Expecting the best: Palestinian Utopianism and trans-sectarianism in the Mandate period.

This essay reconstructs Palestinian utopian discourse from the British mandate period, by focusing on understudied political manifestos and fiction, authored by members of the Palestinian Arab elite. The essay shows that through the lens of utopianism emerges a distinct Palestinian ecumenical discourse on trans-sectarian religion, language unification, bi-nationalism, reform in relations between men and women, and social justice. While this discourse was not necessarily popular, it was shared and articulated in both explicit and latent manners by some of the most influential Palestinians of the period. This discourse was therefore a meaningful, progressive, indigenous political alternative to the colonial and imperial sectarian order. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]