ANTHRO 330 Anthropology of the Middle East, Jessica Winegar
ENGL 383 Globalization and Literature, Brian T. Edwards
HIST 270 Middle Eastern/Islamic Civilization, Carl Petry
HIST 392/395 Revolutionary Egypt under Nasser and Sadat, Carl Petry
Poli Sci 101 The Israeli-Palestinian Conflict, Wendy Pearlman
CONPUB 658: Introduction to Islamic Law (Law School course in Spring semester 2009), Kristen Stilt
History 492: Historiography of the Islamic Middle East (Graduate Seminar), Carl Petry
MUSICOL 335: Music and Gender in Non-Western cultures, Inna Naroditskaya
POLI SCI 372:
The Middle East in International Politics, Wendy Pearlman
This course, offered separately in WCAS and the Northwestern School of Continuing Studies, explores the comparative politics and political development of the Middle East and North Africa, with a focus on the Arab states. To situate contemporary issues in their historic context, the course begins with an overview of the colonial period, the rise of nationalism, and state-building processes. It then turns to topics prominent in the study of the Middle East today, including political identities and culture, political Islam, social movements, the durability of authoritarian regimes, and the prospects for democratization. In the course of this examination, it also discusses the Arab-Israeli conflict and the future of Iraq. This course will help students use the concepts, theories, and methods of comparative politics to develop a more profound and nuanced understanding of this dynamic region of the world.
Radio-TV-Film 300-level: Middle Eastern Cinemas, Hamid Naficy
History 372:
Ancient Egypt, Carl Petry
This course, offered separately in WCAS and the Northwestern School of Continuing Studies, will not attempt to survey chronologically the myriad events unfolding over more than three millennia of Egyptian History. Rather, emphasis will be placed on major themes and debated issues, including the following: Problems of historical study relative to a society "without historians"; Emergence of the political order during the Prehistoric Period; Divine monarchy and the myth of permanence during the Old Kingdom; the shattering of this myth during the First Intermediate Period; The "custodial monarch" of the Middle Kingdom; The impact of Asia: new horizons, new anxieties; Aspects of cosmopolitanism and intellectual syncretism during the Empire Period; The religious revolution of Akhenaton; The myth of permanence reborn as a cult of conservation.
MUSICOL 331: Music and Orientalism, Inna Naroditskaya
The Orient: mysterious, sensuous, hypnotic, and dangerous. Non-existent on any map, the Orient is an image of the east invented by West - by writers Gustave Flaubert and Alexandre Dumas, painters Jean Auguste Ingres and Henry Matisse, composers Wolfgang Mozart, Nicolas Puccini, Georges Bizet, and Alexander Borodin. It is the Others, created and needed by Us! Students will discuss the long-(ever)-existing 'representation' of culturally and politically distant Others. Does the artistic Orient reflect the ethnic and cultural diversity of East? And what is East? Is the Orient a place for artists to escape from the boundaries of their own cultures or the domain against which Europeans could define their own ideals? The course introduce students with vast Orientalist repertoire (primarily operas), theory of Orientalism, and gender study. Much thinking is required!
POLI SCI 100-20 (Freshman Seminar): The Middle East in International Relations, Elizabeth Shakman Hurd
POLI SCI 395: Global Politics and the Middle East, Elizabeth Shakman Hurd
This course is about the politics and history of the Arab states, Israel, Iran and Turkey from a global perspective. We will focus on relations between Europe, the United States, and the Middle East. Topics include the U.S.-led occupation of Iraq, religion and politics in the Middle East, the history, politics and legacies of the 1953 coup in Iran and the 1979 Iranian Revolution, the global political economy of oil, relations between Turkey and the European Union, the Arab/Israeli dispute, Orientalism, and the "war on terror." Debates over modernization, globalization, and secularization both in and outside the region will receive considerable attention.
Radio-TV-Film 584: Graduate Research Seminar: Iranian Art Cinema, Hamid Naficy
Called “one of the pre-eminent national cinemas in the world” in the 1990s both by Toronto International Film Festival and New York Film Festival, Iranian postrevolutionary cinema is a vital productive activity with its own special industrial, financial, and professional structures and unique ideological, thematic, generic, and aesthetic values, which evolved over the decades to encompass several different types of cinemas. One of these is the art cinema that is widely viewed and praised outside the country. This cinema is part of a more general transformation in the political culture of the country since the revolution of 1978-1979, but it is founded on the fertile grounds of a cinema that preceded the revolution. This course examines its emergence, evolution, and diversity, including representation of women, in the context of Iranian national aspirations and Islamic religious values as well a rich tradition of visual and performing arts.
Religion 476: Studies in Islam, Rüdiger Seesemann
This class explores the rich diversity of and the interaction between contemporary Islamic movements in Africa. These include Wahhabism, Salafism, Islamism, Shiism, and also several Sufi organizations. Case studies will be drawn from various areas of Africa, and particular attention will be paid to theoretical and methodological questions.
