LIT 180 - FS: First-Year Seminar

FDR: HL
Credits: 3

Winter 2018, LIT 180-01: FS: Jinn and Ghosts: Poetry, Madness, and Memory in Modern Arabic Literature (3). First-year seminar. Prerequisite: First-year standing. Completion of FDR writing requirement (FW). This course traces the trope of the jinn in Arabic literature: from the place of jinn in the Qur’an and Islamic tradition, through their entanglement with poetic inspiration, to their reincarnation in modern works of literature. More specifically, we ask why do modern authors call up demons and resurrect ghosts, and what political and cultural work these beings, which are neither human nor divine, not quite living and not quite dead, are required to do. Consequently, we explore the manner jinn are latched onto modern debates on personal and collective trauma, memory, madness, relations between East and West (or North and South), political violence, gender difference, and virtual realities. (HL) Alon.