Recovering the Past: Heritage, History, and Memory in the Modern Middle East
How is "the past" experienced and consumed in the modern Middle East? Considering recent ethnographic work on heritage, history, and memory in the Middle East, we will investigate the symbolic import of the "past" and the purported tensions between "authenticity" and "modernity" in this region. In this course we will provide an introduction to the colonial and postcolonial history of this region, but will focus on national commemorations, competing pasts, invented traditions, the role of nostalgia, and the construction (and destruction) of cultural heritage. 3 hrs. lect./disc.