Land and Language

Mahmoud Darwish: As the Land in the Language
Simone Bitton, Elias Sanbar, France, 1998, 60 min. Arabic with English subtitles

Ma'loul Celebrates its Destruction
Michel Khleifi, Belgium, Palestine, 1984, 30 min. Arabic with English subtitles
 
Films introduced by Marwa Arsanios and Haytham el-Wardany, followed by a discussion with the audience

We chose these documentary films because, through two different approaches to form, each film materializes the relationship between land, its loss, its lack, and language and how it is put to work for regaining the land through the Palestinian revolutionary struggle or preserving its memory through narration. Here, the memory project is no less revolutionary as it is mobilized to transmit the loss of land, therefore allowing for the inheritance of its theft. How are loss and struggle transmitted through Darwish's poetry? How is memory narrated through Khleifi's film? These questions will prompt our discussion and help us navigate the intricacies of the Arabic language in its relation to land and revolution. (MA + HeW)      
 
Marwa Arsanios is an artist, researcher, and filmmaker from Beirut who lives in Berlin.
 
Haytham el-Wardany is a writer and translator from Cairo, living and working in Berlin.