Writing Affiliation And Dislocation In The Memoirs Of Ihab Hassan And Edward Said

摘要

The memoirs of Ihab Hassan (Out of Egypt, 1986) and Edward Said (Out of Place, 1999) are testimonials of collective preoccupations of their times. While the intricate play between the private and public may be said to characterize any autobiography, self-writing by academics like Hassan and Said plays a particularly prominent place in intellectual history due to their self-conscious reflections on cultural concerns. Taking its point of departure in the various configurations of place and displacement in the two memoirs, the paper explores how Hassan and Said engage in the nettlesome issue of cosmopolitanism. What type of cosmopolitan figure is fashioned in the two autobiographies? What strategies are employed to make a case for a cosmopolitan figure? Since the discussions about cosmopolitanism most often pit it against patriotism and/or nationhood, the also paper examines the myths of nationhood that inform the memoirs.