluk district of Aleppo who had migrated to Gaziantep during the Syrian civil war (2012-). Life history interviews were also conducted with prominent Aleppine Armenian members of the Armenian community in Kuwait: the priest of the Armenian church in Aleppo, and two leading Syrian Armenian merchants who run successful businesses in Kuwait and play a prominent role in the Armenian community there.

亚洲以穆斯林为主体的城市中心——如阿勒颇、赫拉特、喀布尔与布哈拉——历史上均孕育了规模可观的族裔宗教少数群体社区，涵盖犹太人、基督徒、锡克教徒与印度教徒。学界普遍认为，过去一个世纪以来，少数群体与穆斯林群体均遭遇的冲突与大规模迁徙，已引发了去世界主义化（decosmopolitisation）。针对依附于这些城市的移民群体的相关研究，往往强化了这种去世界主义化的认知。

本研究项目的核心假设为：宗教间关系实则依然存续，但在新旧流散语境以及对共享城市遗产的诉求中，这种关系往往未被察觉。本比较研究计划将分析日常生活与想象性建构活动塑造城市想象图景的路径，以及这些活动在多大程度上跨越（或强化）了宗教、教派、国家与族裔边界。本研究的经验研究重心，聚焦于族裔宗教少数群体的生活体验，以及世界主义城市生活的遗产在多大程度上仍是这些城市穆斯林群体的重要生活面向。

本次数据采集对应本项目中的阿勒颇分支。研究团队通过一位在叙利亚内战（2012年至今）期间移居至加济安泰普的阿勒颇希卢克区前阿拉伯穆斯林居民，以电子方式向阿勒颇平民/工人阶级（sha‘bi）街区的穆斯林居民与前居民发放了阿拉伯语问卷。此外，研究团队还对科威特亚美尼亚社群中杰出的阿勒颇裔亚美尼亚成员开展了生活史访谈：包括阿勒颇亚美尼亚教会的神职人员，以及两位在科威特经营成功企业、并在当地亚美尼亚社群中发挥重要影响力的叙利亚亚美尼亚商界领袖。