Sheiks and sherifs : western portrayals of the middle east between the World Wars.

Abstract

Oftentimes, when there are analyses of E. M. Hull's The Sheik or discussions of Lowell Thomas's presentations over Lawrence of Arabia, the intertextual nature between these works--as well as the historical and cultural context in which they were created--is overlooked. Through this thesis, I aim to show how historical events from World War I influenced and enabled E. M. Hull's The Sheik and led to how Lowell Thomas tailored his presentation of Lawrence of Arabia, and furthermore, how they altogether influenced the world of film during this period. Furthermore, I posit that this is, almost exactly, Orientalism in the sense that Said describes, in which these texts serve as a set of stereotypes and assumptions for which Orientalist stereotypes and assumptions are brought in to the Western consciousness. In other words, by showing how all of these events, novels, films, and productions came together, I aim to show just how they were able to set off stereotypes through which the West absorbed their information about the Middle East--forcing it into more and more standardized and familiar molds--and creating a narrative on what the Middle East was for the West. This would lead to how the Middle East was portrayed throughout the period between World War I and World War II.