Corso di laurea magistrale in Scienze storiche

The course, held in English, is subdivided in 2 modules.

Module n. 1 consists of 12 lessons, 3 hours each.

Module n. 2 consists of 12 lessons, 3 hours each, and 2 "laboratories" (3 hours each).

The two teaching modules offer a specific training in the frame of the degree course in Historical Sciences. They provide students with an in-depth comparative and diachronic understanding of late modern and contemporary history in 3 main macro areas: India, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East. It offers specific methodological tools (space-time collocation of events, technical language; use of sources), in view of historical research, teaching and historical communication, educational and cultural dissemination.

Module n. 1: Entangled Histories: India, Sub-Saharan Africa and the Middle East 

The first module will examine the contemporary history of non-European/American cultures and contexts. The first part will mainly focus on India and Africa (Sub-Saharan), and will provide the analytical, linguistic, and theoretical frame required to approach non-Western contexts. This conceptual background will be also discussed through specific case studies.

The second part of this module will focus on the contemporary history of the Middle East and North Africa, giving special attention to the crucial junctures of the region’s ‘long 19thcentury’, when exceptional circumstances worked to shape the region’s ethno-religious, political, economic and cultural dimensions.

Module n. 2: History of the Middle East and North Africa

The first part of the 2nd module (3 lessons) will provide an analytical overview of the Middle East and North Africa, particularly in relation to the phase in between the “long 19^th century” and our days. To this end, a special attention will be given to the late Ottoman era, WWI and the inter-war period, as well as to the historical phase in between the end of WWII and the 1970s energy crisis.

The remaining lessons (9 lessons) will consist in an in-depth historical analysis focused on the following contexts: Iran, Saudi Arabia, Lebanon, Egypt, Iraq (including Iraqi Kurdistan), Israel, Palestine, Syria, Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco, Libya

Overall, the 2nd module will analyze, among a number of other issues, the "epistemologies of the South"; the emergence of bottom-up grassroots ideas and local anti-colonial movements; the formation of modern nation states; the role of Islamic and non-Islamic groups in the “political reform processes”; the influence and legacy of long-standing regional conflicts; the (active) role of local women in pressure groups and political movements; the impact of colonialism and imperialism on the Middle East and North Africa; the lives of ordinary men and women in the late modern and contemporary era; the “Arab cold war”; the “revival of Islam” and the role of non-Muslim communities; and the rising regional orders in the 2000s and 2010s.

By the end of the 1st module students should be able to:

-acquire a comparative understanding of late modern and contemporary history

-acquire a deeper understanding of concepts, methodologies and fields of studies such as global history, pre- and post-colonial theory, de-colonization, necro-politics, "epistemologies of the South"

-become familiar with the impact of colonialism on national and non-national cultures

-get acquainted with contemporary issues that result from “racial”, “tribal”, ethnic, and religious identities

-acquire a gender understanding in relation to local responses to colonial rule.

-enhance their verbal presentation and written skills.

By the end of the 2nd module students should be able to:

-acquire an in-depth understanding of the history of some of the most important countries – and their inhabitants – in the Middle East and North Africa

-acquire a deeper and more informed knowledge of where to look for, and how to get, scholarships, grants, and research funds, for national and international projects or programs

-enhance their verbal presentation and written skills.

All lessons will be held in person. Students who won't be able to attend the lessons in person can opt for the "non-attending option" (see below the field "note").

Module n. 1 consists of 12 lessons, 3 hours each.   

Module n. 2 consists of 14 lessons, 3 hours each.

Besides frontal lectures, each lesson will include students' presentations, use of media, and class discussion.

Students’ presentations should be organized in the following way: 1) present the thesis that the reading proposes; 2) summarize the main arguments used by the author to support the thesis; 3) present your comments on the article; 4) raise a number of questions to be discussed in class.

Grading

Grades (with a vote based on a 30 points scale) in this course will be based on the following assignments:

Class participation 40%

Oral presentations 20%

Final examination 40% 

As an alternative to the final written exam, students can opt for a final written paper to be agreed with the teacher

Grading criteria for participation:

• Demonstration of reading assigned materials prior to class
• Contribution to discussion
• Ability to critically analyze the readings

Grading criteria for oral presentation:

• Well-organized and clear structure (the presentation has a clear Intro, body, and conclusion)
• Demonstration of understanding the main ideas/thesis that the article intends to propose
• Raise critical comments to readings
• Raise questions to be discussed in the class

Grading criteria for final exam:

• 8 multiple choice & 8 open questions: all taken only from the required readings

Students will prepare the readings following the schedule which will be distributed at the beginning of the course. All teaching materials will be made available to students in a dedicated page on dropbox.

The following reading list is divided into 2 modules (12+14 lessons). Each lesson consists of 3 hours. 

Students are kindly requested to prepare the required readings carefully, in order to be able to participate to class discussions.

Additionally, each week one student (or a group of students, depending on the class size) will be asked to prepare a short oral presentation (about 12 minutes) on one source included in the reading list (see below). Students are prompted to think also about the context in which texts are produced, by whom and for whom they are written, and for which aim, and to assess their potential effects. The list of presentations will be agreed during the first lesson.

MATERIALS FOR MODULE n. 1:

Lesson 1: Overview of the course (presentation of the syllabus; audiovisual tools; hashtags; journals; archives) and preliminary inputs

Suggested reading: F. Ammermann et. al., For a Fair(er) Global History, in “Cromohs - Cyber Review of Modern Historiography”, 3 Feb. 2021. Available on-line: https://oajournals.fupress.net/index.php/cromohs/article/view/12559/12022. Or: 

Lesson 2: The Age of Imperialism and Colonialism

Required reading: G.K. Bhambra, Undoing the Epistemic Disavowal of the Haitian Revolution: A Contribution to Global Social Thought, in D. Bendix, F Müller, A. Ziai (eds.), Beyond the Master’s Tools, Rowman & Littlefield, Lanham 2020, ch. 2.

Presentation delivered by one student: S. Ward, Decolonization and Neocolonialism, in P. Fibiger Bang, C.A. Bayly, W. Schidel (eds.), The Oxford World History of Empire, v. 2, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2021, pp. 1161-83. Or: B. Ibhawoh, Seeking the Political Kingdom: Universal Human Rights and the anti-Colonial Movement in Africa, in D. Moses, M. Duranti, R. Burke (eds.), Decolonization, Self-Determination, and the Rise of Global Human Rights Politics, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2020.

Lesson 3: Epistemologies of the "South"

Required reading: B. de Sousa Santos, The End of the Cognitive Empire, Duke University Press, Durham 2018, only the introduction. And: S.J. Ndlovu-Gatsheni, Epistemic Freedom in Africa, Routledge, Abingdon 2018, introduction. 

Presentation delivered by one student: J.L. Nafafé, Lourenço da Silva Mendonça and the Black Atlantic, Cambridge University Press 2022, ch. 1. Or: P. Dwyer, M. Micale (eds.), The Darker Angels of Our Nature, Bloomsbury, London 2021, ch. 1.

Lesson 4: Local agency and proactive (more than reactive) history

Required reading: A.K. Segobye, Politics and Society in Pre-colonial Africa, in S.O. Oloruntoba, T. Falola (eds.), The Palgrave Handbook of African Politics, Palgrave, New York 2018, pp. 60-69.

Presentation delivered by one student: M.P. Candido, A. Jones (eds.), African Women in the Atlantic World, James Currey, Oxford 2019, ch. 3. Or: P.C. Emmer, L. Lucassen, Migration from the Colonies to Western Europe since 1800, in “European History Online”, Leibniz Institute of European History, Nov. 2012. Available on-line: http://www.ieg-ego.eu/emmerp-lucassenl-2012-en.

Lesson 5: Identifying and discussing stereotypes on the Middle East, Africa, and beyond

Required reading: Required reading: S. Chan, Grasping Africa, IB Tauris, Londra 2008, chapter 3, and Wael B. Hallaq, Restating Orientalism: A Critique of Modern Knowledge, Columbia UP, New York 2018, ch. 1. 

Presentation delivered by one student: E. Said, Orientalism, Pantheon, New York 1978, Introduction & L. Kamel, The impact of “Biblical Orientalism”, «New Middle Eastern Studies», 4, 2014, pp. 1-15. Available on-line: http://www.brismes.ac.uk/nmes/wp-content/uploads/2014/03/NMES2014Kamel.pdf.

Lesson 6: India, Africa and the Middle East: History in a Comparative Perspective

Required reading: P. Gopal, Insurgent Empire. Anticolonial Resistance and British Dissent, Verso, New York 2019, pp. 99-111.

Presentation delivered by one student: J.P. Daughton, An Empire Divided: Religion, Republicanism, and the Making of French Colonialism, 1880-1914, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2006, ch. 1. Or: M.L. Louro, Comrades against Imperialism: Nehru, India, and Internationalism, Cambridge UP, Cambridge 2018, ch. 2.

Lesson 7: The 'Jewel in the Crown': Approaching Modern India

Required reading: N. Ferguson, Empire, Basic Books, New York 2004, (only the conclusion). And: S. Tharor, Inglorious Empire, Scribe, London 2017, ch. 1 (additional suggested reading: C. Burden-Stelly, Caste Does no Explain Race, Boston Review, 15 Dec. 2020, available on-line: http://bostonreview.net/race/charisse-burden-stelly-caste-does-not-explain-race).

Presentation delivered by one student: A. Sen, Home in the World: a Memoir, Allen Lane, London 2021. OR: B. Gammerl, Subjects, Citizens, and Others, Berghahn, New York 2018, pp. 95-105. Or: R. Travers, Ideology and Empire in Eighteenth-Century India: The British Bengal, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2007, ch. 1.

Lesson 8: The “long-19th century” in Africa

Required reading: S. Press, Rogue Empires: Contracts and Conmen in Europe’s Scramble for Africa, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (MA) 2017, ch. 5.

Presentation delivered by one student: J. Thornton, Precolonial African Industry and the Atlantic Trade, in “African Economic History”, n. 19, 1991, pp. 1-19. In alternative you can opt for the two chapters below: F. Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth, Grove Press, New York 1963, pp. 7-45. And: Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Something Torn and New: An African Renaissance, Basic Books, New York 2009, ch. 1.

Lesson 9: The Era of Transformation in the Ottoman Empire

Required reading: J. Clancy Smith, The Modern Middle East and North Africa: A History in Document, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, pp. 61-73.

Presentation delivered by one student: L. Kamel, From Empire to Sealed Identities, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2019, ch. 3.

Lesson 10: World War I in the Middle East: Shaping a New Order

Required reading: W. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, Westview Press, Boulder 2012, ch. 9.

Presentation delivered by one student: R.G. Suny, A History of the Armenian Genocide, Princeton UP, Princeton 2015, ch. 9.

Lesson 11: Competing Visions and Narratives: a Local-Global Conflict

Required reading: L. Kamel, Israel and a Palestinian State: Redrawing Lines? (ch. 7 of M. Beck, D. Jung, P. Seeberg, The Levant in Turmoil, Palgrave Macmillan, New York 2016).

Presentation delivered by one student: B. Bhandar, Colonial Lives of Property, Duke University Press, Durham 2018, ch. 3. Or: L. Kamel, Whose land? Land tenure in late 19th and early 20th century Palestine, «British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies», 41(2), 2014, pp. 230-242.

Lesson 12: The racialization of Nationalisms and the Struggle for Independence

Required reading: M.L. Siegelberg, Statelessness. A Modern History, Harvard University Press, Cambridge (Ma) 2020, ch. 2.

Presentation delivered by one student: S. Altorki (ed.), A Companion to the Anthropology of the Middle East, Wiley Blackwell, Chichester 2015, pp. 452-472.

MATERIALS FOR MODULE n. 2:

Lesson 1: Setting the Stage

Suggested reading: J.L. Gelvin, The Modern Middle East, Oxford UP, Oxford 2011, chapter 4. And: L. Kamel, "Stabilising" the Middle East: A Historical Perspective, Istituto Affari Internazionali, March 2019, pp. 1-5, available on-line: https://www.iai.it/sites/default/files/iaicom1924.pdf

Presentation delivered by one student: P. Manduchi, Arab Nationalism(s): Rise and Decline of an ideology, Oriente Moderno, 97(2017), pp. 4-35.

Lesson 2: From the end of WWII to 1970s Oil Crisis: a Diacronic Overview

Required reading: J. Clancy Smith, The Modern Middle East and North Africa: A History in Document, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, pp. 203-237

Presentation delivered by one student: B.S. Anderson, A History of the Modern Middle East: Rulers, Rebels and Rogues, Stanford UP, Stanford 2016, chapter 6 (“Rebel and Rougues”).

Lesson 3: The “Resurgence of Islam”: the Middle East and North Africa from the 1970s to the Present

Required reading: M. Kamrava, The Modern Middle East, University of California Press, Berkeley 2011, chapter 6 (“The Gulf Wars and Beyond”).

Presentation delivered by one student: K. Ghattas, Black Wave, Henry Holt, New York 2020, ch. 9 (“Mecca is mine”).

Lesson 4: Framing and Deconstructing “The Iranian Century”: the Rising of “Political Shiʿism”

Required reading: F. Bishara, The Many Voyages of Fateh Al-Khayr: Unfurling the Gulf in the Age of Oceanic History, in “International Journal of Middle East Studies”, Summer 2020, pp. 1-16, and: L. Kamel, Whose Stability? Assessing the ‘Iranian Threat’ through History, chapter 9 of: L. Kamel (ed.), The Middle East, Thinking About and Beyond Security and Stability, Peter Lang, Bern 2019.

Presentation delivered by one student: M.R. Kalantari, The Shi’i Clergy and perceived opportunity structures: political activism in Iran, Iraq, and Lebanon, in “British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies”, 2019, pp. 1-15. Or: M. Abedi, An Iranian Village Boyhood, chapter 16 of: E. Burke III (ed.), Struggle and Survival in the Modern Middle East, University of California Press, Berkeley 2006.

Lesson 5: “A House of Many Mansions”: the Past’s Present of Lebanon

Required reading: F. Trabulsi, A History of Modern Lebanon, Pluto Press, London 2007, chapter 6 (“From Mandate to Independence”).

Presentation delivered by one student: K. Salibi, A House of Many Mansions: The History of Lebanon Reconsidered, I.B. Tauris, London 2002, chapter 11 (“The war over Lebanese history”), or: M. Rabah, Conflict on Mount Lebanon. The Druze, the Maronites and Collective Memory, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2020, chapter 2 ("The Druzes and the Maronites: Perceptions of the Other").

Lezione 6: “Al-Gharb”: Tunisia, Algeria, Morocco

Required reading: P.C. Naylor, North Africa, University of Texas Press, Austin 2009, chapter 6 (“European Colonialism in North Africa”) and R. Rouighi, How the West made Arabs and Berbers into Races, available on-line: https://aeon.co/essays/how-the-west-made-arabs-and-berbers-into-races

Presentation delivered by one student: W. Gallois, A History of Violence in the Early Algerian Colony, Palgrave, London 2013, ch. 7, or: M. Oualdi, A Slave between Empires, Columbia University Press, New York 2020, introduction, or: J. Mundy, The Geopolitical Functions of the Western Sahara Conflict, in R. Ojeda-Garcia et. al. (eds.), Global, Regional and Local Dimensions of Western Sahara’s Protracted Decolonization, Palgrave, New York 2017, ch. 3, or: I. Coller, Arab France: Islam and the Making of Modern Europe, University of Califoprnia Press, Berkeley 2001, ch. 4.

Lesson 7: Egypt: A Gender-Centered Historical Approach

Required reading: B.S. Anderson, A History of the Modern Middle East: Rulers, Rebels and Rogues, Stanford UP, Stanford 2016, pp. 612-637.

Presentation delivered by one student: S. Faroqhi, Women in the Ottoman Empire, I.B. Tauris, London 2023, introduction.

Lesson 8: “Al-Marar al-Arabi”: Saudi Arabia between Past and Present

Required reading: J. Wynbrandt, A brief history of Saudi Arabia, Facts of File, New York 2010, chapter 9 (“Birth of a Kingdom”). Or: M. Al-Rasheed, A History of Saudi Arabia, Cambridge UP, Cambridge 2010, chapter 2.

Presentation delivered by one student: A Vassiliev, The history of Saudi Arabia, Saqi Books, London 1998, chapter 2 (“Mohammad ibn Abd al-Wahhab and his Teaching”) and G. Steinberg, Wahhabi ‘ulama and the state in Saudi Arabia, 1927(pp. 77-61), in C.M. Amin, The Modern Middle East, Oxford UP, Oxford 2006. In alternative: P. Mandaville, Wahhabism and the World: Understanding Saudi Arabia's Global Influence on Islam, Oxford UP, Oxford 2022, ch. 1.

Lesson 9: Zionism and the Birth of the State of Israel

Required reading: W. Cleveland, A History of the Modern Middle East, Westview Press, Boulder 2012, chapter 13 (“The Palestine Mandate and the Birth of the State of Israel”)

Presentation delivered by one student: D. Moses, Partitions, Hostages, Transfer, in A.M. Dubnov, L. Robson (eds.), Partitions, Stanford University Press, Stanford 2019, epilogue (pp. 257-295). Or: O. Bashkin, Impossible Exodus: Iraqi Jews in Israel, Stanford University Press, Stanford 2017, chapter 2 (“Children of Iraq, Children of Israel”).

Lesson 10: Palestine, between Ruptures and Continuities

Required reading: L. Kamel, Framing the Partition Plan for Palestine, Cairo Review of Global Politics, n. 44., Winter 2022, and S. Hazkani, Dear Palestine: A Social History of the 1948 War, Stanford University Press, Stanford (Ca) 2021, chapter 4. 

Presentation delivered by one student: L. Kamel, De-Threatenization of the Other. An Israeli and a Palestinian Case of Understanding the Other’s Sufferance, in “Peace and Change”, 37(3), 2012, pp. 366-388.

Lesson 11: Stateless nations in the 19th and 20th centuries: the Kurdish case and beyond

Required reading: L. Kamel, From Pluralization to Fragmentation: The Kurdish Case from an Historical Perspective, «Nuova Rivista Storica», 103(1), Feb. 2019, pp. 251-266.

Presentation delivered by one student: E. Gareth Stanfield, M. Shareef (eds.), The Kurdish Question Revisited, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2017, ch. 4.

Lesson 12: The Libyan Case, and the Case for Libya

Required reading: D. Vandewalle, A History of Modern Libya, Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 2012, chapter 2 (“Italy’s Fourth Shore and Decolonization”)

Presentation delivered by one student: M. Capasso, Politics in the Libyan Arab Jamahiriya, Syracuse University Press, New York 2023, chapter 1.

“Laboratory 1”: Borders, States, Nations, and Minorities in the post-colonial spaces of the MENA region

Required reading: C. Aydın, The Idea of the Muslim World, Harvard UP, Cambridge (Ma), introduction. And: B. White, The Emergence of Minorities in the Middle East, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2011, introduction.

Presentation delivered by one student: U. Makdisi, The Problem of Sectarianism in the Middle East in an Age of Western Hegemony, in N. Hashemi-D. Postel (eds.), Sectarianization, Hurst, London 2017, chapter 1. 

“Laboratory” n. 2: The Future Ahead Seen Through History

Required reading: L. Kamel, D. Huber, Arab Spring: A Decentring Research Agenda, in “Mediterranean Politics”, 20(2), 2015, pp. 272-280.

Presentation delivered by one student: J. Clancy Smith, The Modern Middle East and North Africa: A History in Document, Oxford University Press, Oxford 2014, chapter 7 (“Unknown Destinies”). And: J. Foster, Oil and Global rivalry, in “Canadian Center for Policy Alternatives”, June 2019, pp. 36-37. 

The required readings are listed in the program above.

Students who won’t attend the course (2 modules) should choose 3 among the following books to prepare for their oral exam. Students attending just 1 of the 2 modules are requested to choose 2 among the following books to prepare for their oral exam:

B. De Sousa Santos, The End of the Cognitive Empire, Duke University Press, Durham 2018.

L. Kamel, Napoleone e Muhammad ‘Alī. Medio Oriente e Nord Africa in epoca tardo moderna e contemporanea, Mondadori Università, Milano 2022.

H.W. French, Born in Blackness, Liveright, New York 2021.

J. Scott Holloway, Breve storia degli afroamericani, Il Mulino, Bologna 2022.

L. Kamel, The Middle East from Empire to Sealed Identities, Edinburgh University Press, Edinburgh 2019.

Ngugi wa Thiong’o, Something Torn and New: An African Renaissance, Basic Books, New York 2009. 

S. Yahya-Othman, Development as Rebellion: A Biography of Julius Nyerere, v. 1, Mkuki na Nyota, Dar es-Salaam 2020.

M. Bresciani, F. Conti (a cura di), L'età contemporanea. Prospettive europee e globali, Carocci, Roma 2023.

L. Kamel, Terra Contesa. Israele, Palestina e il peso della Storia, Carocci, Roma 2022.

T. Green, A Fistful of Shells West Africa from the Rise of the Slave Trade to the Age of Revolution, Chicago UP, Chicago 2019.