Inaug.-diss.--Heidelberg. / Arabic text in Hebrew characters, with German translation. Vita. Includes bibliographical references.

This thesis explores modernism's temporality and location through the examination of Arabic modernism's occurrence. In this thesis, I question whether the authenticity of modernism derives from its temporality period or its literary content while concurrently investigating several poems by Lebanese authors Kahlil Gibran and Nadia Tuéni and Syrian poet Adonis. Additionally, I trace Arabic modernism's influence to the early 1900s-1910s to the conception of the Mahjar movement and the Pen League, an Arabic literary society consisting of Arabic immigrant writers. As I discern the political impact within Arabic writings, I explore political events, such as World War I and its aftermath, that heavily influenced Arabic literature and modernism. Subsequently, I acknowledge Lebanon's position in both a colonial and postcolonial context and dispute the simple notion that the Eastern world entirely comprises Western practices and traditions. I accomplish this by exploring Nadia Tuéni's contribution to Arabic modernism through the dual questions of translation and postcolonial theory. By considering these critical political and literary factors, I hope to call attention to Arabic modernism's influence and temporality.

When women are lured away from home, they become vulnerable and cannot survive the violence inflicted upon them by their ‘lovers.’ This thesis explores the ties between two distinct cultural regions, Arabic and Appalachian, to examine the violence against women and what allows these women to escape such situations by using Hanan al-Shaykh’s One Thousand and One Nights: A Retelling and three traditional Appalachian murdered girl ballads. Many of the women in these stories die at the hands of their ‘lovers,’ regardless of their culture of origin. Once removed from their fellow women, they lack a support system that would allow them the strength to survive. While most of the women in these tales die at the hands of their ‘lovers,’ Shahrazad of One Thousand and One Nights: A Retelling survives because she is able to take back some control of the situation by telling her own story, instead of allowing it to be told for her. She survives the bleak situation she has been put in through the support of her sister, who makes it possible for Shahrazad to continue telling her stories. The support Shahrazad receives from her sister allows her to not only save herself, but also to save the lives of other women. This thesis concludes that it is this “sister” support that enables women to survive the violence consistently thrown at them and allows them to take back control of their own narratives.

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