Modernity, Ḥadātha, and Modernité in the Works of Abdallah Laroui

Conceptual Translation and the Politics of Historicity

in Contributions to the History of Concepts
Author:
Nils Riecken Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient nils.riecken@zmo.de

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Abstract

The puzzle this article examines is how one can study the concept of modernity within the history of its universalization as a process of translation. For this purpose, I look at how the contemporary Moroccan historian and intellectual Abdallah Laroui has critically engaged with the history, politics, and epistemology of translating modernity (Arabic ḥadātha, French modernité) into his intellectual and political setting of Morocco, North Africa, and the Middle East during and after the colonial period. I read him as making a critical intervention into existing modes of timing and spacing the concept of modernity and, thus, what I describe as the politics of historicity. In conclusion, I make a methodological plea for framing the history of concepts across political borders in terms of translational practices.

Contributor Notes

Nils Riecken is Postdoctoral Research Fellow at the Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient. Email: nils.riecken@zmo.de

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