TEXTUAL ANALYSIS OF ARAB WOMEN’S PRISON NARRATIVES (1960s-1990s) USING VOYANT TOOLS: LITERARY WORKS FROM EGYPT, LEBANON, PALESTINE AND MOROCCO

Abstract

This thesis explores Arab women’s prison narratives from the 1960s to the 1990s through a mixed-methods approach that combines computational analysis using Voyant Tools and literary interpretation. It focuses on four texts written by women: Return of the Pharaoh (Egypt), Resistance (Lebanon), A Party for Thaera (Palestine), and Stolen Lives (Morocco). This approach enables the study to examine recurring themes, the interaction of key concepts such as resistance, hope, and identity, and the ways in which these concepts evolve over time. The findings reveal that, despite differing national and political contexts, these narratives share core themes of political oppression, spiritual endurance, identity formation, and survival. Moreover, spatial references—such as prison cells, villages, and landscapes—emerge as powerful symbolic anchors that shape how imprisonment and resistance are experienced and narrated. In addition, the study shows that resistance, hope, and identity are deeply interconnected and shaped by each narrative’s political and emotional context. Resistance takes ideological, national, or psychological forms; hope is expressed through both spiritual faith and relational strength; and identity appears as either fixed or evolving, depending on the pressures of imprisonment. Over time, these concepts shift: resistance becomes more adaptive, hope grows more relational, and identity transforms into a fluid, reconstructed sense of self. By integrating distant reading techniques with literary analysis, this thesis contributes to both Arabic prison literature and digital humanities. It offers fresh insight into gendered experiences of incarceration and highlights how Arab women’s prison narratives function not only as testimonies of suffering but also as powerful expressions of political and personal agency.

Date of Award	2025
Original language	American English
Awarding Institution	HBKU College of Humanities and Social Science