Representations of Self and Other in three travel accounts from XIXth Century Cover Image

تمثلات الذات والآخر في ثلاث رحلات عربیة من القرن السابع عشر
Representations of Self and Other in three travel accounts from XIXth Century

Author(s): Rasha Al-Khatib
Subject(s): Language and Literature Studies, Studies of Literature
Published by: Editura Universităţii din Bucureşti
Keywords: Travel Literature; Self and Other; Ahmad ibn Qāsim Al-Hajarī (Afoukay); al-Amīr Fakhr al-Dīn al-Maʻnī al-Thānī; Elias ibn Hanna al-Mawsilī;

Summary/Abstract: Europe in the seventeenth century was deporting from the Middle Ages to the Renaissance, and the Arab Islamic world was still close to civilized Europe, but the educated elite did not notice that the renaissance of Europe has made the cultural gap between the two sides widening day after day. The travel to Europe - for all its reasons and motives - allowed the encounter of civilization between the East and the West. The opportunity was available for the travelers of the Arab Islamic world to maintain the positions of the agreement and discard the positions of disagreement between them. So, did they really do that? Or did the travel failed to change much of the self-promotion against the other?! This paper seeks to extrapolate the representations of the self and the other in the models of the Arab travels in the seventeenth century, which recorded that meeting at that specific historical moment. Three different types of travel literature are chosen, which belong to the same era and to the West, but each is distinct from the other in different aspects. These journeys are: Ahmad ibn Qasim Al-Hajari Al-Andalusi journey (to France and the Netherlands), the journey of Prince Fakhr Al-Din Al Maani (to Italy), and the journey of Priest Elias Al-Mouseley (to America). The choice of these travels was based on the assumption that the journeys that belong to one-time, which is the 17th century, may help to search for other features that may gather them or make them different in the search for the representations of the self and the other in the journey.

  • Issue Year: XVIII/2018
  • Issue No: 18
  • Page Range: 77-87
  • Page Count: 11
  • Language: English, Arabic