This seminar explores performativity and performance in Arabic literature and culture across historical periods, genres, and media. From classical poetry and maqāma prose to folk storytelling, urban spectacle, and digital arts, Arabic cultural production has long mobilized the performative as a mode of shaping identity, memory, and meaning.

Among the many questions this seminar invites is the role of orality—not merely as a vehicle of tradition, but as a dynamic, embodied act. The recitation of classical poetry, the improvisation of folk tales (ḥikāyāt, sīra shaʿbiyya, zajal, and popular epics), and contemporary spoken word or theatrical performances foreground the voice as central to artistic and social experience.

We also encourage papers that consider folkloric and vernacular forms of performance—from wedding songs and marketplace storytelling to puppetry, epic recitations, and ritual games—as sites of cultural negotiation and meaning-making. These performances do not merely reflect social structures—they actively shape communal imaginaries and negotiate symbolic authority.

This seminar invites contributions from literary studies, performance studies, folklore, and cultural studies that engage critically with performativity (Austin, Butler), embodiment (Bourdieu, Turner), and cultural memory (Assmann) in Arabic-speaking contexts. Comparative and cross-cultural perspectives—especially those that situate Arabic performative practices in dialogue with other literary or performance traditions—are especially welcome.

Topics may include, but are not limited to:
- Orality and embodied voice in Arabic literary and folk genres  
- Theatricality in maqāma, sīra, or modern Arabic drama  
- Gender performativity in literature, cinema, storytelling, or public performance  
- Ritualized narrative forms and cultural memory  
- Folklore as performance: weddings, epic cycles, song traditions  
- Voice, media, and performance in contemporary Arabic art and literature 

All papers must be in English. By foregrounding the interplay between orality, embodiment, and performance across both classic and contemporary contexts, this seminar uniquely positions itself at the intersection of literary analysis and performance studies in the Arabic-speaking world.