Episode 67: Dune: Part Two with Mary Hicks and Margari Hill

Historians At The Movies

This week Mary Hicks and Margari Hill drop in to talk all things DUNE. We focus on Dune Part 2 but also talk about the historical influences on Frank Herbert as he wrote Dune, along with how Dune influenced the science fiction and fantasy that came afterward. We talk about the parallels between the fictional universe and historical events, such as the Ottoman Empire and the interactions between European powers and Indigenous communities. We also get into the portrayal of whiteness in the film and the complexities of women's roles and agency within the narrative. We dive into the egalitarianism in the Fremen world and the infiltration of outside values. The depiction of female spirituality and the complexity of women characters are discussed. The casting and representation in the film, particularly in relation to Middle Eastern culture, are examined. Mary and Margari also touch on the historical resonances and sensitivity in the film. The difference between a cautionary tale and a hopeful vision is explored. This conversation is one of the best we've ever had on this podcast and I hope you like it.
About our guests:
Mary Hicks is a historian of the Black Atlantic, with a focus on transnational histories of race, slavery, capitalism, migration and the making of the early modern world. Her first book, Captive Cosmopolitans: Black Mariners and the World of South Atlantic Slavery, 1721-1835, reimagines the history of Portuguese exploration, colonization and oceanic commerce from the perspective of enslaved and freed black seamen laboring in the transatlantic slave trade. As the Atlantic world’s first subaltern cosmopolitans, black mariners, she argues, were integral in forging a unique commercial culture that linked the politics, economies and people of Salvador da Bahia with those of the Bight of Benin.
Margari Hill is the co-founder and Executive Director of Muslim Anti-Racism Collaborative (MuslimARC), a human rights education organization. She is also a freelance writer published in How We Fight White Supremacy (2018) Time, Huffington Post, and Al Jazeera English. She earned her master’s degree in History of the Middle East and Islamic Africa from Stanford University in 2006. Her research includes transformations in Islamic education, colonial surveillance in Northern Nigeria, anti-colonial resistance among West Africans in Sudan during the early 20th century, interethnic relations in Muslim communities, anti-bias K-12 education, and the criminalization of Black Muslims. She is on the Advisory Council of Islam, Social Justice & Interreligious Engagement Program at the Union Theological Seminary. For her work, she has received numerous awards including the Council of American Islamic Relation’s (CAIR) 2020 Muslim of the Year award, Khadija bint Khuwaylid Relief Foundation Lifetime Humanitarian award in 2019, the Big Heart Award in 2017, and MPAC’s 2015 Change Maker Award. She has given talks and lectures in various universities and community centers throughout the country.