Memory, History and Violence in the Middle East

(3 Credit Hours) · Undergraduate

This course examines the interplay between history, memory and violence in the modern Middle East. We will discuss specific case studies of wars and other forms of violence and their social, political and cultural dynamics of commemoration, forgetfulness and silence. The course will start with an overview of theories and concepts from the field of Memory Studies and follow with our case studies. These will include Zionist and Palestinian national myths, the 1948 war that led to the establishment of Israel and to Palestinian displacement, the Lebanese Civil War (1975-1990), the Israeli invasion of Lebanon in 1982, the Iran-Iraq War of 1980-1989, the Armenian genocide during World War I, the Algerian War of Independence (1955-1962) and the Syrian civil war (2011- ?).