Abstract
In Omar El Akkad’s speculative novel American War (2017), set in the 2070s, a second civil war erupts in the United States, parts of which already destroyed by climate change, and a new world order is shaped with the emergence of an empire in the Middle East. At the center of the war is the protagonist Sarat, a rebel from the “Free Southern States” whose life, both as a victim of the conflict and a perpetrator of violence, is traced throughout the novel as one typical of inhabitants of war-torn regions. This paper examines how far the dystopia into which the United States metamorphoses and the transformations through which the world goes touch upon contemporary issues pertaining to American foreign policy, the Arab Spring, terrorism, ultra-nationalism, and global warming. This will be done through looking into the reversal of the balance of power in the novel—the rise of the Bouazizi Empire being the most notable—and its implications as far as the current world order and relations between center and periphery are concerned. Through scrutinizing the different aspects of the ominous future Akkad presents against the backdrop of a turbulent present, the paper attempts to position the text as a form of political commentary that deconstructs the dogmas on which civil conflicts thrive and the role of superpowers in igniting/ fueling those conflicts. A link between the future as depicted in the novel and actual events that took place in the 20th and 21st centuries becomes, therefore, necessary.
Presenters
Sonia FaridAssociate Professor, Department of English Language and Literature, Cairo University, Egypt
Details
Presentation Type
Paper Presentation in a Themed Session
Theme
KEYWORDS
Post-apocalyptic Fiction, Speculative Fiction, Arab Spring, American Politics
