Final Exam

POSSIBLE TOPICS FOR TERM PAPER

1. Exploration of the connection between nationalism and feminism and how various authors/characters express this relation.
2. The tension between tradition and modernity; how gender shapes this discourse as well as colonial encounters.
3. What is the role of imagination in various works that helps women transcend conventional time and space?
4. How is nature portrayed in various works (or in just a single work)?  How may women, according to some of the authors, find redemptive release in nature?
5. Pick a work or several works and analyze the consequence/s of the feminine narrative voice.  What is distinctive about this voice?  Can we label this voice/these voices feminist?  What is a feminist voice?
6. How do some of the authors (or any single author) represent female sexuality?  How do the main characters internalize social norms about sexuality?  If they choose to subvert them, how do they do so?
7. Or as a variation on the above question, how important is it to women to gain mastery over their own bodies?  How do some of them go about it?  
8. Analyze and compare how mothers are portrayed in various works and to what effect.  What may this tell us about socialization in Middle Eastern societies?
9. Explain the significance of certain role models chosen by the protagonists (chief characters) of the various works?  How do women's selective memories function to validate the feminine self?
10. Miriam Cooke states "The Lebanese Civil War lent itself to multiple unorthodox narrations, especially by women." (p. 157)  How may social catastrophes, specifically war redefine gender and social relationships?  What is "unorthodox" about The Story of Zahra (or for that matter, The Year of the Elephant, or both)?        

Your response should be 8-10 pages long, typed, and double-spaced.