Archive for September 18th, 2021

1. New Exhibition – L’Orient inattendu, du Rhin à l’Indus

Strasbourg

Bibliothèque nationale et universitaire

September 18, 2021 – January 16, 2022

On the occasion of the 150th anniversary of the foundation of the National and University Library and the University of Strasbourg, the exhibition

L’Orient inattendu, du Rhin à l’Indus (The unexpected Orient, from the Rhine to the Indus), offers a new look on the history of Strasbourg, Alsace and the Rhine region from the perspective of their relations with the Orient and more specifically the lands of Islam. It aims to present an overview of these relations from the medieval period up to the 20th C., through works that are mostly unknown or even unpublished.

An event in partnership with the Museums of Strasbourg and the Louvre Museum.

https://www.bnu.fr/fr/evenements-culturels/nos-expositions/lorient-inattendu-du-rhin-lindus

2. New OA book: A Handbook and Reader of Ottoman Arabic
Esther-Miriam Wagner (ed.) | September 2021
488pp. | 4 B&W or colour illustration | 6.14″ x 9.21″ (234 x 156 mm)
Link: https://www.openbookpublishers.com/product/1168

3. Research Associate in Historical Iranian Linguistics (Fixed Term)

The Department of Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Cambridge invites applications for a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the field of Historical Iranian Linguistics.

The Postdoctoral Research Associate would work in the research team of the ERC-funded project ‘Echoes of Vanishing Voices in the Mountains: A Linguistic History of Minorities in the Near East’ (ALHOME) under the direction of Professor Geoffrey Khan. The project aims to reconstruct the complex, socioreligious past of Aramaic-speaking and Kurdish-speaking communities in Western Asia through a study of the history and interrelationship of their languages.

Closing date: 4.10.21

https://www.jobs.cam.ac.uk/job/31407/

4. Christ’s College, Cambridge

Academic Vacancies

Two Stipendiary Junior Research Fellowships

Stipend £25,217 (with a PhD) £20,675 (without a PhD)

The College invites applications for two Stipendiary Junior Research Fellowships, summarised below.  Both Fellowships are tenable for four years from not later than 1st October 2022 and are not renewable.  Candidates are advised that a Junior Research Fellowship is intended for a researcher early in their career.  A successful applicant is expected to be either a graduate student, probably in the latter stages of research leading to a PhD degree (or equivalent), or a post-doctoral researcher who has completed their PhD Degree after 1st January 2021.

Applications and referees reports must be submitted through the web site and received by the College by 12:00 noon on Thursday 21st October 2021.  Selected candidates will be invited to the College for interview on or around Wednesday 12th January 2022.

Click here for the application web site which will give further information.  (Queries should be directed to jrf@christs.cam.ac.uk as stated on the application web site.)

1. Stipendiary Junior Research Fellowship

This Fellowship is open to those whose research is principally in one or more of the following subject areas:

Asian & Middle Eastern Studies; Anthropology; Archaeology; Classics; Economics; History (limited to Modern History from circa 1800); History of Art; Land Economy; Politics & International Studies.

1. George Kingsley Roth Junior Research Fellowship

There is an additional stipendiary JRF open to those whose research is principally in one or more of the following subject areas:

Anthropology; Ethnology; History or Contemporary Issues (eg economics, sociology or politics)

In specified countries within the South Asian, East Asian or Pacific Basin regions (see the application web site for further details).

Please note that applications in eligible subject areas will be considered for both the Stipendiary and the George Kingsley Roth Junior Research Fellowships.

https://www.christs.cam.ac.uk/vacancies-christs-college

5. Call for Contributors

Literary Snippets: Colophons Across Space and Time

Editors

Sabine Schmidtke and George A. Kiraz

(Institute for Advanced Study)

The colophon, the ultimate or “crowing touch” _paragraphs of a manuscript or a book, provides readers with a the historical context in which the scribe produced the manuscript (or the publisher, a book). At its most fundamental level, the colophon gives us the “metadata” _of the manuscript: who was the scribe? When and where was the manuscript produced? For whom was it produced and who paid for it?

But colophons are far more rich. They are literary works on their own right, having a style and rhetoric independent of the main literary text of the manuscript. Some are assertive, providing contextual data about the scribe/publisher and manuscript/book; others are expressive, demonstrating the scribe’s feelings and wishes. Some are directive, asking the reader for an action; others declarative, providing all sorts of statements about the scribe/publisher or even the reader. The latter sometimes provide historical facts otherwise lost to histories: wars, earthquakes, religious events, legal agreements, etc. The aim of this volume is to bring together scholars from various disciplines to study colophons in Middle Eastern manuscripts in various languages and traditions across space and time, including, but not limited to, Arabic, Armenian, Coptic, Ethiopian, Hebrew, Persian, and Syriac—as well as the ancient tra-ditions of Egypt and Mesopotamia. Topics may include:

The colophon as a literary genre

Typology of colophons

The formulaic structure of colophons

Factoids found in colophons

How can colophons confirm/help reconstruct historical events?

Colophons born in print publications or born digital

Scholars interested in contributing may send via email a proposal between 1,000 and 3000 words (i.e. a good first draft) for consideration. After acceptance, final papers are expected to be around 6,000 words +/-. Proposals are to focus on the colophon (i.e. not a study of the main literary text of the manuscript). Papers are expected to have an analytical component. Comparative analyses across traditions is encour-aged but not required.

Proposal submission deadline is December 15, 2021. Final papers are due April 1, 2022. Submissions are to be sent via email directly to George A. Kiraz at gkiraz@ias.edu.

6. Call for Posters: ASMEA Annual Conference

The Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) is pleased to invite undergraduate students to participate in its Poster Competition at the Fourteenth Annual Conference being held November 13 – 15, 2021 in Washington, D.C.

In addition, we will award Travel Grants of up to $500 to assist in covering costs associated with attending the event. This competitive opportunity is open to student members of the Association. Undergraduates can join at this membership level here.

Presenting a poster is an excellent opportunity for young scholars to showcase their work in a visual format that promotes discussion, enables interaction with seasoned academics, and receive feedback about their projects.

Information for applicants:

• Applicants must be juniors or seniors in the Fall 2021 academic year to be eligible to apply.
• Interested students must submit an application via the online submission portaland include a 300-word abstract of original unpublished data.
• Topics must be related to the Middle East and/or Africa.
• Posters may be presented virtually or in-person.
• To submit a poster proposal students do not need to be members, however, to apply for the Travel Grant in conjunction with the poster proposal, applicants will need to become undergraduate student members.
• To apply for the Travel Grant, a student will need to submit a letter of reference from an advisor.
• The deadline to submit is October 15, 2021.

Posters will be judged by how well the presenter demonstrates understanding of their subject matter as well as by the clarity of their presentation.

For further information, please visit our Call for Posters page or contact info@asmeascholars.org.

7. Perspectives on Academic Persian

Abbas Aghdassi, ed.

Springer, 2021