Publication of Gianluca Saitta's book: "Representations of landscape and nature in premodern Yemeni maqāmāt/munāẓarāt".

10 May 2023

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CERMOM is pleased to announce the publication of Gianluca Saitta's book, "Les représentations du paysage et de la nature dans les maqāmāt/munāẓarāt yéménites d'époque prémoderne", published by Istituto per l'Oriente C.A. Nallino, Roma, 2023.
Publication de l'ouvrage de Gianluca Saitta : « Les représentations du paysage et de la nature dans les maqāmāt/munāẓarāt yéménites d’époque prémoderne »
Publication de l'ouvrage de Gianluca Saitta : « Les représentations du paysage et de la nature dans les maqāmāt/munāẓarāt yéménites d’époque prémoderne » © Droits réservés‎

The book by Gianluca Saitta stems from his thesis defended at Inalco under the supervision of Luc Deheuvels and Monica Ruocco and winner of the prize for the best thesis "Languages and literatures of the Maghreb and Middle East" awarded by the GIS Middle East and Muslim Worlds and the Institut d'études de l'Islam et des sociétés du monde musulman.

This study focuses on a corpus of Yemenite sessions drawn from unpublished manuscripts and in which the description of landscape and nature occupies a prominent place. This work installs a reflection on the genericity of these texts and it highlights the capacities for renewal and transformation of the maqāma genre by showing the encompassing character of this generic designator often used here to designate munāẓarāt.

This research also explores the landscape and nature descriptions that abound in these texts, shows the intertextual relationships and proximity of writing between these representations and those present in classical descriptive poetry, and questions the scope and meaning of these jousts, studied in the light of the political and cultural context of Yemen from the 14th to the early 20th centuries.