Modern Resistance Poetry: Muslim Identity through Poetic Voices

Resistance has turned into a widespread term used by many nations of theworld which have been facing all forms of oppression and fallacious types ofrepresentation. Resistance has entered different kinds of literary representation andthrough different means the oppressed people of different places of the world triedto assert their resistance to the oppression to which they were subjected. Manynations have experienced tyranny, subjugation, bloodshed, and arduous attempts forrevolution, among which Iran is a good example that opposed a former West-backedregime through all kinds of resistance. The most important resistance which unifiedthe nation under one flag was the expression of resistance through literature:journals were spread, stories were authored, songs and chanting slogans wereproduced and poems were recited. But what extended a wide influence in all theseliterary types was poetry and poetic language. Likewise, nearly all Muslim countriesare experiencing the same social, political, and ethnic phenomena. The reason forthis new experience of the Muslim world is the wide expansion of Westernhegemonic rule in the Muslim countries. For several years Muslim countries wereattacked, invaded, and dominated by Western countries and, as a result, the usualmedia-projected stereotypes which were rendered as threats to the Western world(e.g. the threatening Russian Communist brotherhood, the Japanese invasion threat,and the black gangster community, etc.) were replaced by Muslim fundamentalismand terrorism as the target of Western mass-media propaganda.Like any other nation before, the Muslims have been searching for a means ofrepresentation to resist such false pictures of their identity and stop their beingexploited on a regular basis. Poetry proved to be the best way to assert their trueidentity and to backlash against Western media presenting them as terrorists andthreats for the peace of global community. Therefore, Muslim poetry has generallybecome synonymous with resistance poetry and the present situation of Muslimpoetry is preserving struggle and revolution against the domineering hegemony ofWestern discourse to label and literally and metaphorically colonize them. What this study focuses on is the poetry of Muslim poets who have experienced Western dominance and resisted its containment in late ۲۰th and early ۲۱st centuries. The objective is to find the common poetic features and thus come into a conclusive picture of the present situation of Muslim resistance poetry