Sixty Years of Comparative Literature in the Moroccan University – From Comparative Literary Studies to Comparative Cultural Studies

Call for papers

Sixty Years of Comparative Literature in the Moroccan University

-From Comparative Literary Studies to Comparative Cultural Studies-

Research Team in Comparative Studies
Faculty of Letters and Human Sciences- Mohammed V University, Rabat

April 16-17-18, 2024

 Congress Theme

Sixty years separate the period of establishing the historical Oriental comparative experience in Moroccan universities from the period of entering the arena of comparative cultural studies. Throughout this period, the comparative discipline in Morocco has undergone many changes since the early sixties of the twentieth century, the most notable of which is the serious attempt of getting rid of the legacy of the historical positivist perspective since the eighties through benefiting from the American aesthetic turn, on the one hand,and through relying, on the other hand, on the exceptional Arabic and Moroccan studies that both interact and negotiate with the Other from different fields(Sociology, Philosophy, Linguistics, Philosophy of History, Criticism…).
One of the outcomes of this attempt, in addition to extending the scope of comparativism and broadening its range of languages, was its contribution to the creation of the Arab Comparative Literature Association, in parallel with the establishment of a Moroccan academic training that revisits the Arab comparative legacy and criticizes the Eurocentrism of a field of knowledge that theoretically celebrates difference and interdisciplinarity.

This attempt, which constitutes a break with the previous period,while acknowledging its role in founding and promoting the comparative discipline, is followed by the efforts invested in the third millennium in order to consolidate the dialectic of the literary and the cultural by adopting the cultural turn of the comparative discipline which is based on the premise of democratizing human culture, keeping in mind that the combination of comparative literary studies and comparative cultural studies  in comparative trainings and productions in Morocco  is accompanied by the researchers’ endeavor to foster the creation of an Arab comparative dynamism through:

·         Establishing comparative research teams and associations that celebrate Arab multiculturalism, overriding, at the same time, the dual liminality: The Arab Islamic cultural field/ the Western cultural field.

·         Contributing to the allocation of an “Arab Day for Comparative Literature” that aims at accumulating Arab Comparatists’ efforts and improving the conditions of comparativismin the Arab World.

·         Contributing to the organization of Arab Comparative workshops for the sake of active engagement in “The International Comparative Literature Association”.

Since the trajectory tracked by teaching comparative literature in Morocco, with the aim of developing scientific curricula and creating an equilibrium between the culture of the Self and the culture of the Other in a newly-founded university, is closely bound up with the trajectory taken by the Moroccan culture in general after independence in its continuous journey to assert itself at the Arab level and resist the Western cultural imperialism – through crystallizing a cultural vision premised upon the interaction with the Western culture, and with the different patterns of human culture – we envisage allocating a congress to evaluate the Moroccan comparative achievements within the Arab and international achievements. This could be attained on the basis of the new and broad concept of comparativism, which encompasses the evaluation of all the Moroccan studies geared towards the field of comparative studies in the various languages of writing in Morocco, through three productive periods: From the 1960s to 1980s and from 1980s to the end of the second millennium, and from the beginning of the third millennium till the present.

Axes:

Axe One: From the problematic of influence and impact to interaction

Arabic-Eastern studies:
A- Hebrew studies
B- Iranian studies
Arabic-Western Studies:
A-    The Greek “Miracle” / The Arab-Islamic “Miracle”.

B-    European Modernism / Arabic Renaissance.

Axe Two: The aesthetic turn and the broadening of comparative literature areas

Comparative Literature: the What and the How.
Cultural representation studies: In literature, Art and media
Translation Studies: Theories and criticism of translation.
Gender studies.
Moriscan studies.
Latin-American Studies.
Literature and Art (Drama, cinema, plastic art, music,…).
Literature and Human Sciences.
Literature and Natural Sciences.
Literature and  communication
Comparative Linguistics :
A.Diglossia

B.Grammar and linguistics of Hamitic- Semitic languages

          C. Dictionaries

Axe Three: Comparative Literary Studies and the Prospect of Cultural Studies

·         Cultural anthropology.

·         Multilingualism and multiculturalism

·         Shared identity in national literatures: Amazigh, standard Arabic, Moroccan Arabic, Hassani

·         Postcolonial Studies: In Language, literature, translation and art…

·         Orientalism and Occidentalism.

·         Moroccan in-between literatures: Moroccan literature in foreign languages.

·         Area Studies: Maghrebi and Arab common cultural grounds.

·         Afro-Sub-Saharan Studies

·         Literature and technology

·         Para- Literatures: Popular culture,childliterature,Comic,videotape, caricature, photography, cartoons, advertisements,…

·         Literature and Socio-economic Development: Touristic Imaginary,Professional Translation …

Axe Four: For a democratic republic of world literature

·         Comparative Horizons: Chinese Literatures, Japanese Literatures, Brazilian Literatures, Portuguese Literatures, Georgian Literatures, Turkish Literatures …

Organising committee:

·         Professors: FatihaTaib, DrissAabiza, Mohammed Taamarti, Nora Laghzari,Mahmoud Abdelghani.

·        Researchers: Fatima Zahra Ajjoul, Younes El Yousfi,Hamid Issafi,Khalid AitTahmidit.

Scientific committee:

Said Allouch, Ahmed Bouhsane ,AbdallahMdarhriAlaoui,TaiebBelghazi,IjjouCheikhMoussa, Marie –ThérèseAbdelmessih ,Alaa Abdul-Hadi, Jean-Pierre Dubost,ZohraLhioui Abdu NabiIsstaif ,DarejanGardavadze, DrissAabiza ,Mohamed Taamarti ,FatihaTaib ,Nora Laghzari ,Mahmoud Abdelghani , Mohammed  Taki , Mohammed Jawdate .

Supervision of the Congress :FatihaTaib _ DrissAabiza

Congress Languages: Arabic, French, English

Important dates:

·         Abstract submission deadline: September 30, 2023.

·         Abstract notification of acceptance: October 30, 2023.

·         Paper submission deadline: January 15, 2024.

Notice: Accommodation and meals are only provided during the congress period.

Contact:

·         DrissAabiza : aabiza1driss2@yahoo.fr

Tél : +212 661901242

·         Fatiha Taib : fatihaamehzoun@hotmail.com

Tél :+212662 05 77 25