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The Politics
and Poetics of Palestinian Resistance
English 1A § 16 –
S. Shingavi
DESCRIPTION:
This is a course on Palestinian resistance literature. It takes as its point
of departure the Palestinian literature that has developed since the creation
of the state of Israel in 1948, which has displaced, maimed, and killed many
Palestinian people. The Israeli military occupation of historic Palestine has
caused unspeakable suffering. Since the occupation, Palestinians have been fighting
for their right to exist. And yet, from under the weight of this occupation,
Palestinians have produced their own culture and poetry of resistance. This
class will examine the history of the Palestinian resistance and the way that
it is narrated by Palestinians. The instructor takes as his starting point the
right of Palestinians to fight for their own self-determination.
Discussions about the literature
will focus on several intersecting themes: how are Palestinian artists able
to imagine art under the occupation; what consequences does resistance have
on the character of the art that is produced (i.e. why are there so few Palestinian
epics and plays and comedies); can one represent the Israeli occupation in art;
what is the difference between political art and propaganda and how do the debates
about those terms inflect the production of literature; how do poems represent
the desire to escape and the longing for home simultaneously (alternatively,
how do poems represent the nation without a state); what consequence do political
debates have on formal innovations and their reproduction; and what are the
obligations of artists in representing the occupation.
This 1A course offers students
frequent practice in a variety of forms of discourse leading toward exposition
and argumentation in common standard English. The course aims at continuing
to develop the students' practical fluency with sentence, paragraph and thesis-development
skills but with increasingly complex applications. Students will be assigned
a number of short essays (2-4 written pages) and several revisions.
| REQUIREMENTS: |
6 papers (10%
each)
3 unscheduled quizzes (10% each)
participation – discussion, attendance, contributions to the class
(10%) |
TEXTS:
Course reader (Psalms, Darwish; Victims of a Map, trans. Al-Udhari;
Poetry of Resistance in Occupied Palestine, trans. Hijjawi; All That’s
Left to You, Kanafani); The Adam of Two Edens, Darwish; Memory
for Forgetfulness, Darwish; Men in the Sun, Kanafani; Drops of
This Story, Hammad; Anthology of Modern Palestinian Literature, Jayyusi;
The Question of Palestine, Said; The Politics of Dispossession,
Said; The New Intifada, ed. Carey
CALENDAR:
August 27, 29: Where is Palestine?
September
3, 5: Who are the Palestinians?
- "Identity
Card," "Poem of the Land," "Homing Pigeons," "Guests
on the Sea," "Intensive Care Unit," "Psalm 9," "We
Went to Aden," Darwish
- Question
of Palestine, Said (pgs. 115-181)
***
2-3 page response paper due September 5th (bring 3 copies to class) ***
September
10, 12: What is resistance?
- "Palestinian
Literature," Kanafani
- "Roses
and Dictionaries," "Anger and Pride," "The Passport,"
"The Return," "Victim #18," "My Father," "Wishes,"
"Promises from Al-Assifa," "I am coming to the shade of your
eyes," Darwish
- Question
of Palestine, Said (pgs 56-114)
September
17, 19: What are poetics?
- "A non-linguistic
dispute with Imri’ al Qays," "Speech of the Red Indian,"
"Eleven planets in the last Andalusian sky," "The tragedy of
Narcissus," "The Earth is Closing in on Us," "We Fear
for a Dream," "We are entitled to love Autumn," "We travel
like other people," "We go to a country," We are here near
there," "Athens Airport," "They’d love to see me
dead," "The Wandering Guitar Player," Darwish
- Anthology
of Modern Palestinian Literature, Jayyusi (pgs. 720-730)
- Question
of Palestine, Said (pgs. 182-244)
***
4-5 page rewrite due September 19th ***
September
24, 26: Is there a difference between propaganda and poetry?
- "Psalms
I-XVIII," Darwish
- The Politics
of Dispossession, Said (pgs. 3-23, 56-68, 107-129)
October
1, 3:"Why didn’t they knock on the sides of the tank?"
- The New Intifada,
Carey (pgs. 269-316)
- "Men in
the Sun," Kanafani
October
8, 10: Who are the refugees?
- "‘If
You Were a Horse …’", "A Hand in the Grave," "The
Falcon," "Letter from Gaza," All That’s Left to You,
Kanafani
- Politics
of Dispossession, Said (pgs. 203-246).
***
3-4 page paper due October 10th (bring 3 copies to class) ***
October
15, 17: What is Palestinian modernism?
- All That’s
Left to You,"In My Funeral," "Kafr Al-Manjam," "The
Shore," "The Viper’s Thirst," "The Cake Vendor,"
"The Cat," "Pearls in the Street," "A Concise Principle,"
"Eight Minutes," "Death of Bed 12," Kanafani
- Politics
of Dispossession, Said (pgs. 247-268)
October
22, 24: What is the Occupation?
- "My Country
on Partition Day," "We Shall Return," "I Love You More,"
Abu Salma
- "from Jerusalem
to the Gulf," "On the Presence of Absence," ‘Abd
al-Latif ‘Aql
- "New Suggestions,"
"The Terms of Ambition," "From ‘I do not renounce Madness,’"
"Our Country," "The Hands Again," "The Sparrow Told
Me," Ahmad Dahbour
- "A Souvenir
Vendor in Nazareth," Ahmad Hussain
- "Damascus
Diary," "Against," "First," Rashid Husain
- Memory for
Forgetfulness, Darwish (pgs. xi-60)
***
5-6 page rewrite due October 24th ***
October
28, 31: Who gets to record history?
- From "Zero
Hour," Jabra Ibrahim Jabra
- "The Woman,"
"Songs for an Arab City," "On June 5, 1968," "The
Three of Us Alone," Salma, Khadra Jayyusi
- "Refugee,"
Salem Jubran
- "Dialectics
of the Homeland," From "What is Your Purpose, Murderous Beauty?"
"Departure," ‘Ali al-Khalili
- "Family
Poems," "Peace Be Upon …", Rasim al-Madhoun
- "The Martyr,"
"Call of the Motherland," ‘Abd al-Raheem Mahmoud
- "At Night,"
"Dawn Victory," "The Inheritance," ‘Izzidin
al-Manasra
- "A Nonpersonal
Account," "Echo," "Two Old Ages," "The Road,"
"Poetry," "A Forest," Khairi Mansour
- "Circling,"
"Meeting of Two Wounds," Khalid ‘Ali Mustafa
- "Reverse
Journey," Taba ‘Abd al-Ghani Mustafa
- "Flight,"
"The Hand," "Thread," "Song," Ibrahim Nasrallah
- Memory for
Forgetfulness, Darwish (pgs. 60-118)
November
5, 7:"What next?"
- "All of
This Is Strange, Like Everything," "Language," "Part of
a Wall," "Dead Memory," "Overflow," Kamal Quddura
- "The Clock,"
"Rats," "Ashes," "Love Poems," "You Pretend
to Die," "I Do Not Blame You," Samih al-Qasim (also,
from the reader: "The eternal fire," "Kafr Qasim," "A
Homeland," "The unruly horse," "Letter from a Prison Camp,"
"The man who visited death," "The thunderbird")
- From "Signs,"
Taber Riyad
- "Intimations
of Anxiety," "The Ever-Deferred Moment," Laila al-Sa’ih
- "Departure,"
"From Beirut under Siege," Mai Sayigh
- "Then How
Will the Poem Come?", "Seven Poems," Anton Shammas
- "The Sibyl’s
Prophecy," "Enough for Me," "The Deluge and the Tree,"
Fadwa Tuqan (also, from the reader: "My Sad City," "The
seagull and the negation of the negation")
- "Commando,"
Ibrahim Tuqan
- From "The
Siege," ‘Abd al-Raheem ‘Umar
- "Here We
Shall Stay," "A Million Suns in My Blood," "Pagan Fires,"
"What Next?", Tawfic Zayyad (also, from the reader: "The
impossible," "I clasp your hands," "The bridge of return")
November
12,14: How do you represent the Occupation?
- Memory for
Forgetfulness, Darwish
***
5-7 page paper due on November 14th ***
November
19, 21: What is Palestine to a Palestinian-American?
- Drops of
This Story, Hammad
November
26: Does this tale have a tail?
- "The Odds-and-Ends
Woman," Emile Habiby
- From Memoirs
of an Unrealistic Woman, Sahar Khalifeh
December
3, 5: Student conferences and evaluations
***
7-9 page paper due on December 11th ***
Ground
Rules for Class Participation: Be prepared to focus on the texts
and topics assigned (and come to class having read assigned reading in advance).
Be prepared to comment thoroughly and constructively on the writing of your
fellow students and to have your writing read by others. Help create an open,
safe and respectful climate in the classroom. Do not personalize your responses
to others. No insults, blaming, or verbal attacks of any kind will be tolerated.
Listen actively and considerately. Do not interrupt. Express disagreement civilly.
If you disagree strongly or are offended or upset by something, use the means
I offer at the times I designate (these might include informal, ungraded in-class
and out-of-class writing assignments, tabling some questions for a time to return
to them for a later discussion, "roundtable" discussions in which
each student speaks in turn while others listen silently, or small group work)
to inform the class. Do not monopolize class discussion. If you speak frequently,
be aware of quieter students and make room for their turns to talk. Participate
in a way that encourages other students to participate as well. Respect the
privacy and confidentiality of the other students in the class. Focus on your
own learning.
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