11/23/2007

McNamara Ground Ops Lunchroom coffee machine

In honor or the little publicized(in the US) rally in Gaza today, for discussion in McNamara Ground Ops Lunchroom near to Anapolis where the conference will take place, I offer this revised course in Arabic of liberation Adab-culture and politics of the world for review in the US.

I would very much like to put together a course in Arabic that would expand on Al-kitaab fii Ta’allum Al-‘Arabiyya: A Textbook for Beginning Arabic, Georgetown Univ. Press by Brustad, Batal and Al-Tonsi. And A New Arabic Grammar, Lund Humphries Press by Haywood and Nahmad.

To animate such a course, I envision using the techniques the British use in teaching English (the CELTA method): that is, introducing each lesson by a « theme » or « context » and then teaching speaking before showing the written version on the white-board. For Arabic, I would put together a text with pictures with realistic, natural formal Arabic « visits to » or « contextual themes on » the major centers where Arabic is the first or second language.

My current position teaching English in Saudi Arabia, a country which draws Arabic speakers from diverse areas of Africa and Asia, gives me an opportunity to make tape recordings and collections of authentic « realia » in formal Arabic.

Here is a rough outline of the main cultural points I would like to include in my course, whether as a course taught in English, or within my proposed Arabic course. As you may notice, the « moderns, » whom I have put after a colon, are based on an appreciation of the « liberation » narratives of the post-colonial world as outlined in Edward Said’s Culture and Imperialism. Since a good deal of the « best » in this new literature happens to be from Arabic Africa and Palestine-Syria, it makes sense to introduce students to as expansive a view of the world as possible when teaching Arabic culture.

1. Algeria. Revolt of Emir Abd al Qader, Marx’s 18 Brumaire and the FLN; Kateb Yasine, Franz Fanon
2. Tunis. Ibn Khadun; Khayr al-Din, Bairam at-Tunisi
3. Syria. Umayyad Mosque of Damascus; Usama Ibn Munqidh, An Arab Syrian Gentleman; Adonis
4. Palestine. Hebrew written in Arabic in Geniza Documents, Albright, The Archaeology of Palestine; Arafat’s 1974 Speech to the U.N. Mahmoud Darwish
5. Greece. Iliad, Poetics; Declaration of Havana in Arabic, published in Greece 2007
6. Iran. Kalila wa Dimna, Jahiz, Sufis like Omar Khayyam and Fitzgerald translation; Ali Shariati
7. Italy. Avicenna; Nallino (Italian orientalist who gave lectures in Cairo)
8. France. Averroes Thomas Aquinas; CLR James (Black Jacobins), Cesaire’s Discours sur le Colonialism Maxime Rodinson’s Israel: A Colonial Settler State?
9. Afghanistan-Samarqand Nasr ad-Din at-Tusi; Lenin’s Imperialism and To See the Dawn
10. Iran (Khawarizm). Avicenna’s Al-Shifa, Khuwarizmi’s Algebraic Geometry classic; Sattar Khan’s Constitutionalist Revolution, Arafat’s speech to the Anti-Shah Revolution.
11. Iraq. Farabi, Jahiz; Antonious
12. Sudan. Mahdi Uprising; Tayib Saleh
13. Somalia. 9th century expansion of food/farming/ Arabic speaking Somalis on Al-Jazeera
14. Ethiopia Asmara ruins; Amharic, the oldest, continually spoken Semitic language (Wilvinson)
15. Saudi Arabia. Koran; Abd Ar-Rahman Munif’s Cities of Salt
16. Egypt. Orabi uprising of 1882 in Jergi Zaidan; Neguib Mahfouz
17. 14th Century Egypt. Arabian Nights, Maqrizi; Khitat Tawfiqiyya of Ali Basha Mubarak
18. 20th Century Egypt. Afghani, Abdu; Antonius, Tahtawi Hoda Sha’rawi (To See the Dawn)
19. Spain Translation of Euclid, Almagest, Farabi by Gerard of Cremona; Don Quixote and the Maqamat of Badi’ al-Zaman
20. West Africa. Morabitun (Senegal) conquest of Spain; Chinua Achebe
21. India. Feminist remnants in Arabian Nights; Rabindranath Tagore, Nationalism; Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and essays on Satanic Verses in Mahfouz, Darwish and Munif
22. Great Britain and the US. Canterbury Tales, Michael Scott and the Toledo translation of Al-Khuwarizmi’s Algebra Khalil Gibran Elia Madi; Irving’s Tales of the Alhambra, James Joyce’s Ulysses, Naomi Shihab Nye, Salma Khadra al-Juyushi, Edward Said.
23. The Americas. Marti, Garvey, W.E.B Dubois; Neruda
24. Pakistan. Eqbal Ahmed; Faiz Ahmed Faiz; Essay by Said on Pakistani reporter on Al-Jazeera who spoke fluent Arabic.



Sincerely,




3011

Shati' Tea and Falafel Shop, Gaza

Arabic and the "adab" cultural literature of liberation. A course outline to celebrate the massive rally in Gaza today to protest the non-invitation of Hamas to the Annapolis meeting of Olmert, Abbas, and Bush scheduled for tomorrow.

I would very much like to put together a course in Arabic that would introduce students rapidly to the « classics, » in Arabic, (which should include Euclid, Aristotle and even Homer, in Suleiman Bustani’s translation, since the Semitic speaking world was not only Hellenized for a long period, but also re-transmitted the Hellenic classics to Europe.)

To animate such a course, I envision using the techniques the British use in teaching English (the CELTA method): that is, introducing each lesson by a « theme » or « context » and then teaching speaking before showing the written version on the white-board. For Arabic, I would put together a text with pictures with realistic, natural formal Arabic « visits to » or « contextual themes on » the major centers where Arabic is the first or second language.

My current position teaching English in Saudi Arabia, a country which draws Arabic speakers from diverse areas of Africa and Asia, gives me an opportunity to make tape recordings and collections of authentic « realia » in formal Arabic.

Here is a rough outline of the main cultural points I would like to include in my course. As you may notice, the « moderns, » whom I have put after a colon, are based on an appreciation of the « liberation » narratives of the post-colonial world as outlined in Edward Said’s Culture and Imperialism. Since a good deal of the « best » in this new literature happens to be from Arabic Africa and Palestine-Syria, it makes sense to introduce students to as expansive a view of the world as possible when teaching Arabic culture.

1. Algeria. Revolt of Emir Abd al Qader in Girgi Zaidan’s novels; Kateb Yasine, Franz Fanon
2. Tunis. Ibn Khadun; Khayr al-Din, Bairam at-Tunisi
3. Syria. Umayyad Mosque of Damascus; Usama Ibn Munqidh, An Arab Syrian Gentleman; Adonis
4. Palestine. Hebrew written in Arabic in Geniza Documents, Albright, The Archaeology of Palestine; Arafat’s 1974 Speech to the U.N. Mahmoud Darwish
5. Greece. Iliad, Poetics; Declaration of Havana in Arabic, published in Greece 2007
6. Iran. Kalila wa Dimna, Jahiz, Sufis like Omar Khayyam and Fitzgerald translation; Ali Shariati
7. Italy. Avicenna; Nallino (Italian orientalist who gave lectures in Cairo)
8. France. Averroes Thomas Aquinas; CLR James (Black Jacobins), Cesaire’s Discours sur le Colonialism Maxime Rodinson’s Israel: A Colonial Settler State?
9. Afghanistan-Samarqand Nasr ad-Din at-Tusi; Lenin’s Imperialism and To See the Dawn
10. Iran (Khawarizm). Avicenna’s Al-Shifa, Khuwarizmi’s Algebraic Geometry classic; Revival of liberation: Arafat’s speech when invited by the Iranian Revolution that overthrew the Shah.
11. Iraq. Farabi, Jahiz; Antonious
12. Sudan. Mahdi Uprising; Tayib Saleh
13. Somalia. 9th century expansion of food/farming/ Arabic speaking Somalis on Al-Jazeera
14. Ethiopia Asmara ruins; Amharic, the oldest, continually spoken Semitic language (Wilvinson)
15. Saudi Arabia. Koran; Abd Ar-Rahman Munif’s Cities of Salt
16. Egypt. Orabi uprising of 1882 in Jergi Zaidan; Neguib Mahfouz
17. 14th Century Egypt. Arabian Nights, Maqrizi; Khitat Tawfiqiyya of Ali Basha Mubarak
18. 20th Century Egypt. Afghani, Abdu; Antonius, Tahtawi Hoda Sha’rawi (To See the Dawn)
19. Spain Translation of Euclid, Almagest, Farabi by Gerard of Cremona; Don Quixote and the Maqamat of Badi’ al-Zaman
20. West Africa. Morabitun (Senegal) conquest of Spain; Chinua Achebe
21. India. Feminist remnants in Arabian Nights; Rabindranath Tagore, Nationalism; Salman Rushdie’s Midnight’s Children and essays on Satanic Verses in Mahfouz, Darwish and Munif
22. Great Britain and the US. Canterbury Tales, Michael Scott and the Toledo translation of Al-Khuwarizmi’s Algebra Khalil Gibran Elia Madi; Irving’s Tales of the Alhambra, James Joyce’s Ulysses, Naomi Shihab Nye, Salma Khadra al-Juyushi, Edward Said.
23. The Americas. Marti, Garvey, W.E.B Dubois; Neruda
24. Pakistan. Eqbal Ahmed; Faiz Ahmed Faiz; Essay by Said on Pakistani reporter on Al-Jazeera who spoke fluent Arabic.

Sincerely,




3011