Archive for November 7th, 2026

1.Gerlach Press: Now Five New Reference Collections on History of Medicine & Science, Adab, Arabic Poetry, Islamic Heresiography, and Ottoman History

1. HISTORY OF SCIENCE & MEDICINE IN ISLAM: Collection of 150 volumes from the library Professor Hans-Hinrich Biesterfeldt (University of Bochum)

>> Details: https://gerlachbooks.com/COL_189

2. ISLAMIC TEXTUAL TRADITIONS & HUMANITIES – Literature – Philosophy – Theology – Historiography: Collection of 275 volumes.

This is part 2 of the library of Professor Hans-Hinrich Biesterfeldt.

>> Details: https://gerlachbooks.com/COL_192

3. ARABIC POETRY OF THE NAJD: Collection of 146 volumes (mainly in Arabic) from the library of Dr Marcel Kurpershoek.

>>> Details: https://gerlachbooks.com/COL_190

4. ISLAMIC DENOMINATIONS & HERESIOGRAPHY: Collection of 411 volumes from the library of Professor Heinz Halm (University of Tübingen).

>>> Details: https://gerlachbooks.com/COL_188

5. OTTOMAN HISTORY: 365 volumes from the Library of the late Professor Petra K. Kappert (1945-2004).

>>> Details: https://gerlachbooks.com/COL_182

A few more details:

• You can access detailed description, prices and full list of books via the links provided.
• Each collection is catalogued in Zoterowhich enables us to supply you with bibliographic data in a variety of standard formats.
• As regards budgets, we can invoice either this year or next year, depending on your requirements, or split the cost across two financial years.

GERLACH PRESS – MIDDLE EAST & ISLAMIC STUDIES

1. O. Box 191324 D-14003 Berlin, Germany

TEL +49 30 32303111 FAX +49 30 3235667

EMAIL office@gerlach-press.de

 

 

 

 

 

2. Islamicate manuscripts and LLMs at Ars Inquirendi 2026 (Oxford and online, 20–22 November): registration closes next week

On Friday 20 November, Sarah Bowen Savant (Aga Khan University) traces work references across the OpenITI corpus, and David Owen (Harvard) takes the Saharan manuscript archive as a stress test for confabulation and palaeography (13:00–16:15 GMT); later that day Karen Pinto (Colorado Boulder) presents “Digital Odysseys with Islamicate Maps”, and Badr and Abdulaziz Al-Harbi ask how to evaluate the source fidelity of AI-generated Islamic knowledge (16:30–18:30 GMT).

Ars Inquirendi  2026: Querying Pre-Print Cultures with LLMs
St Edmund Hall, Oxford, and online, 20–22 November 2026

We are convening over thirty scholars from around the world to answer two questions: in the era of large language models, what can we now discover about the pre-print past that we could not before, and what would justify believing it? Keynotes by Peter Turchin and Marieke Meelen; three hands-on workshops.

Registration closes 11 November: online £10; in person £60 (students and unwaged £25).
Programme and registration: https://www.arsinq.com

 

 

 

 

 

3. We are delighted to announce that the 2027 Annual Conference of the British Association for Islamic Studies will be hosted by the University of Edinburgh on Monday 14 and Tuesday 15 June 2027. 

We are excited to be returning to Scotland’s stunning capital city where we last hosted our conference back in 2022.

The BRAIS 2027 Call for Papers is now live and can be viewed by CLICKING HERE.

We welcome proposals for individual papers or whole panels from across the many sub-disciplines of Islamic Studies. The deadline for submissions is Monday 18 January 2027 at 5pm GMT.

If you have any questions, they may be answered on our conference FAQ page which can be viewed by CLICKING HERE.

Otherwise, please do not hesitate to contact us on this email address.

The BRAIS 2027 Conference Team

British Association for Islamic Studies

The Alwaleed Centre

University of Edinburgh

16 George Square

Edinburgh

EH8 9LD

brais@ed.ac.uk

www.brais.ac.uk

 

 

 

 

 

4. The Cambridge Festival of Islamic Arts runs from 19 to 29 November 2026, with more than 75 performances, exhibitions, workshops and talks across Cambridge’s colleges, museums and places of worship. Celebrating the theme Fostering Friendship Through Beauty, the Festival welcomes everyone, whatever their background.

Most events are free with registration. Explore the programme and book at cfia.co.uk/programme..

Highlights of what’s on:

– A Sema ceremony by the Mevlevi order

– Spoken word from poet Rakaya Fetuga

– An evening with Mesut Kurtis at the Cambridge Corn Exchange

– Poetry and calligraphy workshops where you can try the skills yourself

– Lectures and seminars on history and culture of Islamic art, with speakers including Dr Timothy Winter, Tharik Hussain, and author Diana Darke

Most events are free with registration, and concerts have concessionary rates. Places go fast, so book early!

When posting, please tag us so we can share your posts too:

Instagram: @cfia_2026

LinkedIn: The Cambridge Festival of Islamic Arts

Hashtag: #CFIA2026

 

 

 

 

5. Research in the Social Scientific Study of Religion, Volume 35

https://brill.com/display/serial/RSSR
Open Section
For the open section of RSSSR 35, we welcome articles that examine any area in the social and scientific study of religious or non-religious belief.
Special Section 1: Global Perspectives on Digitality and Belief, edited by Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor, Alamgir Ahmed, Anna Grasso, and Laura Jones
This RSSR Special Section emphasises the societal and intellectual significance of burgeoning digitality on lived experiences, understandings, perceptions and representations of diverse religious and non-religious world-views. This special issue begins with recognition of the burgeoning impact of cyber environments, new technology, large language models on everyday practices of religious and non-religious beliefs, as well as the growing reliance on these to learn, transmit, preserve, practice and present faith. In addition to sociological impacts, digitality here refers to the ontological shifts and turns facilitated by these technologies as beliefs and believers’ engage with multiple layers of mediation, through technology and through ideas that are digitally-expressed. Within digital religious environments, notions of consent, choice and decision-making become relative to individuals’ digital literacy, access to technology and understanding of the algorithms that underpin how and what they access online. Secondly, this special issue aims to be inclusive of the variety of religious, spiritual and non-religious worldviews that individual or groups may subscribe to and recognises global and local-situated waxing and waning in the significance of various faiths.
For this special section, we welcome articles that address questions emerging from the digital turn in relation to any aspect of religion or belief. Articles may situate themselves within one or more disciplines including, but not limited to Sociology, Theology, Anthropology, Gender Studies, Psychology, Law and Digital Humanities. We encourage articles that employ traditional methods to research religion or belief, as well as new methodological innovations. This call for proposals is purposefully broad, so that the volume will ultimately promote multi-disciplinary and multi-site reflections in the study of digitality and religion or belief.
∎ Belonging and identity online
∎ Recording, archiving elements of religion or belief online
∎ Digital religious communities
∎ Changes brought about by digitality within ideas of faith leadership, community and societal norms
∎ Transnational flow of ideas and movements
∎ Analogue impacts of digital religious acts
∎ Inter-faith relations in digital contexts
∎ Peace and conflict in relation to religion or belief online
∎ Methodological innovations of the study of digitised religion or belief
∎ Articles that prioritise lesser heard actors in research including women, children and others that may be minoritised in particular local contexts
∎ Articles that study all the above in non-Western and non-Eurocentric geographic contexts
Submitting Proposals
We invite proposals for the next edition of RSSR – Volume 35. This will be published by early 2028. We welcome proposals from academics at all levels of their career, including early career researchers and final year PhD students.
For articles (for open and special sections):
Please submit a title and abstract of no more than 300 words together with names and short biographies (150 words), institutional affiliation/s (if relevant), and contact details.
∎ Deadline for abstracts: Friday 27th January 2027
∎ Notification of acceptance of paper: Friday 12th February 2027
∎ If accepted full articles will be due by Tuesday 31st August 2027
Please submit your proposals via this form. You will need to provide a short 250 word abstract and a 150 word short biographical note.
For Special Section proposals:
We welcome enquiries for guest edited special sections for RSSSR 35 (early 2028) and also for future editions (late 2028 onwards). Special section proposals can emerge from conference proceedings, research networks or from other forms of academic collaboration around a specific subject area. To suggest a special proposal please email the editor Professor Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor in the first instance (including RSSR in the email subject line), with the following information:
∎ Theme / Title of the special section
∎ Short rationale of the special section (no more than 500 words)
∎ Guest editor/s name and short bio (150 words) for each editor
∎ List of potential contributors
∎ If accepted timelines for special sections will be discussed with editors
∎ For RSSR 35, please send proposals in by Friday 29th January 2027. Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor is very happy to have informal chats with prospective editors before then.
Style Guide and submission guidelines
Please check the author guidelines or contact the editors.
We look forward to receiving your work.
Professor Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor, Dr Alamgir Ahmed, Dr Anna Grasso and Dr Laura Jones

Professor Sariya Cheruvallil-Contractor

Professor in the Sociology of Islam

Centre lead – Strategy, People and Research Environment

Series Editor | Research in the Social Scientific Study of Religion

Chair (2020-2026) | Muslims in Britain Research Network

Centre for Peace and Security (CPS), Coventry University

ac0967@coventry.ac.uk | @Sariya_CC

https://pureportal.coventry.ac.uk/en/persons/sariya-cheruvallil-contractor

 

 

 

 

6. Steppe Sisters Annual Lecture: Queens, Poets and Paymasters – The Women of the Ancient and Medieval Persianate World

We are pleased to invite you to Steppe Sisters Annual Lecture titled ‘Queens, Poets and Paymasters – The Women of the Ancient and Medieval Persianate World’ with Shabnam Nasimi.
Friday 13 November | 5.30pm
D110, Department of Archaeology, Durham University
From the archives of Persepolis to the courts of the Sasanian and Timurid empires, this lecture reveals the rulers, poets, patrons and paymasters whose lives shaped the Persianate world – and challenges the idea that women’s authority in the region is a modern invention.
This project has been supported by the British Institute of Persian Studies.
The Annual General Meeting of the Steppe Sisters will take place the following day on Saturday 14th of November 2026 at 9am. This will be followed by a workshop titled ‘Surveying the field: ECR women in human sciences in Central Asia and neighbouring regions’ from 10am-1pm. The Annual General Meeting and the workshop will take place at the Department of Archaeology, Durham University (D210, Dawson Building). For in-person attendance, please email k.a.hopper@durham.ac.uk. Registration for online attendance can be found here.

 

 

 

 

 

7. Journée d’étude « Les sciences religieuses versifiées », MMSH, Aix-en-Provence, 12 novem-bre 2026, 10h00 – 17h00 CET

Programme : – Les qawāʿid al-tafsīr et le défi de la versification. – Du matn mémorisé au manuel commenté : les usages contemporains du Murshid al-Mu‘īn d’Ibn ‘Āshir. – La méthodologie du droit (uṣūl al-fiqh) et sa mise en vers chez Ibn ‘Āṣim al-Ġarnāṭī (m. 829/1426). – La manẓūma d’Ibn Farḥ : la poésie amoureuse au service de la terminologie du hadith. – Manẓūmat Jawharat al-Tawḥīd d’al-Laqānī. – Échanges et perspectives.

Information : https://tinyurl.com/4jy4emjh

 

 

 

 

 

8. ONLINE Lecture: “The Hour and the Sword: Apocalypticism, Violence, and Coercion at the Origins of Islam” by Javad Hashmi, Islamic Studies Team, University of Helsinki, 16 November 2026, 17:00 – 19:00 CET

Was the historical Muḥammad a failed apocalyptic prophet who predicted the imminent end of the world within his own lifetime? Dr. Hashmi will offer a new perspective, arguing that Muḥammad was deeply influenced by Late Antique Christian traditions: the Prophet initially endorsed a Christ-like paradigm of eschatological pacifism but subsequently resorted to a Christian-influenced conception of just war to quell religious persecution; throughout, however, he maintained a commitment to the Late Antique Christian ideal of libertas religionis (liberty of worship).

Information and registration: https://tinyurl.com/4ea2x7es

 

 

 

 

 

9. HYBRIDE : Atelier-rencontre avec Sylvia Chiffoleau et Philippe Pétriat “Une histoire du temps dans le monde arabe” avec Sylvia Chiffoleau et Philippe Pétriat, EHESS, Paris, 17 novembre 2026, 12h00 CET

Contrairement à des stéréotypes répandus, les sociétés du monde arabe ne sont aucunement indiffé-rentes au temps, elles savent au contraire se mouvoir dans la pluralité de ses expressions.

Embrassant la longue durée, cet ouvrage évoque leur contribution majeure à l’art de la mesure du temps. Il s’attache à rendre compte des rythmes sociaux qui ont orchestré la vie quotidienne des indi-vidus et des groupes, durant la période ottomane et dans les contextes coloniaux, jusqu’au moment où les processus de modernisation sont venus bouleverser le régime rythmique traditionnel.

Information et inscription : https://iismm.hypotheses.org/160784

 

 

 

 

 

10. Conference: “Monsters and Marvels of Anatolia”, Bilkent University & Social Sciences University, Ankara, 14-16 April 2027

We invite papers that explore how Anatolia, as culturally-constructed place, generates and reshapes stories and images of monstrosity across time. What is it about this land that has made it such a suc-cessful breeding ground for hybrids and giants, miracles and marvels? How have different cultures and communities – prehistoric, Hittite, Phrygian, Persian, Greek, Roman, Byzantine, Islamic, Ottoman, Turkish, Circassian, Jewish, Arab, Armenian, Kurdish, Laz, Syriac, and many more – placed their fears and fantasies into the landscapes and monuments of Anatolia?

Deadline for abstracts: 15 November 2026. Information: https://tinyurl.com/frc7hb8r

 

 

 

 

 

11. International Conference: “Experience in Phenomenology and Islamic Thought”, 29 Mayis University, Istanbul, 16-17 April 2027

On the one hand, certain dimensions of contemporary Islamic thought risk becoming disconnected from the lived experience of believers – whether in philosophy and theology or in law. Here, phenomenology offers tools to interrogate this tendency toward idealization, examining how truths and norms might remain anchored in the lived experience of those who receive and enact them. Conversely, Islamic thought can stimulate phenomenological discourse by presenting it with objects that, while new, are not entirely foreign.

Deadline for abstracts: 15 January 2027. Information: https://tinyurl.com/vujzw6vj

 

 

 

 

 

12. International Conference: “Second Meeting of the Euro-Ottoman Exchange Network”, Sabancı University, Istanbul, 13-14 May 2027

This conference brings together scholars working on Europe, the Ottoman Empire, and intersections between the two. It aims, in particular, to forge connections between young scholars from different countries working on these issues, promoting collaboration, shared knowledge, and friendship. Themes: – Institutions, Capitulations, and Legal Realities. – New Diplomatic History & Intermediaries. – Material Culture and Spaces of Encounter. – Violence, Coercion, and Non-State Actors. – Mobility, Science, and Environment.

Deadline for abstracts: 1 December 2026. Information: https://tinyurl.com/kxknjat2

 

 

 

 

 

13. PSi#32 Conference “Meydan”, Performance Studies international & Performistanbul, Istanbul, 15-19 September 2027

Meydan means an open space, a gathering place, a common ground. We welcome contributions from broad spectrum of disciplines and practices within performance studies including but not limited to theatre, dance, live art, music, visual arts, anthropology, architecture, literary studies, sociology, cultural studies, philosophy, psychology/psychoanalytic studies, law, the social sciences, and history.

Deadline for abstracts: 16 November 2026. Information: https://psi32.psi-web.org/

 

 

 

 

 

14. Fellowships (1-9 Months) for Research in Turkey 2027-2028, American Research Institute in Turkey (ARIT), Istanbul

Scholars and advanced graduate students engaged in research on ancient, medieval, or modern times in Turkey, in any field of the humanities and social sciences, are eligible to apply. Student applicants must have fulfilled all requirements for the doctorate except the dissertation by June 2027, and before beginning any ARIT-sponsored research.

Deadline for applications: 15 November 2026. Information: https://tinyurl.com/45tzka8p

 

 

 

 

 

15. Postdoctoral Fellowship (1 Year), Sakıp Sabancı Center for Turkish Studies, Columbia Uni-versity, New York

The fellowship competition is open to candidates who have received their Ph.D. degree in the human-ities or social sciences after May 1, 2024, and have written a dissertation on a topic related to Turkish Studies. Fellows cannot hold another scholarship, visiting position, or employment during the term of the fellowship. Candidates must have successfully completed all requirements for their doctoral degree by April 1, 2027, with a conferral date no later than June 2027.

Deadline for applications: 15 December 2026. Information: https://tinyurl.com/3pzuds3x

 

 

 

 

 

16. Assistant Teaching Professor of Arabic (3 Years +), Georgetown University, Washington, DC

We seek a dynamic individual committed to innovative methods of teaching Modern Standard Arabic in the context of Arab-Islamic culture. Applicants should have native or near-native fluency in Modern Standard Arabic and an Arabic dialect; experience in proficiency-based, communicative methods of teaching Modern Standard Arabic; and thorough grounding in classical Arabic language (including syn-tax and morphology). Experience in assessment and curriculum design is a plus.

Deadline for applications: 1 December 2026. Information: https://apply.interfolio.com/155396

 

 

 

 

 

17. ONLINE Course: “Introduction to Classical Judeo-Arabic”, Jewish Theological Seminary, New York, 4 February – 8 April 2027

Beginning with a brief overview of the history and linguistic features of Judeo-Arabic and a survey of major medieval writers, this course will primarily focus on the close reading of texts from a range of genres. The course will also offer a window into the lives of medieval Arabic-speaking Jews, illustrating how they engaged with Arabic culture while preserving and developing a unique religious and intellec-tual heritage.

Registration as soon as possible. Information: https://tinyurl.com/4j2bcrtp

 

 

 

 

 

18. Articles on “Humor in Times of Crisis” for Special Issue of the Journal “Anthropology of the Middle East, Vol. 22, Iss. 2

Humour may be expressed through a wide range of media and practices, including cartoons, comic strips, memes, social media posts, jokes, stand-up comedy, films, songs, performances, speeches, and everyday interactions. Contributions may address questions such as: Who produces humour, for whom, and under what conditions? How is it circulated and received? How does humour help people narrate crisis, negotiate everyday life, circumvent censorship, challenge authority, or express what cannot be said openly? Can it also legitimise power or reinforce hierarchies?

Deadline for abstracts: 15 December 2026. Information: https://tinyurl.com/yfpcrj5n

 

 

 

 

 

19. ONLINE New Journal: “Cyber Orient: Journal of the Virtual Middle East and Islamic World”, Vol. 20, Iss. 1, 31 October 2026, 65 Pages

Articles: – “The Attention Academy: Digital Environments, Creativity, and the Transformation of Learn-ing in the Network Society” by Maha Tazi, Hibah Jawahar Ali, Sara Battah. – “COVID-19 Memes and Young Adults’ Behavior in the UAE” by Safiya Alaaeldin, Raghad S. Hamarsha, Riona Merici Rego, Maha Tazi.

View: https://tinyurl.com/2nkxzr3u

 

 

 

 

 

20. Nouveau Livre : “Histoire de la Syrie contemporaine” de Matthieu Rey, Actes Sud-Sindbad, 14 octobre 2026, 144 pages

Quels sont les fondements historiques d’un demi-siècle d’autocratie de la dynastie Assad, parvenue à se maintenir au pouvoir en effaçant le peuple syrien ? Cet ouvrage retrace un siècle d’histoire au cours duquel, en 1920, apparaît un nouvel État, la Syrie, dont la population est confrontée depuis lors à de redoutables défis : occupation étrangère, convoitises régionales, méfiances communautaires, survie des vieilles hiérarchies sociales, dictatures militaires et surtout besoin vital d’un projet politique com-mun.

Information : https://tinyurl.com/2bu9n387