For more than a century, the US and European film industry has used certain 'others' to construct a strange or dangerous counterpart for the protagonists in film. Arabs' are no exception - and their portrayal is sometimes caricatured in a similar way to that of the 'Jew' in other contexts: dressed in harem pants and turbans, with an uncanny look, uncivilized and wild, politically radicalized or religiously fanatical. Often enough, the 'Arab' is the villain - as the cultural 'other' par excellence. In this seminar we will go on the trail of such 'stereotypes'. We will not only look at films, but also at series and documentaries. For example: The Thief of Baghdad, Aladdin, Body of Lies, The Night Manager, Reel Bad Arabs, Terra-X documentaries. close