The Arab World and the West: Past and Future

The aim of the course is to give students basic knowledge of the cultural and political interaction between the Arab world and the West during their common history. In the first section of the course we will analyze the history of the Arab world from the emergence of Islam to the Iraq war passing through the crusades, the Ottoman Empire, the western colonization, etc. And in the second section of the course we will focus on the main challenges for the relations between the Arab world and the West. This course will cover topics such as the long-term impact of the penetration of Europe into the Islamic World, Orientalism, and Occidentalism, Islamic immigration into western societies, the impact of 9-11 and the Iraq war, and the role of oil and the Middle East conflict.