Arabic and Middle Eastern Literary and Cultural Studies: Home

Overviews

Culture and History

• Encyclopedia of Islam
• Encyclopedia of Islam and the Muslim World
• Everyday life in the Muslim Middle East
• Middle East patterns: places, peoples, and politics
• Pop Culture Arab world!  Media, Arts, and Lifestyle.

Cinema

• Arab Cinema: History and Cultural Identity.
• Companion Encyclopedia of Middle Eastern and North African Film.
• Historical Dictionary of Middle Eastern Cinema.

   

Literature

• Arab women writers: a critical reference guide, 1873-1999
• Dictionary of Literary Biography
• Encyclopedia of Arabic Literature
• A Historical Companion to Postcolonial Literatures: Continental Europe and Its Empires
• Modern Arabic literature
• Modern Arabic literature in translation: a companion

War

• The Oxford Handbook of War

All Subjects

• CREDO Reference
• Oxford Reference Online

Visuals

Images

• ARTstor
• Picture Collection   |  Digital Collections (New York Public Library )
• Library of Congress

Streaming Videos

• Films from Kanopy
• Filmmakers Library Online (Award-winning documentaries)
• PBS Video Collection

**see also, Finding Videos

    Professor Alexandra Chreiteh (Shraytekh)

•     Fantastic cohabitations: magical realism in Arabic and Hebrew and the politics of aesthetics
•    Ali and his Russian mother
• Always Coca-Cola.
• دايمًا-- كوكا كول al-Ṭabʻah 1. ed., Bayrūt, Al-Dār Al-ʻArabīyah Lil-ʻUlūm Nāshirūn.
•   علي وأمه الروسيّة : [رواية]al-Ṭabʻah 1. ed., Bayrūt, Al-Dār Al-ʻArabīyah Lil-ʻUlūm Nāshirūn.

  Professor Kamran Rastegar

•    Surviving Images: Cinema, War and Cultural Memory in the Middle East.
•    Literary Modernity Between Europe and the Middle East: Transactions in Nineteenth-Century Arabic, Persian and English Literatures.
• Editor of special issue: "Authoring the Nahda: Writing the Arabic 19^th Century" Journal of Middle Eastern Literatures, 16:3, 2013.
• Personal Website

 Annotated Bibliographies

• Islamic studies
• Cinema and media studies
• Dissertations and Theses (Check out the bibliographies of recent dissertations on your topic.)

 (JumboSearch for) Books  

 

Note: Libraries Worldwide is still a better place to get a fuller picture of  books on a topic.

Keywords to try out in search of books on varies themes covered in your courses:

Arabic and Middle Eastern Literature

• 1. on literary writers and their works

  • Najib Mahfuz
  • Ilyas Khuri
  • "Suad Amiry"
  • Edward Said
  • Ghada Samma
  • Hanan al - Shaiykh
  • Lila Abu Lughod
  • Leila Ahmed
  • Mahmoud Darwish

  2. in the context of the genres:

  • Arabic fiction
  • Arabic drama
  • Arabic poetry
   

  3. in the context of the Literary History:

  • Arabic Literature -- History And Criticism.
  • Arabic literature Palestine
  • Arabic fiction -- Palestine
  • Arabic poetry -- Palestine
  • Iranian literature
  • Persian literature
  • Turkish literature
  • Middle Eastern literature

  4. Topic:

  • Arabian nights

  ---

  Travel Literature

  Arabic Travelers

  • Travelers' writings, Arabic
  • Travelers' writings persian
  • Muslim travelers

  European Travelers

  • Travelers' writings, European
  
  
  • Travelers' Writings, English.
  • Travelers' Writings, English -- Middle East.  
  • Travelers' Writings, English -- Orient
  • Travelers' Writings, English -- Turkey
  • British -- Travel -- Middle East
  • Palestine -- Description and travel.
  • Iran -- Description and travel
  • Saudi Arabia -- Description and travel
  • Turkey -- Description and travel.
  • Middle East -- Description and travel.

  in the Context of

  • Travelers' Writings
  • Travel writing
  
  
  • Travelers -- Middle East.
  
  
  • Travelers Europe
  
  
  • East and West
  
  
  • Travelers -- Great Britain.

  Related Topics

  • Orient in literature
  • East and West in Literature

 

Tips in using Literary Anthologies and Collections

• keywords to try out: arab* and antholog*

  Introductory texts in anthologies provide overviews and surveys of the literary periods. The explanatory footnotes enhance an understanding of the works in terms of contemporary culture in which the authors live and write. Hence, the historical significance of the works.

  Sample findings:

  • Classical Arabic literature: a library of Arabic literature anthology
  • Classical Arabic Stories: an Anthology / edited and with an introduction by Salma Khadra Jayyusi.
  • Modern Arabic Fiction: an Anthology. / edited by Salma Khadra Jayyusi.
  • Opening the gates: an anthology of Arab feminist writing

 

Arabic and Middle Eastern Film

• 1. on particular themes and Topics:

  • Motion pictures and globalization
  • Intercultural communication in motion pictures
  • Emigration and immigration in motion pictures.
  • (diaspora or exile) and cinema
  • "third cinema"
  • "fourth cinema"
  • (film* or cinema) and postcolonial
   

  Middle Eastern Cities in Literature/Cinema

  • Algiers (Algeria)
  • Beirut (Lebanon)
  
  
  • Cairo (Egypt)
  • City and town life -- Egypt -- Cairo
  
  
  • Damascus (Syria)
  • Istanbul (Turkey)
  • Jerusalem -- History
  • Tehran (Iran)
  • Tunis (Tunisia)
  
  
  • Cities and towns -- Arab countries
  • Cities and towns, Ancient -- Middle East
  • Cities and towns -- Middle East
  • Cities and towns -- Iran.

  2. on Filmmakers and Films

  • Makhmalbāf, Muhsin
  • "Elia Suleiman"
  • The Battle of Algiers

  3. place the themes in the larger context

  • Motion pictures Turkey (a country)
  • Motion pictures -- Iran
  • Motion pictures Palestine

  4. Regional and Geopolitical

  • Motion pictures Arab (a region)
  • Motion pictures -- Middle East.
  • Motion pictures -- Developing countries. (geopolitical)

 

War and Cultural Memory

• 1. Wars:

  • Algeria -- History -- Revolution, 1954-1962
  • Arab-Israeli Conflict
  • Israel-Arab War, 1948-1949
  • Iraq War, 2003-2011
  • Iran-Iraq War, 1980-1988
  • Lebanon history civil war 1975-1990
  • Muslim women and rights

  2. War Stories and Films:

  • War stories
  • War films
  • War films -- Israel -- History and criticism.
  • War films -- Lebanon.
  • War films -- United States

  2. on Cultural Memory of War

  • War and society -- Lebanon.
  • War in mass media
  • War in literature
  • Art and war
  • Psychic trauma in motion pictures
  • "collective memory" and war
  • "collective memory" and war and Japan*
  • "popular culture" and war and russia*
  • "visual communication" and war

 Journal and Magazine Articles 

A. All subjects

• JSTOR
• Project Muse

B. Middle Eastern Studies

• Index Islamicus

C. Other discipline/subject Databases

• In EBSCOhost databases, you can select to search across the following databases, among others:
• Academic Search Premier (all subjects)
• Art & Architecture Source
• ATLA Religion
• Communication & Mass Media Complete
• Film & Television Literature Index
• Historical Abstracts (World history and culture)
• LGBTQ+ Source
• MLA International Bibliography (literature, folklore and related studies.)
• Women's Studies International

A few notable journals

• International Journal of Middle East Studies
• Islamic Studiies
• Journal of Near Eastern Studies
• Journal of Middle East Women's Studies
• The Middle East Journal
• Muqarnas
• Journal of Arabic literature (970-2012) (1999 - present)

 Newspaper Articles 

Current

• Access World News (rich U. S.regional news)
• MidEastWire.com (2005 - present; daily news from newspapers, TV, and radio, originating in Arab countries, Iran, and the Arab media diaspora, Translated into English.)
• Factiva (more international coverage)

Historical Magazines

• American Periodicals (1740 - 1940)
• British Humanities Index (1962- )
• British Periodicals (1680s - 1930s)

**A complete list of Newspaper Collections, current and historical