Palestine Across Millennia - A History of Literacy, Learning and Educational Revolutions

List of contents

Acknowledgements
Introduction
Chapter One: Literacy and Functionality: The Scribal Schools of Ancient Palestine
Chapter Two: Cities of Learning: The Intellectual Revolutions of Byzantine Palestine (3rd-early 7th Centuries)
Chapter Three: Greek and Syriac into Arabic and the Palestine’s Translation Movement under Islam: Monasteries of Learning, Mar Saba and Arabic belles lettres (8th -11th Centuries)
Chapter Four: Latin Learning and the Crusader Kingdoms of Palestine: The Library of Nazareth
Chapter Five: The Golden Age of the Islamic Law Colleges of Jerusalem:The Palestinian Madrasas under the Ayyubids and Mamluks (1187-1517)
Chapter Six: Legal Pluralism and the Social World of Palestine in the 17th Century: The Azhar College of Cairo and Palestinian Muslim Scholars
Chapter Seven: The ‘Azhar’ of Palestine. The Ahmadiyya Seminary of Acre (1782-1948)
Chapter Eight: Modernity, the Printing Press and Mass Literacy: The Educational Revolution of Late Ottoman Palestine and the Mandatory Period (1860s-1948)
Chapter Nine: Humanism and Arab Nahda Education: Khalil Sakakini and Reforming Palestinian Education
Chapter Ten: Learning From Below:The Kuttab Schools in Palestine (Muslim, Jewish and Christian)
Chapter Eleven: Between Professionalism and Cultural Nationalism: Palestinian Education in Mandatory Palestine (1918-1948)
Epilogue: The Libraries, Archival Collections and Sharia Courts’ Records of Modern Palestine
Bibliography

About the author

Professor Nur Masalha is a Palestinian academic and historian and former Director of the Centre for Religion and History at St. Mary's University, London. He is currently a Member of the Centre for Palestine Studies, SOAS, University of London. He is the Editor of “Journal of Holy Land and Palestine Studies,” published by Edinburgh University Press. He is also the author and editor of numerous books on Palestine, including, Palestine: A Four Thousand Year History (2018); An Oral History of the Palestinian Nakba (with Nahla Abdo, 2018); Theologies of Liberation in Palestine-Israel: Indigenous, Contextual, and Postcolonial Perspectives (2014); The Zionist Bible: Biblical Precedent, Colonialism and the Erasure of Memory (2013); The Palestine Nakba: Decolonising History, Narrating the Subaltern, Reclaiming Memory (2012); The Bible and Zionism (2007); The Politics of Denial: Israel and the Palestinian Refugee Problem (2003): Imperial Israel and the Palestinians: The Politics of Expansion (2000); A Land Without a People (1997); Expulsion of the Palestinians: The Concept of ‘Transfer’ in Zionist Political Thought, 1882-1948 (1992). Professor Masalha also currently serves as a judge on the panel for the Palestine Book Award (London).

Summary

In this magisterial cultural history of the Palestinians, Nur Masalha illuminates the entire history of Palestinian learning with specific reference to writing, education, literary production and the intellectual revolutions in the country. The book introduces this long cultural heritage to demonstrate that Palestine was not just a ‘holy land’ for the four monotheistic religions – Islam, Christianity, Judaism and Samaritanism – rather, the country evolved to become a major international site of classical education and knowledge production in multiple languages including Sumerian, Proto-Canaanite, Greek, Syriac, Arabic, Hebrew and Latin. The cultural saturation of the country is found then, not solely in landmark mosques, churches and synagogues, but in scholarship, historic schools, colleges, famous international libraries and archival centres.
This unique book unites these renowned institutions, movements and multiple historical periods for the first time, presenting them as part of a cumulative and incremental intellectual advancement rather than disconnected periods of educational excellence. In doing so, this multifaceted intellectual history transforms the orientations of scholarly research on Palestine and propels current historical knowledge on education and literacy in Palestine to new heights.

Additional text

'In this ground-breaking study, Nur Masalha brilliantly traces the pedagogical and intellectual beginnings, evolution and multifaceted histories of Palestinian learning, literacy and education. Masalha’s exciting book deepens and broadens our understanding of oral representation, textuality and written literacy in modern and ancient Palestine. Drawing on a rigorous intellectual and historical framework, Masalha dismantles mainstream Zionist propaganda and its patronizing myths of cultural and educational superiority.'

Product details

• Authors: Nur Masalha
• Publisher: Tauris, I.B.
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 24.02.2022
• EAN: 9780755642946
• ISBN: 978-0-7556-4294-6
• No. of pages: 352
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > History; Social & cultural history, HISTORY / Middle East / Israel & Palestine, LANGUAGE ARTS & DISCIPLINES / Literacy, History of Education, Social and cultural history, Middle Eastern history, Palestine