糖心TV

Faculty of Arts colleagues and students are warmly invited to come along to a forthcoming Department of English and Comparative Literary Studies research seminar. The research seminar will take place in the Student Hub (FAB5.49). Drinks and nibbles are provided.

Wednesday 22 October, 5pm, FAB5.49:

鈥溾�橳o be Libyan is to Live with Questions': Masculine Identity Formation and Neopatriarchy in Contemporary Libyan Fiction鈥�

Sam Naseem (Lancaster University)

This paper examines the impact of paternalistic regimes on the process of masculine 鈥榮elving鈥� (Joseph) within Libyan national identity, as presented in contemporary works of literature. I suggest how the reframing of history in texts by Libyan authors offers what I consider 鈥榗ounter-collective鈥� narratives of cultural memory. Combating politics of erasure and nationalist male trajectories in autocratic regimes, I suggest the ways contemporary fiction presents lived experience and national allegory in place of the missing 鈥榯hings鈥�, hidden or eradicated by state discourses. I suggest the impact of memory and representation on identity (Said) may have led to the issue of 鈥楳en In Crisis鈥�, as recognised in the field of Gender Studies for MENA (Amar), and how new forms of world literature cultivate an archival space for previously fractured or displaced pieces of Libyan (male) identity.

Sam Nassem is an Associate Lecturer and PhD candidate at Lancaster University. Her research considers the representation of men and masculinity in contemporary North African fiction in English, and the impact of neopatriarchy in Egypt and Libya.

Best wishes,

Dr Steve Purcell

Director of Research, English and Comparative Literary Studies