Mapping Cairo: Modern literary representations of the city
, littérature, espace urbain, histoire urbaine, Cairo, Le Caire, Mehrez Samia
<div><b>Extract from a review of Mehrez's lecture, <a target="_blank" href="http://academic.aucegypt.edu/caravan/story/celebrating-cairos-underground-historians">"Celebrating Cairo's 'Underground Historians'" by Nadeen Shaker</a>:</b></div>
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Samia Mehrez, a professor of Arab and Islamic Civilizations, describes Cairo as the protagonist of a story seen and told by its residents and authors.<br />
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During the second of the Provost Lecture Series “Mapping Cairo: Modern Literary Representations of the City,” Mehrez discussed a map of Cairo she created using literary constructions found in century-old texts.<br />
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Mehrez introduced the Islamic genre of Khitat literature, a social history of the nations under Muslim rule in the Middle Ages, which she focused on in her recently published book, The Literary Atlas of Cairo, an AUC Press publication.<br />
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She used it to offer a historiographical – also known as a narrative presentation of history – map that evokes a spatial sense of Cairo.</div>
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<b>Samia Mehrez </b>is Professor of Arabic literature in the Department of Arab and Islamic Civilization and Director of the Center for Translation Studies, The American University in Cairo.</div>
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Samia Mehrez
13 October 2010
http://www1.aucegypt.edu/resources/smc/webcasts/
The literary atlas of Cairo : One hundred years on the streets of the city
, littérature, culture urbaine, tissu urbain, exclusion, fragmentation sociale, Cairo, Caire, Mehrez Samia
<div><b>Abstract from the publisher :</b></div>
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Readings from literary works that re-construct and re-map the city of Cairo.<br />
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Bringing together writings by Egyptians, Arabs, men and women, Muslims, Copts, and Jews, this rich selection maps out many of the changes in Cairo’s geopolitics and its urban fabric, while tracing spatial and social forms of polarization and new patterns of inclusion and exclusion within the expanding megacity. Through its thematic organization, The Literary Atlas of Cairo traces the developments that have taken place over a century in modes of literary production, and presents a unique historical cross-section of the actors within the Cairene literary field, to provide an unprecedented, original, and indispensable educational and research tool for scholars and students as well as a much wider readership interested in Egypt and Cairo in particular as one of the globe’s largest historic, multi-cultural urban centers.</div>
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<b>Samia Mehrez</b> is professor of Arabic literature in the Department of Arab and Islamic Civilization and director of the Center for Translation Studies at the American University in Cairo.</div>
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Samia Mehrez
The American University in Cairo Press
May 2010
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