Courses / Module

This module explores outstanding works of literature (novel, short story and memoir), film and documentary, in English and in translation, by contemporary Arab writers and filmmakers who are originally from the Middle East and North Africa and migrated to Europe and North America. These works address waves of socio-political oppression and resistance, conflicts and associated human rights violations in the Arab world, as well as unprecedented rates of clandestine and forced migration, especially to Europe. These aesthetically and politically important works invite reflections on trauma and storytelling, asylum seekers and refugees, neoliberalism and globalisation, environmentalism and the more-than-human, gender and sexual rights, religious diversity and extremism, as well as language, translation, and the transformative power of the literary and filmic imagination in a global context. (Iraq/Finland) Blasim, Hassan. "The Iraqi Christ," "Why Don't You Write a Novel, Instead of Talking about All These Characters?" and "The Dung Beetle" in The Iraqi Christ, trans. Jonathan Wright, Comma Press, 2013. (Palestine/US) Dabees, Cherien. Amreeka, 2009. Film. (Lebanon/Canada) Hage, Rawi. Cockroach, Penguin, [2008] 2015. (Syria/UK) Al-Kateab, Waad and Edward Watts. For Sama, 2019. Film. (Morocco/US) Lalami, Laila. Hope and Other Dangerous Pursuits, Algonquin Books of Chapel Hill, 2005. (Libya/UK) Matar, Hisham. In the Country of Men, Viking, 2011. (Egypt/US) Noujaim, Jehane, dir. The Square, 2013. Film.