13 March 2019
Dr. Dheya Abdullah Khamis Al Kaabi’s Critical Approach Presented In a lecture at Al-Khalifiyah Library
As the most acclaimed 14th Edition of the Spring of Culture Festival continues to attract its lovers and followers, Bahrain Authority for Culture &Antiquities (BACA), roganzied a lecture at Al-Khalifya Library, on Wednesday, 13 March, on “ Belated Travelers and the Passion for Travel in the Age of Colonial Dissolution” by Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi. Many academicians, intellectuals, writers, media figures and specialists of literary criticism also attended this event.
During her lecture, Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi, an assistant professor of Literary Criticism and Narratology, Arabic and Islamic studies at the University of Bahrain, presented her own critical approach to the academic and researcher Ali Behdad – an expert in Cultural Studies - in his important book “Belated Travelers: Orientalism in the Age of Colonial Dissolution”. Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi also shed lights on the biography and life of Dutch diplomat and Orientalist Paul Marcel Kurpershoek as manifested in his book“ The Last Bedouin- Al-Badawi al-Akhir” : Arabia of the Bedouins”, linking it with a another parallel project by academician and Anthropologist Saad Al-Sowayan with regard to demounting the desert of Arabia culturally.
Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi also urged an important question theme, asking “ Why speaking about the journey and its cultural tales now?”, denying the preoccupation with the archival documentation obsession tendencies of western narratology’s science with regard to the Arab region, especially with the multitude of publications dealing with this documentary aspect. Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi added that she is more interested with deciphering and dismantling the Western travels and journeys’ perception and discourse culturally, through shedding lights on two important approaches; Ali Behdad’s book and Kurpershoek’s publication.
Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi did not miss the opportunity to unveil the ambiguity of the “ new orientalism” concept and its contraction with the “ old orientalism”.
Worth to mention that Dr. Dheya Abdullah Al Kaabi Assistant Professor of Literary Criticism and Narrative, University of Bahrain with more than 13 years of experience in academic teaching. She was awarded a PhD, in (Modern Literary Criticism and Narratives) from the University of Jordan and a Bachelor of Arts in (Modern Literary Criticism and Narratives) from the same university also. Dr. Al Kaabi has received first prize in the field of criticism and feminine critical studies in theatre and arts. Al-Kaabi has also published valuable researches and books on literary criticism m and narratives.
