Provincializing the Public Sphere: The Press in Late Qajar and Early Pahlavi Iran

This paper considers how local economic, geographical and socio-religious conditions, such as the intensity of commercial activities, the proximity to borderlands, and the density of educational networks simultaneously enables and limits the emergence of provincial public spheres in early twentieth-century Iran. It argues that a view from the edge of the Iranian press produces an alternative account of the public sphere: newspapers printed outside of the capital Tehran demonstrate the fragmented, heterogeneous, and contested nature of provincial publics. Taking three cities—Isfahan, Rasht, and Tabriz—as case studies, this paper suggests there were multiple provincial publics with local and regional debates and characteristics that do not fit neatly into a single national narrative. By provincializing the Iranian public sphere, we realize that Persian publishers in the provinces were integrated into a number of interconnected fields that included other Iranian provinces, the capital Tehran, and South Asia, Central Asia, the Persian Gulf, and beyond. The circulation of the press and its producers illuminates not only the history of printing, but also of censorship, political opposition, and European imperialism in Iran.