Fellows

Abdesselam CHEDDADI

History, University Mohammed V, Morocco

Fellowship : October 2018 to June 2019

Discipline(s) : History

Pays : Maroc

Research project: The Arabs in Modernity: linguistic and cultural issues

The Arabs’ destiny in Modern times poses a twofold problem, at anthropological and historical levels. How can we explain their difficulties in reconstructing themselves as Societies, Nation States and Cultures, and integrating well into the Modern World System? What stages have they gone through since the 19th century in order to inscribe themselves in Modernity? This research makes the hypothesis that the greatest handicap of Arab Societies lies in the fact that, until today, they have been unable to find an appropriate solution to the questions of language and culture. This research adopts an approach of global history and connected history, taking into account local, international and global dimensions. It attempts to elucidate the reasons for this failure by tracing the historical process of Arab Societies since the 19th century on, according to a new perspective.

Biography

Moroccan national Abdesselam Cheddadi was born in Fes on 25 January 1944. He studied philosophy and history in France at the Sorbonne and EHSS where he received a PhD and a doctorate degree in humanities and social sciences. He worked as a lecturer and researcher at Mohammed V university in Rabat and was Associate Director of Studies at l’École des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales in Paris and visiting professor at the universities of Harvard and Princeton in the United States. His research studies have focused primarily on Arab historiography, the thinking of Ibn Khaldûn, whose work he has translated into French, as well as questions of Arabic culture in the modern age. He has been awarded a number of French, Moroccan and Arabic prizes including the Franco-Arab Friendship prize, the Ibn Khaldoun Senghor prize, the Prix du Maroc and the King Faysal international prize in humanities.

Major publications

CHEDDADI, Abdesselam, « L’histoire globale : un concept à construire » (Global History: a Concept to Build), Hespéris-Tamuda LV (1) (2020): 117-133

Ibn Khaldûn, Le livre des Exemples, 2 volumes, Paris, Gallimard, La Pléiade ( volume I, 2002, 1559 p. ; volume II, 2012, 1633 p.), texte établi, traduit et présenté par Abdesselam CHEDDADI

CHEDDADI, Abdesselam, Ibn Khaldûn L’homme et le théoricien de la civilisation, Gallimard, 2006, 523 p.

CHEDDADI Abdesselam, Les Arabes et l’appropriation de l’histoire, Paris, Actes Sud, 2004, 390 p.

CHEDDADI Abdesselam, Ibn Khaldûn revisité, Edition Toubkal, Casablanca, 1999, 132 p.

CHEDDADI Abdesselam, Culture arabe, pensée universelle, éditions Marsam, Rabat, 167 p.