The House and the Other House: An Ethnography of Kin-work in Publishing

Abstract

Publishing in Beirut is a kinship enterprise. This study examines the nexus of kinship and economics at a small publishing house. Starting with the dream of publishing and the kin-work that rendered it into reality, I study the dialectics of obligation and desire that sustain the publishing house. Resources in the form of money, labor, books, and texts circulate and morph between the family house, the publishing house, and the bookstore. I argue for an interpretive theory of economic activity which produces sale, consignment, gift, and debt exchanges. The Arabic book market is a market of talk. I argue that monetary and textual value claims require interpretation and slip between the market and the language systems. Speech patterns and socialities further consolidate into publishing methodologies. The publishing house contends with the secular and sacred aesthetic realms to produce crafted and textured books. I observe that their print artefacts impress onto the reader’s intuition and materialize a playful yet reverent orientation to the public. Eventually, this thesis studies exercises of meaning and matter making.