IMAGINING PALESTINE: Cultures of Exile and National Identity

Description

All national identities are somewhat fluid, held together by collective beliefs and practices as much as official territory and borders. In the context of the Palestinians, whose national status in so many instances remains unresolved, the articulation and ‘imagination’ of national identity is particularly urgent. This book explores the ways that Palestinian intellectuals, artists, activists and ordinary citizens ‘imagine’ their homeland, examining the works of key Palestinian thinkers and writers such as Edward Said, Mahmoud Darwish, Mourid Barghouti, Ghassan Kanafani and Naji Al Ali. Deploying Benedict Anderson’s notion of ‘Imagined Communities’ and Edward Soja’s theory of ‘Third Space’, Tahrir Hamdi argues that the imaginative construction of Palestine is a key element in the Palestinians’ ongoing struggle. An interdisciplinary work drawing upon critical theory, postcolonial studies and literary analysis, this book will be of interest to students and scholars of Palestine and Middle East studies and Arabic literature Cover Contents List of Figures Acknowledgements Introduction Imagining Palestine: Defining the concept Beginning with Palestine: The historical context Chapter 1 The Restless Spirit: Palestine Theorized Said’s (Post) catastrophic theoretical oeuvre Theorizing resistance literature: Ghassan Kanafani’s contribution Chapter 2 Exile is the World Inside: The Poetry of Resistance and Solidarity Exile is the world inside: Darwish, Said and identity in exile On the poetry of besiegement and resistance: Mahmoud Darwish’s ‘state of siege’ and other poems On the poetry of solidarity: June Jordan, Suheir Hammad, Darwish, Adonis, Roger Waters and the Trio Joubran, John Trudell and Lee Maracle On imagining victory: Mourid Barghouti’s ‘midnight’ Chapter 3 Writing Self, Writing Nation in the memoir and the Novel: Palestine Narrated The Palestinian story must be told Said’s personal and collective exilic out of placeness The difficulty of representation in the memoir and the novel: Out of place and out of time in the works of Kanafani, Susan Abulhawa, Radwa Ashour and Mourid Barghouti Chapter 4 Writings on the Wall Palestine writes on walls and in notebooks: Revolutionary imaginings Olive trees: Uprooting and bitterness: Barghouti and Hamdi K. Hamdi, the intertwining of life, literature and science Drawings on the wall: Naji al-Ali Palestinian song, dance and revolution: From heritage to resistance Conclusion Continuing the Conversation: Palestine, A Living Cause Notes Bibliography Index