Reblog
Radio Rome and Radio Berlin playing to impress the Arab peoples: cover of the Egyptian journal Ruz al-Yusuf in 1940. Although there is a lot of scattered evidence about the impact of European totalitarianism on contemporary Arab intellectuals, politicians, and movements, little effort has been spent to study the empirical material with the help of reception theory and the concept of totaliarianism in a comprehensive, systematic, and comparative perspective. Western historical research about the impact of European totalitarianism(s) on Arab intellectuals and movements has mainly focused on Palestine and Iraq during World War II, especially on the links between the Mufti of Jerusalem, Hajj Amīn al-Ḥusaynī, and the short-lived Rashīd ‘Alī al-Ghaylānī government with Nazi Germany. Much less is known, e.g., about the intellectual and political impact of Italian and Spanish fascism in North Africa; about the decisive ‘seduction period’ of the 1920s and 1930s, the perception of the Stalinist show trials of the late 1930s, the end and aftermath of World War II (breakdown of Fascism, expansion of Soviet communism, foundation of Israel), and the impact of the de-Stalinization period of the mid-1950s; about critical approaches towards fascism and Stalinism in the Arab world; about intellectual and political links between the perception of Communism and Fascism; and, above all, on the patterns, motives, and regional varieties of perceiving, “translating”, evaluating, endorsing, imitating, rejecting, or simply ignoring the perceived phenomena of European totalitarianism in different segments of the Arab public from the 1920s to the 1950s. 
Sat, 17th Sep — 12 notes
Reblog
 Wed, 2nd Jun — Notes