Dr. Nana Aba Bentil-Mawusi - Arabic Section

PhD     Indiana University Bloomington, USA. 2018

MA      The American University in Cairo, Egypt. 2002

BA       University of Ghana, Accra. 1997.

Dr. Bentil-Mawusi is a lecturer of Arabic. She obtained her Bachelor’s degree from the University of Ghana with a combined major in Arabic and French in 1997. Her MA degree from the American University in Cairo in 2002, specialized in the 20th century Arabic novel. She earned her PhD in Arabic from the Indiana University in Bloomington in June 2018, minoring in Comparative Literature and African Studies.

She has taught Arabic language, literature and translation classes as well as African culture courses in the University of Ghana and Indiana University Bloomington. Among her awards are the African Student Research Fund, Indiana University 2014; Visiting Research Scholar Fellowship, Indiana University Bloomington 2008; and the African Graduate Fellowship, 1999.

Research Areas:

• Comparative studies in Arabic and African literature and culture.
• Comparative approaches to the teaching of the Arabic Language in West Africa and elsewhere.
• Arab Communities in West Africa

Courses Recently Taught:

ARAB 312       Modern Arabic Short story in Translation

ARAB 414       Modern Arabic Novel in Translation

AFRI   232       Contemporary Africa

Thesis:

1. Performing Arab and African Royalty: An Intertextual Approach to the Performance of the Abbasid, Ashanti and Yoruba Court Panegyric (PhD, June 2018)
2. The Gendered Self and the Gendered Other: The Representation of Men in Selected Arabic Novels. (MA, Feb. 2002)

Papers and Presentations

1.  “The Construction of Selfhood and the Poetics of Identity in the Ashanti and Abbasid Court Panegyrics” (Paper presented in Arabic)   Georgetown University, April, 2016.
2. “I Will Praise My King or I Die: An Intertextual Approach to the Abbasid and Asante Court Panegyric,” MEST Annual Symposium, Indiana University, March 2015
3. “Behold the King: In Search of a Comparative Approach to African and Arabic Court Poetry” (Paper presented in Arabic).  Literature and Theory Workshop,   Indiana University, Bloomington. Dec. 2013.
4. قصيدتا المدح العربية و(الأباي) الأكانية الأفريقية : مقارنة طقوسية أدائية (“The Akan Apaee and the Arabic Madih: A Ritualistic Performative, Comparison”).  (Paper presented in Arabic). Indiana University, Bloomington. April 2010.