Böcker av Walid El Hamamsy

Food as culture in literature and the artsThis issue of Alif seeks to contribute to current scholarship on food and foodways. Food, here, emerges as a way to construct identities--both individual and national--and as a means of addressing familial, social, and religious issues, thereby providing a valuable critical approach, not just to literature and the arts, but to the humanities and social sciences as well. CONTRIBUTORS: Emad Abdul-latif, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar.Randa Aboubakr, Cairo University, EgyptShereen Abouelnaga, Cairo University, EgyptAsaad Alsaleh, Indiana University, Bloomington, Indiana, USAIsabella Altoé, Queen's University, Ontario, CanadaYasmin Amin, Orient-Institute Beirut, Beirut, LebanonNada Ayad, The Cooper Union, New York City, New York, USADavid Bell, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, USASayyed Daifallah, The Academy of Arts, Cairo, EgyptAnusha D'souza, University of Mumbai, IndiaAnny Gaul, University of Maryland, College Park, Maryland, USAWalid Ghabbour, Port Said University, Port Said, EgyptMagda Hasabelnaby, Ain Shams University, Cairo, EgyptMohja Kahf, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville, Arkansas, USAAdham Masaoud Al Kak, Levant Center for Cultural Studies, Cairo, Egypt Ezzat El Kamhawi, Egyptian author, Cairo, EgyptMousa M. Khoury, Birzeit University, Ramallah, PalestineTheresa Moran, Ohio University, Athens, Ohio, USASalma Serry, University of Toronto, Ontario, CanadaOmer Taher, Egyptian Author, Cairo, Egypt

A rich exploration of sibling bonds in literature and the artsThis issue of Alif explores representations of brotherhood/sisterhood in literature and the arts. What does it mean to be part of a brotherly/sisterly bond? And what do such bonds entail, positively or otherwise? These questions have been extensively posed and revisited in a variety of traditions old and new. Sibling relations, here defined, can also transcend kinship and blood relations to include shared causes and values, such as political solidarity and gender equality.Contributors:Shereen Abouelnaga, Cairo University, Egypt Abdelrahman Abuabed, independent scholar, Doha, Qatar Karam AbuSehly, Beni-Suef University, Egypt Saad Al-Bazei, King Saud University, Riyadh, Saudi Arabia Mariam Elashmawy, Freie Universität Berlin, Germany Safaa Fathy, poet, essayist, and filmmaker, France Anna G¿owacka, independent scholar, Austria Hala K. Gomaa, independent scholar, Cairo, Egypt Noha Hanafy, The British University in Egypt, Cairo, Egypt Magda Hasabelnaby, Ain Shams University, Cairo, Egypt Amina Mansour, photographer, creative conceptualizer, and copywriter, Cairo, Egypt Dalia Said Mostafa, The University of Manchester, UK Manal Al-Natour, West Virginia University, Morgantown, West Virginia, USA Andrea Maria Negri, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Germany Yomna Saber, Qatar University, Doha, Qatar Muhammed F. Salem, independent scholar, Cairo, Egypt Mary Youssef, Binghamton University, New York State, USA

A wide-ranging, multi-disciplinary collection of essays that decenter, critique, and problematize predominant notions of the meaning of mortality for human creativityThis issue of Alif explores the ways in which humans have come to confront their mortality across time and space. Contributions question the nature of loss, grief, and the possibility of an afterlife. Is death only an interlude? Perhaps simply the end? How have people used literature and the arts to conceptualize its relentless presence in our existence?The articles in this issue decenter, critique, and problematize predominant notions of the meaning of mortality for human creativity. They provide a wide scope of responses to mortality, anthropologically, philosophically, and psychologically. They shed light on different cultural receptions of loss, annihilation, and mortality, ranging from India to Yemen, Palestine to Iraq, the Island of Lampedusa to the war-ravished city of Beirut, among many other locales. Death is dealt with in an intimate fashion through the exploration and reinterpretation of modern and classical elegiac poetry, children's picturebooks, fictional accounts of war, grief, and displacement, and dramatic treatments of dying and the afterlife. Contributors: Hajjaj Abu Jabr, Egyptian Academy of Arts, Cairo, EgyptKaram AbuSehly, Beni-Suef University, Beni Suef, EgyptHala Amin, Beni-Suef University, Beni Suef, EgyptShaimaa El-Ateek, Imam Mohammad Ibn Saud Islamic University, Riyadh, Saudi ArabiaMohamed Birairi, Beni-Suef University, Beni-Suef, Egypt, and American University in Cairo, Cairo, EgyptElliott Colla, Georgetown University, Washington, DC, USASaeed Elmasry, Cairo University, Cairo, EgyptShaimaa Gohar, Ain Shams University, Cairo, EgyptWalid El Khachab, York University, Toronto, CanadaYasmine Motawy, American University in Cairo, Cairo, EgyptDani Nassif, University of Münster, Münster, GermanyAndrea Maria Negri, Ludwig Maximilian University of Munich, Munich, GermanyMarwa Ramadan, Zagazig University, Zagazig, EgyptCaroline Rooney, University of Kent, Kent, United KingdomTania Al Saadi, Stockholm University, Stockholm, SwedenMay Telmissany, University of Ottawa, Ottawa, CanadaShahla Ujayli, American University of Madaba, Madaba, Jordan