Publication Date
2011
Document Type
Thesis
Committee Members
Ava Chamberlain (Committee Member), Awad Halabi (Committee Co-chair), Donovan Miyasaki (Committee Co-chair)
Degree Name
Master of Humanities (MHum)
Abstract
Nearly two centuries have elapsed since the early 19th century modern Arab nahda. In contemporary Arab-Muslim accounts, there can be no downplaying the fact that after nearly two centuries, the Arab nahda has faltered at achieving its desired objectives. If so, what explains its faltering? Numerous well-read explanations on this bulk in Arab and Western literature; however, I argue that the most important factor behind the faltering of Arab nahda to date is the faulty form of Arab rationality dominating nahda discourse since its inception: ahistoricity. The entirety of Arab discourse treats the past as ahistorical and sacral to be repeated while seeking to extract from it already-possessed or realized solutions to the Arab problems of the present. I conclude that any hope of resuming nahda's progress is by no means assured without a nahdazid mind, one that assumes a healthful awareness of the past which is based first and foremost on a historical consciousness of and critical relation to it.
Page Count
116
Department or Program
Humanities
Year Degree Awarded
2011
Copyright
Copyright 2011, all rights reserved. This open access ETD is published by Wright State University and OhioLINK.
