Message in a Mobile: Mixed-Messages, Tales of Missing and Mobile Communities at the University of Khartoum

Acknowledgements

viii Acknowledgements (0) Ϫϴϟ ϰϟϮϗ ϪϴΤλ έΎψΘϧϻ΍ Ϧϣ ϙήΒλ Ϟϣ ϥ΍ϭ ϮϬϴΠϋΰΗ ϻ ϙϮΟέ΍ Ϣ΋Ύϧ ϪΘϴϘϟ ϥ΍ϭ ϮϬϳέϭίϭ ΰϳΰόϟ ϪϟΎγέ Ύϳ ϰΣϭέ ήΤΗ ϻ ήϜϔΑ ϮϬϴϠΧ ϚΑϭΎΟ Ύϣ ϥ΍ϭ ϙΰόΑ ϪϟΎγήϟ΍ ΐΣΎλ ϮϬϴΟ ruuHii ya risaala l-‘aziz wa zuuriihuu wa in ligiithu naa’im arjuuk la taz ‘ajiihu wa in mella Sabrik min al-intizaar SaHiihu guuli leehu Sahib al-risaala bi‘izik wa in ma jaawabik khalliihu yafakir la taHrjiihuu ‘Go message to the kind one and visit him and if you find him sleeping please don’t bother him and if you lose patience from waiting wake him up and tell him the message owner appreciates you and if he does not reply you let him think don’t embarrass him’ This is one of my favourite text messages in the corpus that I collected. It is personified, meaning it takes on human qualities, and would better represent me than a few written words. I would like to think it could carry me to all those that I would like to thank personally and show my appreciation to for their support, kindness, help, interest, guidance, tolerance or whatever role was taken. In Sudan, I first must thank my dear friends and helpers, who prefer to remain under the pseudonyms Rashid and Imen but without whom I could never have made sense of any of this. I deeply appreciate their keen insight into the research and their endless energy and creativity not to mention the long exhausting hours in translation and typing. Moreover, I miss the relaxed afternoons drinking tea and musing about life in Sudan, discussions of people, poetry, music and other things. Many other students and friends at the University of Khartoum deserve mention, Joseph, Alessandro, Fellah, Samia, Hashim, Lu’lu’, Hatim are only a few among many. Hisham Bilal, thanks for picking me up at 5 o’clock in the morning, helping me buy my very important telephone number, but especially your friendship. Leila, and my other “sisters” Sara and Ashwag, and Mama, who were my family while in Sudan, thank you for introducing me to Sudanese life. I appreciate the working space, the sponsorship and the support provided by the Linguistics Department at the University of Khartoum. I am glad to have had the opportunity to teach a class there. To Dr. Omar al Siddiq at the Arabic Language Institute, Neda in the linguistics library, Abir, Suzan and Maha and Prof. Mugaddam. In Leiden, I am especially grateful to my supervisor Inge Brinkman at the African Studies Centre, who helped me develop my ideas, encouraged my work and carefully plowed through all the chapters. I really enjoyed and appreciated our discussions. And to Mirjam de Bruijn for nourishing and supporting my ix interest in such an interdisciplinary project and having faith in its realization. Also to Maarten Mous in the Linguistics Department for reading and complementing this work, in spite of its length and Karin Willemse for carefully reading and commenting on one of the chapters. To those Sudanese friends who helped with the editing of the Sudanese text in the Netherlands and in Germany, Mohamed Salah, Adam Ali, Tajeldin and Zahir Musa. This research was partially funded with the financial support of the Leiden University Fund, the Outbound Study Grant at the International Office and the Mobile Africa Revisited research group at the African Studies Centre. Thank you for extending your budgets in support of this work. I want my parents to know how much their weekly phone call meant to me, even if involved redialing twenty or so times to get through to me. I especially want to thank my fellow students and friends in the Mphil program at the ASC, Sophie, Marieke and most of all, my dear friend Martina, who knows all the struggles and successes inside and out. ...