Loading...
Title: Abbas Khider

Abbas Khider

by David N. Coury (Volume editor) Karolin Machtans (Volume editor)
©2021 Edited Collection X, 228 Pages
German Studies
Series: Contemporary German Writers and Filmmakers, Volume 5

Summary

Abbas Khider (b. 1973) has established himself as one of the leading literary voices of refugees and marginalised communities in Germany today. Born in Baghdad, Iraq, Khider was at a young age a vocal critic of Saddam Hussein’s regime, during which he was jailed and tortured before fleeing the country. As a refugee, he crossed many countries before arriving in Germany, where he was eventually granted asylum. His own life experiences have served as a departure point for his novels, which similarly explore the refugee experience and the challenges that migrants to Europe face. This volume represents the first collection of essays devoted to Khider’s works to date. The contributions analyse his narrative works and probe important questions relating to political, cultural, and linguistic identity in Germany today. While his works explore what it means to be an immigrant, they do so with a wry sense of humour and an insight into the human condition that also reflect on the political situation in Germany today. His award-winning novels, including Der falsche Inder (2008, The Village Indian, 2013) and Ohrfeige (2016, A Slap in the Face, 2019), which have been translated into English, are discussed in detail. Additionally, an original interview with the author offers insight into his writing process and influences.

Table Of Contents

  • Cover
  • Title
  • Copyright
  • About the editors
  • About the book
  • This eBook can be cited
  • Table of Contents
  • Acknowledgements
  • Works by Abbas Khider
  • Abbas Khider: Introduction (David N. Coury and Karolin Machtans)
  • Interview with Abbas Khider (Karolin Machtans, Trans. David N. Coury)
  • Productive Ruptures: Trauma as Both a Disruptive and Generative Force in Abbas Khider’s Der falsche Inder and Die Orangen des Präsidenten (Katherine Anderson)
  • Portraying the Refugee as a Transitional Figure of Plurality: The Performance of Gender and Ethnicity in the Post-migrant Narratives of Abbas Khider’s Der falsche Inder and Ohrfeige (Markus Hallensleben)
  • Islam and the Image of God in Abbas Khider’s Der falsche Inder and Ohrfeige (Warda El-Kaddouri)
  • The Transience of Prisoners’ Memoirs in Abbas Khider’s Die Orangen des Präsidenten (Carolin MÜLler)
  • Refuge and Refuse: Waste Imagery in Abbas Khider’s Die Orangen des Präsidenten and Ohrfeige (Sabine Zimmermann)
  • ‘[W]enn die anderen rausbekämen, dass ich eine Mannfrau bin’: Grotesque Physicality and Carnivalesque Subversions in Abbas Khider’s Ohrfeige (Jara Schmidt)
  • ‘German Is My New Tongue’: The Role of (Foreign) Language in the Construction of Identity (Beate Baumann and Corinne Puglisi)
  • Multilingual Aesthetics in Abbas Khider’s Deutsch für alle: Das endgültige Lehrbuch (Karolin Machtans)
  • Bibliography
  • Notes on Contributors
  • Index
  • Series index

About the editors

David N. Coury is Frankenthal Professor of the Humanities, German, and Global Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Green Bay.

Karolin Machtans is Associate Professor of German Studies at Connecticut College.

About the book

“Almost two decades into the US War in Iraq and the change of Saddam Hussein’s regime, this timely and rich collection of essays offers a multi-faceted examination of the works of the Iraqi-German author Abbas Khider, one of the rising stars in German literature today. Contextualizing Khider’s novels and non-fictional works in post-9/11 Islamophobia, seen especially in the wake of arrival of over a million refugees in Germany since 2015, Coury and Machtans have brought together a diverse set of voices that revisit many essential questions concerning the multilingual register of German ‘national’ literature in the twenty-first century through filters of migration, politics, and religion. With an illuminating Introduction framing the thoughtful essays, this volume will be of interest to readers of Khider in German and English, contemporary European literature, as well as scholars of Migration and Refugee Studies. The book would also serve as an excellent sourcebook for teaching Khider.”

Details

Pages
X, 228
Publication Year
2021
ISBN (PDF)
9781789974911
ISBN (ePUB)
9781789974928
ISBN (MOBI)
9781789974935
ISBN (Softcover)
9781789974904
DOI
10.3726/b15771
Language
English
Publication date
2021 (August)
Keywords
Contemporary German literature Refugee studies Migration studies Abbas Khider David N. Coury Karolin Machtans
Published
Oxford, Bern, Berlin, Bruxelles, New York, Wien, 2021. X, 228 pp.
Product Safety
Peter Lang Group AG

Biographical notes

David N. Coury (Volume editor) Karolin Machtans (Volume editor)

David N. Coury is Frankenthal Professor of the Humanities, German, and Global Studies at the University of Wisconsin–Green Bay. Karolin Machtans is Associate Professor of German Studies at Connecticut College.

Previous

Title: Abbas Khider