Conducting Research in Lebanon: An Overview of Historical Sources in Beirut (Part I)
Nearly two decades of war in Lebanon crippled possibilities for historical research during a period when scholarship underwent significant theoretical and methodological developments. The last several years, however, have seen a renewed vigor to preserve, catalog, and promote all types of sources that could possibly shed light on the rich history of the country and of the Middle East in general. Sources and resources in Lebanon are largely decentralized, rendering the country something of a logistical labyrinth that can cost scholars considerable expenditures of time and energy. This article is a modest attempt to facilitate research in Beirut. Although mostly geared towards historians, we hope that this article may prove useful to scholars from other fields as well. It is slightly slanted towards the British and American academies, particularly since the Francophone world has been so much more embedded in the intellectual and scholarly atmosphere of the country.