Wajih Ayed holds an MA, a PhD, and a postdoctoral degree in Medieval English literature. He is an associate professor of English at the Faculty of Arts and Humanities, University of Sousse, Tunisia. He has taught graduate and undergraduate courses in English literature and literary theory in many higher education institutions in Tunisia. His research interests include the questions of identity, alienation, integration, and negotiation. He has written, presented, and published on the conditions of minority groups or subjects in (medieval) literature and culture. His current research projects focus on the study of late medieval and early modern narratives from the perspectives of postclassical narratologies. Supervisors: Professor Emeritus Hedi Sioud
Pedagogies of the premodern in anglophone contexts face many obstacles, like cultural differences... more Pedagogies of the premodern in anglophone contexts face many obstacles, like cultural differences, linguistic remoteness, and stereotypical representations. In EFL learning and teaching settings, student motivation, cultural adequation, and historical imagination are also needed. In Tunisia, this was further complicated after the Jasmine Revolution when newly radicalised students of English resented aspects of premodern literature which they considered inaccurate, uninteresting, or inappropriate. In this paper, the author presents a learning and teaching model developed to help post‐revolutionary Tunisian learners with diverse backgrounds and orientations better understand and appreciate the works of Geoffrey Chaucer. Combining elements of cognitive studies, comparative literature, and digital codicology, this bricolage was used in graduate seminars at the University of Sousse to study digitised manuscripts and texts in Arabic, Latin, and (Middle) English. Informed by active pedagog...
Essais d'analyse de discours : Mélanges offerts à la mémoire du Professeur Hedi Sioud, 2021
Higher-education teaching of English literature in Tunisia relies on instructional formats of inf... more Higher-education teaching of English literature in Tunisia relies on instructional formats of information transfer which do not favour active learning and competence building. This paper first argues for the need to rethink national tertiary-level pedagogy by shifting to student-centred and outcome-oriented teaching methods. The second part of the work discusses classroom practices which can help develop the literary competences of learners in taught English degree courses.
Neither Sir Palomides in Thomas Malory’s _Le Morte d’Arthur_ nor Othello in William Shakespeare’s... more Neither Sir Palomides in Thomas Malory’s _Le Morte d’Arthur_ nor Othello in William Shakespeare’s eponymous play originally belongs to his targeted ingroup, and yet the former is partially admitted therein after his baptism whereas the latter is returned to the outgroup zone in spite of his prior conversion. I contend that the divergent discourses of (non-) belonging in the late medieval chivalric romance and the early modern tragedy are determined by changing ideas about religion and race. For the racially marked Saracen and Moor, identification with the master signifiers of inclusiveness in Camelot and Venice modulates from desire to fantasy and from illusion to delusion.
Many miniatures from recently digitised medieval manuscripts circulate in social media as mere ob... more Many miniatures from recently digitised medieval manuscripts circulate in social media as mere objects of curiosity and amusement. This article first studies the statuses of samples of these thresholds in their contexts of production, reception, and transmission, then explores their functions in the manuscript matrix. Proceeding from the Genettian theory of paratextuality, it argues for a functional typology of medieval iconic peritexts involving simple or complex and governed or non-governed relations with the written text. Funny, perhaps at times, and at times almost amusing, these gateways/getaways still have a painted depth that delights (in) sight.
The verbal text of the Gawain-manuscript has received significant critical interest, but its four... more The verbal text of the Gawain-manuscript has received significant critical interest, but its four illuminations have generally been discarded as low-quality drawings. When viewed from the perspective of Possible Worlds theory, however, these peripheral miniatures show complex relations with each other and with the verbal part of the narrative. They also appear to assist in the mental creation of the storyworld, where characters’ private domains compete for validation in the Textual Actual World, and where mental and physical events intertwine into a braided plot. This paper contends that, far from being disposable, the iconic peritexts of Ms Cotton Nero A.x. (art. 3) help generate the elements of the storyworld and accelerate the modern readers’ immersion in its past alterity.
In this work, I discuss the management of the initial iconic peritext of _Sir Gawain and the Gree... more In this work, I discuss the management of the initial iconic peritext of _Sir Gawain and the Green Knight_ in a paper edition, a translation, and a digital facsimile. Writing from the perspective of cognitive narratology, I argue that the miniature is not a disposable illustration but a framing border, the (non) reproduction of which in each modern rendition of the text has different consequences on the mental processes involved in reading the poem.
Arab World English Journal for Translation & Literary Studies, 2017
Mourning becomes Shakespeare, perhaps; celebration too. Romeo and Juliet (1597) and Othello (1604... more Mourning becomes Shakespeare, perhaps; celebration too. Romeo and Juliet (1597) and Othello (1604) are tragedies of sweeping passion and rash action where love falters and lovers fall. In her 1988 play entitled Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), Ann-Marie MacDonald parodies the two Shakespearean texts and visits the intersections between genre and gender where tragedy modulates into comedy and liminal gender identities fade in and out across permeable genre spaces. The protagonist of the play, Constance Ledbelly, is sucked into the wonderland of her unconscious mind where she outwits her opponents, Iago and Tybalt, and moderates the extremes of her avatars, Desdemona and Juliet. She thus breaks free from her stalking shadow, Night the Professor, and realises that she is the unwitting author of the play. Her unconscious leap onto the stages of mourning becomes a farewell to the night, and a greeting of the morning that becomes the queerness of the postmodernist world—laughing off its past and laughing at its present. The golden pen which Constance finds at the end of her toying with genre, language, and gender is a reward for the author who takes refuge in a world where the fool of court is king of wit, and where the pandemonium of tragedy becomes the playground of parody. The author of this paper studies the alchemy of Constance's change and MacDonald's reconsideration of genre and gender through parody, the postmodern philosopher's stone. He also argues for a politics of identity revisiting the aesthetics of mourning.
Mawared موارد (مجلة كلية الاداب والعلوم الانسانية بسوسة), 2016
Virginity is not normally compatible with marriage. Nor is the virgin usually able to reclaim pre... more Virginity is not normally compatible with marriage. Nor is the virgin usually able to reclaim premarital chastity—except at the spiritual level, like a saint. Like a virgin, Margery Kempe goes through a personal religious experience outside officially charted venues of devotion to regain her chastity in a community where virginity was physiologically recognised and institutionally regulated. Listening for religious guidance, she sees divine truth in the private pursuit of piety. I argue that the female mystic finds a measure of safety in the non-gendered status of the virgin, and yet develops a resilient sense of identity which enables her to bypass antagonism and negotiate her way to virginal cleanness.
The Quest for Identity in Middle English Literature: The Matter of Negotiations, 2021
The question of the quest for personal
identity in Middle English literature
exercised critics an... more The question of the quest for personal identity in Middle English literature exercised critics and polarised their views, but diverging critical perspectives converged on the misconception of the medieval subject as a self-unconscious member of a supposedly organic body politic free from cultural friction. Across the terrain of critical contest and in line with recent orientations in medieval studies, I argue for the existence of subjectivity in English literature in the later Middle Ages. My central contention is that self-fashioning depends on the clever interaction of the self-styling subject with the cultural parameters generating medieval selfhood. Because the search that departs from cultural normativity is usually contained, the quester who resourcefully reacts to the trammels imposed by the orthodox constructions of identity achieves a measure of success in self-fashioning. Scrutiny of key Middle English literary texts, particularly, The Canterbury Tales, The Book of Margery Kempe, Piers Plowman, and Le Morte D’Arthur, shows that the optimal quest for identity is a matter of negotiations.
Pedagogies of the premodern in anglophone contexts face many obstacles, like cultural differences... more Pedagogies of the premodern in anglophone contexts face many obstacles, like cultural differences, linguistic remoteness, and stereotypical representations. In EFL learning and teaching settings, student motivation, cultural adequation, and historical imagination are also needed. In Tunisia, this was further complicated after the Jasmine Revolution when newly radicalised students of English resented aspects of premodern literature which they considered inaccurate, uninteresting, or inappropriate. In this paper, the author presents a learning and teaching model developed to help post‐revolutionary Tunisian learners with diverse backgrounds and orientations better understand and appreciate the works of Geoffrey Chaucer. Combining elements of cognitive studies, comparative literature, and digital codicology, this bricolage was used in graduate seminars at the University of Sousse to study digitised manuscripts and texts in Arabic, Latin, and (Middle) English. Informed by active pedagog...
Essais d'analyse de discours : Mélanges offerts à la mémoire du Professeur Hedi Sioud, 2021
Higher-education teaching of English literature in Tunisia relies on instructional formats of inf... more Higher-education teaching of English literature in Tunisia relies on instructional formats of information transfer which do not favour active learning and competence building. This paper first argues for the need to rethink national tertiary-level pedagogy by shifting to student-centred and outcome-oriented teaching methods. The second part of the work discusses classroom practices which can help develop the literary competences of learners in taught English degree courses.
Neither Sir Palomides in Thomas Malory’s _Le Morte d’Arthur_ nor Othello in William Shakespeare’s... more Neither Sir Palomides in Thomas Malory’s _Le Morte d’Arthur_ nor Othello in William Shakespeare’s eponymous play originally belongs to his targeted ingroup, and yet the former is partially admitted therein after his baptism whereas the latter is returned to the outgroup zone in spite of his prior conversion. I contend that the divergent discourses of (non-) belonging in the late medieval chivalric romance and the early modern tragedy are determined by changing ideas about religion and race. For the racially marked Saracen and Moor, identification with the master signifiers of inclusiveness in Camelot and Venice modulates from desire to fantasy and from illusion to delusion.
Many miniatures from recently digitised medieval manuscripts circulate in social media as mere ob... more Many miniatures from recently digitised medieval manuscripts circulate in social media as mere objects of curiosity and amusement. This article first studies the statuses of samples of these thresholds in their contexts of production, reception, and transmission, then explores their functions in the manuscript matrix. Proceeding from the Genettian theory of paratextuality, it argues for a functional typology of medieval iconic peritexts involving simple or complex and governed or non-governed relations with the written text. Funny, perhaps at times, and at times almost amusing, these gateways/getaways still have a painted depth that delights (in) sight.
The verbal text of the Gawain-manuscript has received significant critical interest, but its four... more The verbal text of the Gawain-manuscript has received significant critical interest, but its four illuminations have generally been discarded as low-quality drawings. When viewed from the perspective of Possible Worlds theory, however, these peripheral miniatures show complex relations with each other and with the verbal part of the narrative. They also appear to assist in the mental creation of the storyworld, where characters’ private domains compete for validation in the Textual Actual World, and where mental and physical events intertwine into a braided plot. This paper contends that, far from being disposable, the iconic peritexts of Ms Cotton Nero A.x. (art. 3) help generate the elements of the storyworld and accelerate the modern readers’ immersion in its past alterity.
In this work, I discuss the management of the initial iconic peritext of _Sir Gawain and the Gree... more In this work, I discuss the management of the initial iconic peritext of _Sir Gawain and the Green Knight_ in a paper edition, a translation, and a digital facsimile. Writing from the perspective of cognitive narratology, I argue that the miniature is not a disposable illustration but a framing border, the (non) reproduction of which in each modern rendition of the text has different consequences on the mental processes involved in reading the poem.
Arab World English Journal for Translation & Literary Studies, 2017
Mourning becomes Shakespeare, perhaps; celebration too. Romeo and Juliet (1597) and Othello (1604... more Mourning becomes Shakespeare, perhaps; celebration too. Romeo and Juliet (1597) and Othello (1604) are tragedies of sweeping passion and rash action where love falters and lovers fall. In her 1988 play entitled Goodnight Desdemona (Good Morning Juliet), Ann-Marie MacDonald parodies the two Shakespearean texts and visits the intersections between genre and gender where tragedy modulates into comedy and liminal gender identities fade in and out across permeable genre spaces. The protagonist of the play, Constance Ledbelly, is sucked into the wonderland of her unconscious mind where she outwits her opponents, Iago and Tybalt, and moderates the extremes of her avatars, Desdemona and Juliet. She thus breaks free from her stalking shadow, Night the Professor, and realises that she is the unwitting author of the play. Her unconscious leap onto the stages of mourning becomes a farewell to the night, and a greeting of the morning that becomes the queerness of the postmodernist world—laughing off its past and laughing at its present. The golden pen which Constance finds at the end of her toying with genre, language, and gender is a reward for the author who takes refuge in a world where the fool of court is king of wit, and where the pandemonium of tragedy becomes the playground of parody. The author of this paper studies the alchemy of Constance's change and MacDonald's reconsideration of genre and gender through parody, the postmodern philosopher's stone. He also argues for a politics of identity revisiting the aesthetics of mourning.
Mawared موارد (مجلة كلية الاداب والعلوم الانسانية بسوسة), 2016
Virginity is not normally compatible with marriage. Nor is the virgin usually able to reclaim pre... more Virginity is not normally compatible with marriage. Nor is the virgin usually able to reclaim premarital chastity—except at the spiritual level, like a saint. Like a virgin, Margery Kempe goes through a personal religious experience outside officially charted venues of devotion to regain her chastity in a community where virginity was physiologically recognised and institutionally regulated. Listening for religious guidance, she sees divine truth in the private pursuit of piety. I argue that the female mystic finds a measure of safety in the non-gendered status of the virgin, and yet develops a resilient sense of identity which enables her to bypass antagonism and negotiate her way to virginal cleanness.
The Quest for Identity in Middle English Literature: The Matter of Negotiations, 2021
The question of the quest for personal
identity in Middle English literature
exercised critics an... more The question of the quest for personal identity in Middle English literature exercised critics and polarised their views, but diverging critical perspectives converged on the misconception of the medieval subject as a self-unconscious member of a supposedly organic body politic free from cultural friction. Across the terrain of critical contest and in line with recent orientations in medieval studies, I argue for the existence of subjectivity in English literature in the later Middle Ages. My central contention is that self-fashioning depends on the clever interaction of the self-styling subject with the cultural parameters generating medieval selfhood. Because the search that departs from cultural normativity is usually contained, the quester who resourcefully reacts to the trammels imposed by the orthodox constructions of identity achieves a measure of success in self-fashioning. Scrutiny of key Middle English literary texts, particularly, The Canterbury Tales, The Book of Margery Kempe, Piers Plowman, and Le Morte D’Arthur, shows that the optimal quest for identity is a matter of negotiations.
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Papers by Wajih Ayed
Keywords: Christianity – mysticism – alienation – virginity – negotiation – autobiography
Books by Wajih Ayed
identity in Middle English literature
exercised critics and polarised their views, but
diverging critical perspectives converged on
the misconception of the medieval subject as
a self-unconscious member of a supposedly
organic body politic free from cultural friction.
Across the terrain of critical contest and in line
with recent orientations in medieval studies, I
argue for the existence of subjectivity in English
literature in the later Middle Ages. My central
contention is that self-fashioning depends
on the clever interaction of the self-styling
subject with the cultural parameters generating
medieval selfhood. Because the search that
departs from cultural normativity is usually
contained, the quester who resourcefully reacts
to the trammels imposed by the orthodox
constructions of identity achieves a measure
of success in self-fashioning. Scrutiny of key
Middle English literary texts, particularly, The
Canterbury Tales, The Book of Margery Kempe,
Piers Plowman, and Le Morte D’Arthur, shows
that the optimal quest for identity is a matter of
negotiations.
Keywords: Christianity – mysticism – alienation – virginity – negotiation – autobiography
identity in Middle English literature
exercised critics and polarised their views, but
diverging critical perspectives converged on
the misconception of the medieval subject as
a self-unconscious member of a supposedly
organic body politic free from cultural friction.
Across the terrain of critical contest and in line
with recent orientations in medieval studies, I
argue for the existence of subjectivity in English
literature in the later Middle Ages. My central
contention is that self-fashioning depends
on the clever interaction of the self-styling
subject with the cultural parameters generating
medieval selfhood. Because the search that
departs from cultural normativity is usually
contained, the quester who resourcefully reacts
to the trammels imposed by the orthodox
constructions of identity achieves a measure
of success in self-fashioning. Scrutiny of key
Middle English literary texts, particularly, The
Canterbury Tales, The Book of Margery Kempe,
Piers Plowman, and Le Morte D’Arthur, shows
that the optimal quest for identity is a matter of
negotiations.