This article focuses on a feminist aesthetics of violence that distinguishes Algerian women filmmakers' treatment of violence from that of earlier male filmmakers. Such feminist aesthetics reveal how questions of gender and nation have moved to the forefront of analyses of the roots and repercussions of institutionalised violence. Through their female protagonists,...

This article examines Antara Ibn Shaddad's poetry in light of early Arab encounters with Black Africa. Prior to the invasion by the Christian state of Ethiopia in 525 AD, Arab traders had used Ethiopia as their starting point for trade, in both spices and slaves. Caravans moved from Hijaz (modern day Saudi Arabia) to Abyssinia (ancient Ethiopia). Pre-Islamic poet A...