Critical Muslim | 11

Syria

Edited by
July 2014 9781849044516 256pp

Description

Critical Muslim’s Syria issue approaches the diversity of this rich culture as it is reborn through revolution, tortured by repression, and traumatised by war.

Thomas Pierret illuminates the varying positions of Syria’s Muslims and Islamists; Rasha Omran writes about being an Alawi revolutionary; Robin Yassin-Kassab investigates the revolution’s artistic and cultural shifts; Firas Massouh appraises the role of workers and the left inside Syria; Louis Proyect castigates leftists in the West; Nader Attasi examines the successes of the revolutionary committees and the failures of opposition political elites; Hassan Hassan recounts the rise, fall and rise again of the Muslim Brotherhood’s Syria branch; Razan Ghazzawi questions her atheism under fire; Omar Hossino presents the town of Selemmiyeh as a non-sectarian model; Ross Burns asks what’s become of Syria’s unparalleled archeological heritage.

Plus poetry from Golan Hajji, prose from Zakkariya Tamer and Lina Sergie Attar, an appreciation of Adonis’s verse, satire from Karl Sharro, and ‘the story of the bra’.

Table of contents

SYRIA

Peter Clark – INTRODUCTION: THE ROOTS OF THE SYRIAN CRISIS
Robin Yassin-Kassab – REVOLUTIONARY CULTURE
Sam Charles Hamad – THE REVOLUTION’S ARMED ISLAMISTS
Rasha Omran – THE SECT AS HOMELAND
Ella Wind – INSIDE AND OUTSIDE
Malu Halasa – THE BRA IN ALEPPO
Afra Jalabi – THE LOST CHILD IN OVERSIZED SHOES
Amal Hanano – FROM HAMA TO DARAYA
FredericGijsel – NOT EVEN THE BASEMENT ESCAPES
Ross Burns – PROTECTING THE CULTURAL HERITAGE
Brigid Waddams – OLD DAMASCUS
Hania Mourtada – VIRTUAL INTERACTIONS
Boyd Tonkin – VOLUNTEERS AND TERRORISTS

ARTS AND LETTERS

Itab Azzam – SYRIA’S TROJAN WOMEN
Tom Hill – THE CHILDREN OF ATMEH CAMP
Zakaria Tamer – FIVE STORIES
Golan Haji – POEMS
Ruth Padel – FACING EAST
Moniza Alvi – POEMS

REVIEWS

Laurens de Rooij – WHERE NOW?
Yasmin Fedda and Daniel Gorman – CINEMA OF DEFIANCE
Maysaloon – THE COMPLICITY OF SYRIAN DRAMA

ETCETERA

Ehsan Masood – LAST WORD: ON RELIGIOUS ENVIRONMENTALISM
The List – TEN THINGS TO REMEMBER ABOUT SYRIA

Reviews

‘Show[s] that the voices [of Syrians] are loud and alive and cannot be silenced. Some of the depictions and accounts of the horror in Syria are by Syrians, others by people knowledgeable and involved, but … the power of human resistance to oppression stands out.’ — Times Literary Supplement

Editor(s)

Ziauddin Sardar is an award-winning, internationally renowned writer, futurist and cultural critic. A former New Statesman columnist and Equality and Human Rights Commissioner, he has authored many books, including Desperately Seeking Paradise: Journeys of a Sceptical Muslim; Reading the Qur'an; and Mecca: The Sacred City. He is editor of the influential quarterly Critical Muslim.  

Robin Yassin-Kassab, co-editor of Critical Muslim, is the author of the acclaimed novel, The Road From Damascus (Penguin). Born in west London, he has lived and worked in France, Pakistan, Turkey, Syria, Morocco, Saudi Arabia and Oman. He is a regular contributor to the literary pages of The Guardian and The Independent.

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