Inside Qatar

I was alerted to this book by the cover of the latest Geographical magazine.

Out on the 7th of July, which is good timing for the start of the summer term, and published by Icon Books.

Details from the publisher below:

Just 75 years ago, the Gulf nation of Qatar was a backwater, reliant on pearl diving. Today it is a gas-laden parvenu with seemingly limitless wealth and ambition. Skyscrapers, museums and futuristic football stadiums rise out of the desert and Ferraris race through the streets. But in the shadows, migrant workers toil in the heat for risible amounts.

Inside Qatar reveals how real people live in this surreal place, a land of both great opportunity and great iniquity. Ahead of Qatar's time in the limelight as host of the 2022 FIFA Men's World Cup, anthropologist John McManus lifts a lid on the hidden worlds of its gilded elite, its spin doctors and thrill seekers, its manual labourers and domestic workers.

The sum of their tales is not some exotic cabinet of curiosities. Instead, Inside Qatar opens a window onto the global problems – of unfettered capitalism, growing inequality and climate change – that concern us all.

John McManus is a social anthropologist and writer who has spent most of the past decade in Turkey and the Middle East. 

Has the potential to be another book to find a strong geography teacher audience given the World Cup will be held there at the end of the year.

A review here.