Off-campus UMass Amherst users: To download campus access theses, please use the following link to log into our proxy server with your UMass Amherst user name and password.
Non-UMass Amherst users: Please talk to your librarian about requesting this thesis through interlibrary loan.
Theses that have an embargo placed on them will not be available to anyone until the embargo expires.
Access Type
Open Access
Document Type
thesis
Degree Program
Geography
Degree Type
Master of Science (M.S.)
Year Degree Awarded
2011
Month Degree Awarded
September
Keywords
city space, literary geography, global south, Cairo, performance
Abstract
Albert Cossery, known as the ‘story teller of Cairo’, weaves tales of the marginalized living in a city of the global South whose geographies have been impacted by colonial and neocolonial legacy. Cairo’s city and economic spaces have often been theorized as determined and dominated by the forces of neoliberalism, an approach that obscures the experience of residents who contest and evade these forces daily. For example, in “Les Couleurs de l’infamie”, the main character is a robin-hood archetype that revels in observing the resourcefulness of the city’s residents. ‘Alternative’ occupations and spatial uses abound: an unemployed philosopher teaches secretly out of the family crypt and a man has created his own trade in helping old women cross dangerous streets in the city. This paper approaches literature and the act of writing as being more-than-representational. It is a literary geography that considers how the city spaces and economic possibilities of Cairo are performed by Cossery’s writings, and how this performance can be considered an act of resistance.
DOI
https://doi.org/10.7275/2118225
First Advisor
Richard W. Wilkie
Second Advisor
Kathryn Lachman