Shii News – Academic Items
1.The Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture at Hellenic College Holy Cross in Brookline, MA, is pleased to announce that “Byzantine Pieces of an Umayyad Puzzle: A Basalt Platform in the Azraq Oasis” has been rescheduled. In this lecture, Dr. Alexander Brey, Wellesley College, will discuss an Umayyad-era basalt reservoir platform built within the Azraq oasis in eastern Jordan and places its carved interlocking stones in conservation with early Byzantine zodiac and celestial diagrams.
October 1, 2020 | Zoom | 4:00–5:00 pm (Eastern time)
This lecture will take place live on ZOOM, followed by a question and answer period. Please register to receive the ZOOM link. An email with the relevant ZOOM information will be sent 1–2 hours ahead of the lecture. Registration closes at 11:00 AM on October 1, 2020.
Register here: https://maryjahariscenter.org/events/byzantine-pieces-of-an-umayyad-puzzle-a-basalt-platform-in-the-azraq-oasis
Mary Jaharis Center lectures are co-sponsored by Harvard University Standing Committee on Medieval Studies.
Contact Brandie Ratliff (mjcbac@hchc.edu), Director, Mary Jaharis Center for Byzantine Art and Culture, with any questions.
2. Turkish History and Culture in India: Identity, Art and Transregional Connections
co-edited by A.C.S. Peacock and Richard Piran McClary.
Leiden: Brill, 2020
https://brill.com/view/title/57315?language=en
3. Sheikh Zayed Book Award (9 categories) | Final Call for Submissions to 15th edition | 1 October 2020
Examples of previous winners
Marina Warner (Arabic Culture in Other Languages, 2013); Amin Maalouf (Cultural Personality of the Year, 2016); Ibitisam Barakat (Children’s Literature, 2020); and Moncef Ouhaibi (Literature, 2020).
Award categories include:
● Arabic Culture in Other Languages
● Translation (either to or from Arabic)
● Literature (including fiction, poetry and plays)
● Literary and Art Criticism
● Young Author (for writers under the age of 40)
● Children’s & Adolescent Literature
● Publishing & Technology
● Contribution to the Development of Nations
● Cultural Personality of the Year
For further information:
https://www.zayedaward.ae/en/how.to.nominate.aspx
4. Mideastwire announces free access to the Taliban Source Project
Through a partnership with Thesigers, the Norwegian Defense Research Establishment (FFI) and the University of Oslo, Mideastwire.com has translated and is now making available 1,452 separate translations drawn from nine years of the Taliban’s Arabic language magazine, Al-Samood (Issues 1-99/2006-2014), which together constitute the overwhelming bulk of the Taliban Source Project (TSP) database.
Unfortunately, the TSP as a whole and our translations of Al-Samood specifically were only made available this year because of what we believe was a fundamental misunderstanding of the project and its implication.
Indeed, several years ago, the British Library, which was supposed to serve as the sole repository, judged that the archive contained some material that could contravene the Terrorism Act.
Thankfully, the University of Oslo recently stepped up and hosted the project, thereby recognizing how freely available, high-quality translations – especially of one’s purported adversary – can actually lead to greater understanding and, potentially, peace-building.
The material in both the original Arabic (downloadable PDF for each month) and English are all searchable in full.
Register at: https://www.mideastwire15years.com/
5. The HIAA Biennial Symposium, originally planned for October 2020, was postponed due to the COVID-19 outbreak. We are now writing to announce that the event will be held remotely by the University of Michigan on April 15-17, 2021. Please mark your virtual calendars!
We are currently revising the symposium program in order to accommodate our participants’ various time zones. Thank you for staying tuned for more information as we revise the schedule of panels and talks.
The remote pivot notwithstanding, we are so looking forward to hosting the HIAA Biennial Symposium remotely in April 2021! If any questions pop up, please do not hesitate to contact us at besener@umich.edu.
All best wishes,
Christiane Gruber and Bihter Esener
5. ONLINE: Conference via Zoom: “The Concept of Death, and the Concept of Life in Judaism, Christianity and Islam”, Research Unit “Key Concepts in Interreligious Discourses”, University Erlangen-Nürnberg, 23-24 September 2020
It is possible to join the conference after registration. Please contact Mr. Fabian Schmidmeier fabian.schmidmeier@fau.de. Program: https://www.kcid.fau.de/files/2020/09/program_online_conference_the-concept-of-life-and-the-concept-of-death-in-judaism.pdf
6. ONLINE: “4th Annual Late Antique, Islamic, and Byzantine Studies Conference”, University of Edinburgh, 19-21 November 2020
The conference focuses on disasters (natural, “manmade” or “supernatural”) that shape historical memory and our understanding of the past, concentrating on the problematic relations between catastrophes and memory in Late Antique, Islamic and Byzantine societies.
Information and registration: https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/4th-annual-edinburgh-late-antique-islamic-and-byzantine-conference-tickets-117904135443
7. POSTPONED: Conference: “The Middle East c.1960-1980. Global and Transnational Perspectives“, St Antony’s College, University of Oxford, 5 March 2021; Postponed, New Date to be Announced
The Conference will look at the ways in which events in the Middle East were shaped by global and transnational contexts and, in turn, the impact events in the region exercised on other parts of the world.
8. Symposium on “Alanya and Alaaddin Keykubat on the Eve of 800th Year of Conquest”, Alanya Alaaddin Keykubat University, 21-22 April 2021
The symposium will focus on Sultan Alaaddin Keykubat and the history of Alanya during Seljukid, Ottoman and Republican periods.
Information: https://selcuklu.alanya.edu.tr/ctrcms/media/61/tmp//2020_05_11_alanya_sempozyum_call_for_papers_EN.pdf
9. Post-Doctoral Researcher (3 Years) in Islamic Manuscripts of Sumatra, SOAS, University of London
Requirements: PhD, or be very close to completion of a PhD, in a relevant subject (i.e. philology, codicology, textual or literary analysis, history and/or ethnography utilising Islamic manuscripts in Malay and/or Arabic and/or other relevant languages); etc.
Deadline for applications: 3 October 2020. Information: https://www.jobs.ac.uk/job/CBK758/post-doctoral-researcher-in-islamic-manuscripts-of-sumatra?uuid=aeb9c14b-f17f-11ea-a3a3-064da8edb92a&campaign=jbew20200908&source=jbe
10. Articles on “Feminist Political Economy in the Arab Region” for a Special Issue of the Journal “Al-Raida”
This issue of Al-Raida asks what feminist political economy, or FPE, can contribute as a critical framework for analyzing, understanding, and challenging dominant socioeconomic and political systems in the Arab Region. With an emphasis on process, FPE examines the lived realities of social difference, and the constraints and pressures of the everyday under global capitalism.
Deadline for full-length article: 27 November 2020. Information: http://alraidajournal.com/index.php/ALRJ/announcement/view/5
11. Articles for “Al Noor”, the Undergraduate Middle Eastern Studies Journal of Boston College
Our aims: – Facilitate a nonpartisan, unbiased conversation within the Boston College community and beyond about the Middle East. – Provide a medium for students to publish research on the Middle East. – Promote diverse opinions and present a comprehensive view of the myriad of cultures, histories, and perspectives of the Middle East
Deadline for submissions: 11 October 2020. Information: https://www.bcalnoor.org/ and https://mesana.org/resources-and-opportunities/2020/09/10/al-noor-fall-2020
12. ARIT Summer Fellowships for Advanced Turkish Language in Istanbul offers intensive advanced study of Turkish at Bogazici University during the summer 2021. Participants must have two years of Turkish language study or the equivalent. The fellowships cover round-trip airfare to Istanbul, application and tuition fees, and a maintenance stipend. The application deadline will be in early February, 2021.
For additional information please see the ARIT webpage at http://ccat.sas.upenn.edu/ARIT/FellowshipPrograms.html
13. The Silk Road: Crafting global futures, global pasts
Panel Proposal, International Convention of Asia Scholars (ICAS )12
Kyoto, Japan, 24-27 August 2021
Prof Tim Winter, University of Western Australia
Deadline for Abstracts 25th September 2020
The Silk Road has emerged as one of the key geocultural and geostrategic concepts of the 21st century. Built around narratives of maritime and overland trade and exchange connecting Asia with Africa and Europe, Silk Road discourses are rewriting histories, remapping futures. In the age of Belt and Road, they now operate as platforms for international trade, diplomacy, infrastructure development and statecraft.
The ascendancy of the Silk Road in international affairs means it is also fast gaining currency across academic disciplines, migrating outwards from Archaeology, Asian Studies and History into International Relations, Political Geography, Religious Studies, Public Health and Urban Studies, to name a few. Such developments raise important questions about how to interrogate and locate the Silk Roads, conceptually and empirically.
In China’s worldview the Silk Roads serve as both ‘shared heritage’ and ‘shared destiny’. So what does the idea of ‘reviving’ them for the 21st century tell us about global futures? How are we to read the Health Silk Road as a platform for COVID-19 medical cooperation across Asia and beyond? What’s really at stake in the Digital Silk Roads? And is the push for Silk Road narratives finally putting Asia at the centre of global history?
In exploring such themes, this panel takes the Silk Road as a topic of critical investigation. It addresses the urgent need to take Silk Road discourses seriously, interrogating the work they do crafting both pasts and futures around certain themes, ideologies and structural relations.
Papers are welcome that consider the Silk Roads across different contexts, in academia or policy.
Please send 250 word abstracts and author details to Tim Winter, tim.winter@uwa.edu.au by 25th September 2020.
See: silkroadfutures.net
14. Call for Papers: 4th Islamicate Digital Humanities Conference
We are calling for contributions from both members and guests employing digital methods in their research within the Islamicate Studies and related fields in the Humanities, as well as from our colleagues in Linguistics and Computer Science.
We will have four to six presentations of 20 minutes each in which you can introduce your project and share your expertise and questions with the network.
To contribute, send an email to info@idhn.org with the preliminary title, an abstract of 150 to 250 words, and your academic affiliation until October 2nd, 2020. We encourage submissions from those in Graduate School or beyond. Find more information on www.idhn.org and join at https://idhn.org/contact/.
15. CALL FOR APPLICATIONS: SoFCB JUNIOR FELLOWS PROGRAM
Rare Book School’s Andrew W. Mellon Society of Fellows in Critical Bibliography (SoFCB) invites applications for its 2021–23 cohort of junior fellows. The deadline is Monday, 2 November 2020.
Continuing the work of the Andrew W. Mellon Fellowship in Critical Bibliography (2012–17), this scholarly society works to advance the study of texts, images, and artifacts as material objects through capacious, interdisciplinary scholarship—and to enrich humanistic inquiry and education by identifying, mentoring, and training promising early-career scholars. Junior Fellows will be encouraged and supported in integrating the methods of critical bibliography into their teaching and research, fostering collegial conversations about historical and emerging media across disciplines and institutions, and sharing their knowledge with broader publics.
The fellowship includes tuition waivers for two Rare Book School courses, as well as funding for Junior Fellows to participate in the Society’s annual meeting and orientation. Additional funds are available for fellows to organize symposia at their home institutions, and fellows will have the option of attending a bibliographical field school to visit libraries, archives, and collections in a major metropolitan area. After completing two years in good standing as Junior Fellows, program participants will have the option to become Senior Fellows in the Society.
The Society is committed to supporting diversity and to advancing the scholarship of outstanding persons of every race, gender, sexual orientation, creed, and socioeconomic background, and to enhancing the diversity of the professions and academic disciplines it represents, including those of the professoriate, museums, libraries, archives, public humanities, and digital humanities. We warmly encourage prospective applicants from a wide range of disciplines, institutions, and areas of expertise.
For more information and to apply, please visit:
http://rarebookschool.org/admissions-awards/fellowships/sofcb/
For more information about diversity and the SoFCB, please visit the SoFCB Diversity & Outreach Committee’s Welcome Letter: https://rarebookschool.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/08/SoFCB_Welcome_Letter_2020.pdf
Inquiries about the SoFCB Junior Fellows Program can be directed to Sonia Hazard, SoFCB Selection Committee Chair, at shazard@fsu.edu, or Donna Sy, SoFCB Administrative Director, at rbs-mellon@virginia.edu.
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- September 15, 2020
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