Research Question: How does society influence Hassan’s decision to keep his loyalty to Amir?

Annotated Bibliography

Cullather, Nick. "Damming Afghanistan: Modernization in a Buffer State." The Journal of American History 89.2 (2002): 512-37. ProQuest. Web. 27 May 2013.

This scholarly journal explains that America plans to help Afghanistan to develop their country and also to prevent the local culture, which is influenced by Russian.
In the article, Cullather points out that, “Within Afghanistan's government, the impulse to modernize went back to the early twentieth century when tribal and ethnic loyalties were reformed as a national identity.”(5). This shows the importance of the loyalty in Afghanistan culture and can support my topic. Although only a small part of this journal is related to my research question, the ideas and research results could be used as references.

Kenneth D. Wann. "Cultural Values and Learning in Afghanistan." Educational Leadership Journal April 1959: 434-454. Print.

This article introduces the development of the education of Afghanistan from 1937 when Afghanistan was united under one king to 1959. Kenneth argues, "In modernizing their educational system, the people of Afghanistan are striving toward consistent emphasis upon the enduring elements of their own culture" (434). This article would be useful resource as it demonstrates what the Afghanistan students learned in school and how it changed as time lapses. In addition, Kenneth D. Wann is professor of education at Teachers College, Columbia University, New York, N.Y.

Mazhar, Muhammad Saleem, Samee Ozair Khan and Naheed S. Goraya. “Ethnic Factor in Afghanistan.” Journal of Political Studies 19.2 (2012): 97-109. Web. 29 May 2013.

This scholarly journal mainly talks about the ethnic factor in Afghanistan. It firstly introduces the ethnic background information of Afghanistan, which includes the origins of various ethnic groups and its history. Also, it describes every main ethnic group of Afghanistan in detail. Author shows a geographic map of distribution in regions of different ethnic groups in Afghanistan and some data related to the population of these groups’ percentages of the total population. In addition, it analyzes the important role of ethnicity in the society of Afghanistan and some serious problems caused by that. At the end of the journal, the author said, “But even then historically, the ethnic loyalties have been stronger than any other fidelity and have had anecdotal degrees of power among diverse social groups” (106). This indicates that whatever in which ethnic, loyalty is considered as the most vital character and it is related to my topic perfectly.

Riphenburg, Carol. “Ethnicity and Civil Society in Contemporary Afghanistan.” The Middle East Journal 1 (2005): 31-51. Web. 23 May 2013.

This scholarly journal discusses mainly about the conditions and problems among different ethnic groups in Afghanistan. It shows the distribution in population among the several main ethnic groups using specific data in detail. Also, it describes the social and political status of these ethnic groups, especially for the Pashtuns and the Hazaras. In addition, the relationship between these ethnic groups and some problems caused by that have been mentioned in the journal, such as discrimination in Afghanistan due to the ethnicity. According to Carol Riphenburg, “Pashtuns from the Durrani tribes strengthened their control over state and society, often to the detriment of other tribal and ethnic groups” (38). This scholarly journal would be useful source as it analyzes the relationship between different ethnic groups in Afghanistan and describes the status about Pashtuns and Hazaras in detail and this information is related to my topic about the social factor influencing loyalty.