28th Annual Student Research Conference
Trading Tyrants for Tyrants: Reading Marjane Satrapi's Persepolis
Antonio B. Gomez Doggett
Dr. Hena Ahmad, Faculty Mentor
Satrapi, in her autobiographical graphic novel, Persepolis: The Story of a Childhood, recounts her story as a child growing up in Iran during the late 70's and early 80's, as a reminder that accounts of the Islamic Revolution of Iran should not reduce the stories of the individual into a compendium of reductive analyses of Iranian society. Ironically, the revolution of the "proletariat" that represented the dream of Satrapi's father and, according to critics, of Leftist Iran proved a source of censure. This paper will examine the ways in which Satrapi shows that the "Islam" the people fell in love with changed with the rise of Ayatollah Khomeini to power in 1979, leading to a rejection of the liberty to be secular.
Keywords: Marjane Satrapi, Persepolis, Ayatollah Khomeini, Iran, Iranian Islamic Revolution, Marxism, Foucault
Topic(s):English
Presentation Type: Oral Paper
Session: 304-5
Location: MG 1098
Time: 2:00