Memory Politics in Bahrain: The Invocation of the Early Modern Past in the Aftermath of the February 14, 2011 Uprising

Abstract: On February 14, 2011, protests broke out in Bahrain led by the mostly Shi'i opposition against the Sunni Al Khalifa ruling family. After a failed attempt to appease the protestors, the Al Khalifa government blamed Iran for the unrest and invited Saudi and Emirati troops to enter Bahrain and crush the uprising. This article explores how and why the events of an earlier crisis, which began with a Shi'i uprising in 1922 and widened to include Iranian nationals in 1923, was remembered and communicated by states and social groups in the aftermath of the 2011 protests, both in scholarly articles and in the digital media. These contested narratives of Bahrain's past are located within the politically charged context of the 2011 uprising to shed light on the relationship between memory and politics in Bahrain.