Studies how oil has shaped societies and cultures of the modern Middle East This volume explores the ways petroleum as an industry and substance has moulded the social, cultural and artistic life of the Middle East. Rather than tackling the powers of this crucial resource from the perspective of macro-economics, impersonal rentier states and large corporations, this book 'brings oil back' into the ebbs and flows of Middle Eastern life. It focuses on the ways petroleum mediates and is mediated by national formations and imaginaries, visual practices, as well as scientific, business and artistic production. In focusing on the largest oil producing and exporting region in the world, this volume sheds light on the effects and affects of petroleum's presence within and beyond the oil-industry. Part 1: Exposing Oil sets out the main themes through which oil is analysed in the volume (visibility, experience, representation and mediation). Part 2: Oil Images deals with image making by the oil industry (as graphs, aerial photographs and promotional media) and by artists and designers who have engaged with, and commented on, oil's presence in the region. Part 3: Oil Subjects focuses on the production of (oil) subjecthood and the formation of oil knowledge. Key Features - Proposes a new research agenda for the study of the oil's varied lives in the contemporary Middle East - Combines the work of leading historians and anthropologists, who have pioneered the study of Middle Eastern oil cultures and societies, with world-renown artists, curators and designers - Includes 2 photo essays by Alia Younis and Rania Ghosn that showcase critical reflections on their oil-related work The Editors Nelida Fuccaro is Professor of Middle Eastern History at NYU Abu Dhabi. Mandana Limbert is Associate Professor of Anthropology at Queens College and the Graduate Center, CUNY.