Readings

Required Texts

Buy at Amazon Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York, NY: Pantheon, 1978. ISBN: 9780710000408.

Buy at Amazon Abu-Lughod, Lila. Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1986. ISBN: 9780520054837.

Buy at Amazon Nieuwkerk, Karin Van. A Trade Like Any Other: Female Singers and Dancers in Egypt. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1995. ISBN: 9780292787209.

Buy at Amazon Eickelman, Dale F. The Middle East and Central Asia: an Anthropological Approach. 3rd ed. Englewood Cliff, NJ: Prentice-Hall, 1997. ISBN: 9780131230194.

week # Topics Readings and Viewings
1 Introduction Videotape: Algiers (1938) with Charles Boyer and Hedy Lamarr.

Videotape: The Battle of Algiers (1967) plus handouts of film scenarios.

Buy at Amazon Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. New York, NY: Grove Press, 1965, pp. 38-39. ISBN: 9780802150837. (Handout.)

Eickelman, pp. 1-26.
2 Orientalism Buy at Amazon Said, Edward. Orientalism. New York, NY: Pantheon, 1978, part 1, pp. 1-110, and 166-197. ISBN: 9780710000408.

———. "Orientalism Reconsidered." Cultural Critique 1 (1986): 89-107.

al-'Azm, Sadiq Jalal. "Orientalism and Orientalism in Reverse." Khamsin 8 (1981): 5-27.
3 Performance: The Egyptian Dancing Girl Eickelman, pp. 27-52.

Lane, Edward, and Gerard de Nerval. Description de l'Egypte. (Handouts.)
4 Popular and Folk Culture Slyomovics, Susan. "Arabic Folk Literature and Political Expression." Arab Studies Quarterly 8, no. 2 (1986): 178-85. (PDF)

Buy at Amazon ———. "Arabic Traditions." As originally published in Teaching Oral Traditions. Edited by John Miles Foley. New York, NY: The Modern Language Assocation, 1998, pp. 266-272. ISBN: 9780873523714. (PDF)

Videotape: The Power of the Word.

Webber, Sabra. "On Canonicity, Literacy, and Middle Eastern Folk Narrative." Edebiyat 4, no. 1 (1993): 35-48.
5 The Performance of Folktale: "The Story of Solomon and Sheba" -- Christian, Muslim and Jewish texts 1) Bible. Old Testament: I Kings, I Chronicles; 2) Bible. New Testament: Matthew 12.42 and Luke 11.31; and 3) Koran: Sura 27

Handouts: Targum Sheni on The Book of Esther and al-Kisa'i, Stories of the Prophets.

Buy at Amazon de Nerval, Gerard. "The Tale of the Queen of the Morning." In Journey to the Orient. London, UK: Peter Owen Ltd, 1972, pp. 123-213. ISBN: 9780720600117.
6 Performance and the Koran Buy at Amazon Nelson, Kristina. The Art of Koranic Chant. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1986, pp. 1-51. ISBN: 9780292703674.

Audiocassettes of Koranic chanters.

Buy at Amazon Fernea, Elizabeth Warnock. Guests of the Sheikh: An Ethnography of an Iraqi Village. New York, NY: Anchor, 1995, pp. 106-126. ISBN: 9780385014854. (Section on women's kraya.)

Eickelman, pp. 249-323.
7 Women and Poetic Performances Buy at Amazon Abu-Lughod, Lila. Veiled Sentiments: Honor and Poetry in a Bedouin Society. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1986. ISBN: 9780520054837.

Joseph, Terri Brint. "Poetry as a Strategy of Power: The Case of the Riffian Berber Women." Signs 5, no. 3 (1980): 418-434.

Eickelman, pp. 123-173.
8 Wedding Song

Videotape: Slyomovics, Amanda Dargan. Wedding Song (1990).

Slyomovics. Wedding Song, accompanying booklet. (PDF)

Eickelman, pp. 174-221.

9 Professional Entertainers: Solo Females Buy at Amazon Nieuwkerk, Karin Van. A Trade Like Any Other: Female Singers and Dancers in Egypt. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1995. ISBN: 9780292787209.

Buy at Amazon Fernea, Elizabeth Warnock, and Bassima Qattan Bezirgan, ed. "The Umm Kulthum Nobody Knows." In Middle Eastern Muslim Women Speak. Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1977, pp. 134-165. ISBN: 9780292750333.

Eickelman, pp. 222-247.
10 Professional Entertainers: Arab Oral Epic Performance Buy at Amazon Slyomovics, Susan. The Merchant of Art: An Oral Epic Egyptian Poet in Performance. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1988, pp. 1-35, and 264-268. ISBN: 9780520097377.

Videotape: Slyomovics. The Merchant of Art (1986).

———. "Approaches to Transcription and Translation of Arab Oral Epics." (Unpublished English translation of "Methodes de transcription et traduction d'une performance de geste orale arabe." In Le Conte (1987): 127-139. Edited by Pierre Lyon and Paul Perron. Montreal, Canada: Didier.) (PDF)

———. "Asig Ra'bad: The Passion of Ma'bad." Oriente Moderno, XXI n.s. (LXXXII), no. 3 (2002). Edited by Claudio lo Jacono of Istituto per l'Oriente C.A. Nallino of Roma (Italy). (PDF)
11 Islam in America: Parades and Mosques Aswad, Barbara. "Arab Americans: Those Who Followed Columbus." Middle East Studies Association Bulletin 27 (July 1993): 5-22.

Buy at Amazon Slyomovics, Susan. "New York City's Muslim World Day Parade." In Nation and Migration: The Politics of Space in the South Asian Diaspora. Edited by Peter Van Der Veer. Philadephia, PA: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1995, pp. 157-177. ISBN: 9780812215373. (PDF)

Buy at Amazon Slyomovics. The Muslim World Day Parade and 'Storefront' Mosques of New York City." In Making Muslim Space in North America and Europe. Edited by Barbara Daly Metcalf. Berkeley, CA: University of California Press, 1996, pp. 204-216. ISBN: 9780520204034. The Regents of the University of California.

Buy at Amazon ———. "Comparing Mosques to New York City's Ethnic and Social Clubs." In NY Masjid: The Mosques of New York. Edited by Jerrilyn Dodds. New York, NY: Storefront for Art and Architecture, 1996, n.p. Catalogue essay with photographs for a museum exhibition, Nov. 30, 1996-Jan. 30, 1997 held at the Storefront for Art and Architecture, powerHouse Books; 1 edition (May 2002). ISBN: 9781576871355. (PDF)