Friederike Pannewick

Georges Khalil

This book is about relations between literature, society and politics in the Arab world. It is an attempt to come to terms with the changing conceptualizations of the political in Arabic literature in recent modern history. It examines historical and contemporary conceptions of literary commitment (iltizam) and how notions of 'writing with a cause' have been shaped, contested, re-actualized since the 1940s until today. Against the backdrop of the current social and political transformations in the Arab world, questions on the role of the arts, specifically literature and its politics, arise with immediacy and require profound reflection and analysis. The chapters reexamine critically both current and historical notions of the political in modern Arabic literature as well as the legacy of iltizam as a term and an agenda. Literary commitment is understood here not just solely as a (completed) period in Arabic literary history but also as a vivid, changing and continuing idea that questions the role of literature and the author in and for a society.

Reflections On/Of the Political in Arabic Literature Since the 1940s

Commitment and Beyond

Alena Strohmaier

Rachid Ouaissa

This edited volume is an open access title and assembles both the historical consciousness and transformation of the MENA region in various disciplinary and topical facets. At the same time, it aims to go beyond the MENA region, contributing to critical debates on area studies while pointing out transregional and cultural references in a broad and comparative manner.

Contextualising Transformation Processes and Lasting Crises in the Middle East and North Africa

Re-Configurations

Julius Dihstelhoff

Charlotte Pardey

The impulse for the recent transformations in the Arab world came from the Maghreb. Research on the region has been on the rise since, yet much remains to be done when it comes to interdisciplinary comparative research. The Maghreb is a heterogeneous region that deserves thorough investigation. This volume focuses on Entanglements as a cross-field and cross-lingual concept to generate a new approach to the region and its inner interdependencies as well as exchanges with other regions. Eminent researchers conceptualize Entanglements through the description of various thematic fields and actors in motion, addressing culture, politics, social affairs, and economics.

Cultural and Political Aspects of a Region in Motion

Entanglements of the Maghreb

Friederike Pannewick

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