New practices of reading and writing are being produced today, new concepts of knowledge are being defined, and new critiques of power are emerging. These changes are the subject of Tarek El-Ariss’ new book Leaks, Hacks, and Scandals: Arab Culture in the Digital Age (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 2019). He is Professor and Chair of Middle Eastern Studies at Dartmouth. One of his many research interests include contemporary Arabic culture, literature, and art; new media and cyber culture; digital humanities; Nahda literature and gender and sexuality studies; as well as psychoanalysis and affect theory, just to name a few. Many events are taking place in Dartmouth dealing with Arab authors and artists, for example on September 28, Mashrou’ Leila will perform at the Hopkins Center for the Arts at Dartmouth. Back in Spring we talked via Skype about his new book and on how culture is changing in the digital age.
Tugrul Mende How did you first come across the topic of digital culture and more specifically of leaks and hacks in the Arab context? Could you describe your research and approach and how they differ from your previous work?
Tarek El-Ariss: I got interested in this topic when I started witnessing new critiques of power that did not correspond to the traditional left or right, Islamists or secularists. At the same time, new forms of writing including experimental writing started to emerge in the late 1990s. I became involved in tracing these changes that gradually constituted a break with previous writing and protest models. When I was finishing my first book, the Arab uprisings happened. I was about to finish my last chapter when I realized that the new phenomenon that I was describing was not only about aesthetics but that there was a political dimension that has drawn these things together. This was the point where I tried to understand this intersection between new writing practices, new aesthetics, and a new generation of people writing in Egypt, Lebanon but also in the Gulf.
