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In this seminar we will focus on the interrelated issues of Orientalism and Islamophobia. We will begin with an introduction to the emergence of Orientalism, i.e. constructions of the so-called ‘Orient’ in the Western imagination, in different historical and cultural contexts, which encompass depictions of Eastern cultures in literature and the arts (including Western translations of and fascination with the stories from One Thousand and One Nights). We will then discuss a variety of texts, both critical (beginning with Edward Said’s famous study of Orientalism) and fictional (from seventeenth-century travel literature to contemporary short stories), as well as examples from visual culture (including book illustrations, paintings and films).
Texts:
An extensive course reader containing excerpts from literature discussed in the seminar as well as a selection of critical texts will be made available at the beginning of the semester. |
