Contemporary Arab Thought: Cultural Critique In Comparative Perspective

Book Summary

The disastrous outcome of the Six-Day War led to a major shift in Arab intellectual and popular thought. Movements to liberalize and decolonize several Arab nations had failed, leading to further occupation and repression and a severe crisis in culture and politics. In response to these events, two trends crystallized: totalizing doctrines, especially of a religious nature, and a revitalized critique directed at prevailing modes of thinking and ideology. The first book to take stock of this critical trend, this volume illuminates the interface between cultural and political critique in the major writings of Arab thinkers of the second half of the twentieth century and compares it to similar elaborations in other postcolonial contexts. Arab intellectuals of the post-1967 period struggled with issues of politics, religion, secularism, democracy, and gender. Elizabeth Suzanne Kassab identifies the main topics and preoccupations of these thinkers and traces their ideas back to the Arab Renaissance of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. A crucial aspect connects Arab debates concerning cultural malaise, identity, and authenticity to the postcolonial issues of Latin America and Africa, revealing the shared struggles of different regions and various Arab specificities. Kassab also reflects on the challenges of critical thinking in postcolonial settings due to a disrupted sense of history, a distorted sense of reality, and a disturbed sense of self, aggravated by postindependence disenchantment.

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