As a course, Palestine in the World analyzed how Palestine became a touchstone for anticolonial forces around the globe. It interpreted Palestine’s role as a point of symbolism, debate, and organizing at various junctures, including but not limited to: the competing visions of the British & the Comintern during the Mandate era, U.S. and Soviet maneuvering during partition, the Bandung Conference, the Tricontinental, the Cultural Revolution in China, the rise of Black Power and the left in Latin America, the PLO’s connections across Africa, and the neoliberal era after the mid-1970s. As a core component of this course, students selected a theme related to Palestine in the World. After significant research, they created their own Digital Humanities projects that explored their theme.
The projects that students envisioned and built were diverse and inspiring. In tune with local narratives, students charted a history of Palestinian Activism at the University of Michigan, digging into archives that took them back to the 1940s. Others tackled broader Cold War themes, presenting the complicated histories of Chinese-Palestinian solidarities, detailing the ideologies of resistance during the Lebanese Civil War, or documenting Cuban solidarity with the Arab World. Some students produced podcasts on Black Power and Palestine, interviewing a former Black Panther member. One group explored the history of Palestine and the Catholic Church, and another the history of Indigenous American solidarity with Palestine. Still others documented the complicated ways in which Palestine entered the world of Sports. These were just some of the wonderful Digital Humanities projects produced during this period.
Derek Ide, Ph.D. 