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Situating Arab women’s writing in a feminist ‘global gothic’ : madness, mothers and ghosts

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Douglas, Roxanne (2021) Situating Arab women’s writing in a feminist ‘global gothic’ : madness, mothers and ghosts. Feminist Theory . doi:10.1177/14647001211019188 (In Press)

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Official URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1177/14647001211019188

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Abstract

This article sketches a new way of approaching some contemporary Levantine (Egyptian and Lebanese) feminist texts. Extending Glennis Byron’s notion of the ‘global gothic’, I examine Hanan Al-Shaykh’s The Story of Zahra (1986), Mansoura Ez Eldin’s Maryam’s Maze (2007) and Joumana Haddad’s The Seamstress’ Daughter (2019) as examples of an Arab feminist Gothic approach, which serves as a framework to theorise difficult and pressing questions that feminism poses regarding women’s rights. Arab feminist Gothic writers use the jahiliyyah period, or the ‘time of ignorance’, as a folkloric referential backdrop for texts which theorise the female condition under contemporary patriarchal society. The presence of ghosts, madness, doubles in the form of the folkloric qarina spirit-doubles and dreams can be read as part of a local Gothic feminist mode. This as-yet unacknowledged Arab feminist Gothic tradition, while emerging from debates over statehood and postcolonial subjectivities, delves into the intensity of personal traumas through the lens of women’s relationships to other women, especially mothers and daughters. Taking Arab feminist fiction as its focus, this article models how feminist scholarship can use genre, particularly the Gothic, to trace artistic feminist theorising in non-western contexts.

Item Type: Journal Article
Subjects: H Social Sciences > HQ The family. Marriage. Woman
P Language and Literature > PJ Semitic
P Language and Literature > PN Literature (General)
Divisions: Faculty of Arts > English and Comparative Literary Studies
SWORD Depositor: Library Publications Router
Library of Congress Subject Headings (LCSH): Feminists -- Arab countries , Feminism -- Arab countries, Gothic revival (Literature) -- Arab countries , Gothic fiction (Literary genre) , Gothic fiction (Literary genre) -- 20th century -- Women authors , Gothic literature -- Arab countries, Gothic fiction (Literary genre) -- 21st century -- Women authors , Women's rights -- Arab countries , Feminism and literature -- Arab countries
Journal or Publication Title: Feminist Theory
Publisher: SAGE Publications
ISSN: 1741-2773
Official Date: 26 May 2021
Dates:
DateEvent
26 May 2021Published
DOI: 10.1177/14647001211019188
Status: Peer Reviewed
Publication Status: In Press
Access rights to Published version: Open Access

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