'The World is an Undutiful Boy!': Sayyid Qutb's American experience

Abstract

The article analyzes the images of America put forward by Sayyid Qutb (1906-1966), the prominent Egyptian ideologue of Islamism, during and immediately following his study mission to the US between 1948 and 1950. It argues that Qutb's understanding of America was conditioned by his tendency, already explicit in his 1938 critique of Taha Husayn's Mustaqbal al-Thaqafa fi Misr, to posit a cultural divide between a 'spiritual East' and a 'materialist West'. In addition to Qutb's articles and letters on the subject, many of which were published in al-Risala, the article draws upon hitherto untapped materials uncovered by the author at the University of Northern Colorado, where Qutb studied in 1949.

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