Premium
The joke is on us: Irony and community in a Beirut scrapyard
Author(s) -
SALEH ELIZABETH,
ZAKAR ADRIEN
Publication year - 2018
Publication title -
anthropology today
Language(s) - English
Resource type - Journals
SCImago Journal Rank - 0.419
H-Index - 24
eISSN - 1467-8322
pISSN - 0268-540X
DOI - 10.1111/1467-8322.12431
Subject(s) - complicity , joke , irony , trips architecture , work (physics) , sociology , argumentation theory , gender studies , political science , law , engineering , art , mechanical engineering , philosophy , literature , epistemology , transport engineering
The Lebanese scrap metal industry – one of the country's largest exports – relies heavily upon marginalized young boys displaced from their homes in Syria. These underage waste pickers are not supposed to be working, and yet work is the only legitimate reason for their presence in Lebanon. Workers engage in different types of trip as they journey across Beirut, discreetly rummaging through rubbish. These trips allow them to cover up play under the guise of work while fostering a community of complicity that functions according to age hierarchies, rites of passage and codes of conduct.