Visiting Artists
The Liberal Arts Department, The Professional Education Division, The Office for Cultural Diversity, and FUSION Magazine
Present
Reflections on the Genesis of Islamic Radicalism, a dinner seminar with Professor Salah el Moncef bin Khalifa, Prof. of American Literature & Culture, University of Nantes, France; Editor of International Journal Angelaki
Wednesday, November 12th, 2008, William Davis Room, 6-8 P.M.
To reserve dinner, please RSVP to Lena Serpa, mserpa@berklee.edu
Questions regarding program content, please contact Joseph Coroniti, FUSION Magazine Editor-in-Chief, jcoroniti@berklee.edu
Salah el Moncef bin Khalifa comes to Berklee as part of the Major Residency Program. He lives in Nantes, France, where he teaches American literature and culture. He is editor in the journal Angelaki (Oxford) and directs the Contemporary French Thinkers series in the same journal. In 1987, he received the Presidential Award for Excellence in the Humanities, and from 1988 to 1993 he was a Fulbright fellow at Indiana University, Bloomington. El Moncef bin Khalifa has published short stories along with many essays on modernist and postmodern literature, culture, and film. He is the author of Atopian Limits, a study on postmodern narrative, and the co-editor of Borderline Identities and Présence et représentation¥Presence and Representation.
What are the socioeconomic and cultural elements that go into the making of an Islamic extremist? This seminar will explore the controversial premise that Islamic radicalism in the U.S. and Europe is not rooted primarily in a religious choice; nor does it originate in a collective metaphysical crisis and its accompanying existential choices. Rather, our discussion will center upon what is arguably the most elusive yet fertile ground for extremist affiliation: the ethnic “other’s” perception of the power of Europe and America to exclude him/her from the unwritten communal covenant, that is, the set of societal codes that governs Western cultures’ conceptions of what it means to be human. How can the other—feeling excluded by society—engage in human relations and human relating? What happens when this individual feels unable to accept, connect, and empathize with those around him/her? How, then, does the potential extremist’s perceived exclusion from society contribute to Islamic radicalism? What effect does this exclusion, real or imagined, have on both Europe and the United States? What, if anything, should be done about it?
Please join us for discussion with Prof. El Moncef bin Khalifa.