Filming the Modern Middle East: Politics in the Cinemas of Hollywood and the Arab World: v. 57 (Library of Modern Middle East Studies) - Softcover

Lina Khatib

Softcover

ISBN 10: 1845111915 ISBN 13: 9781845111915

Publisher: I.B. Tauris, 2006

Synopsis

'Filming the Modern Middle East' is the first comparative investigation of how modern American cinema and the cinemas of the Arab world represent Middle Eastern politics to their audiences. Lina Khatib examines the cinematic depictions of major political issues, from the Arab-Israeli conflict to the Gulf War, to Islamic fundamentalism, and covers films made in the USA, in Egypt, Tunisia, Morocco, Lebanon, Syria and Palestine. She explores cinema's role as a tool of nationalism in the USA and the Arab world, and the challenges the Arab cinemas present to Hollywood's dominant representations of Middle Eastern politics. But, she also reveals similarities between supposed contradictory cinemas and - importantly - not only how the 'Orient' is constructed by the 'Occident', but also how the 'Orient' itself in these cinemas represents Self and Others and how it is consumed by internal as well as external struggles. This is a fascinating, original contribution to the burgeoning interest in world cinemas, which also offers a fresh way of seeing Middle East politics through cinematic lenses.

About this title

From the Author:

This is the first comparative study on the way cinema
represents politics in the Middle East. I have encountered a few studies on
the stereotyping of Arabs in the Western media, but I'm frustrated with
this focus on Arab victimization, and have written this book to present an
alternative way of thinking about representation. How do Arabs represent
themselves and Others (for they have their own Other too)? And what purpose
does representation--whether in Hollywood or in Arab cinemas--serve? I hope
my book fills this gap in knowledge, and broadens the scope of thinking
about the role played by cinema in world politics. I also hope it takes us
beyond focusing on difference and the concept of an essential East/West
divide.

About the Author:

Lecturer in World Cinema, Royal Holloway University of London.

About this edition

• Publisher: I.B. Tauris
• Publication date: 2006
• ISBN 10: 1845111915
• ISBN 13: 9781845111915
• Binding: Paperback
• Number of pages: 256