Categories : Academic items
Shii News – Academic Items
1.‘Shiraz on the Adriatic
Persian Literary Culture, Φαρσί Speakers and Multilingual Locals
between Cairo, the Balkans and Venice (ca. 1600–1900)’
Stefano Pellò
Iran and the Caucasus, 28 (2024).
https://brill.com/view/journals/ic/28/1/article-p42_4.xml
David Durand-Guédy, Emad al-Din Sheykh al-Hokamaee
JEHSO, 2024 (67).
3. ONLINE Colloquium “Reform Unbound: Afghanistan’s Sirāj-ul Aḳhbār (1911-19) and its Global Publics” by Sumaira Nawaz, University of Cambridge, 10 April 2024, 16:00 – 17:30 BST
This paper explores the “global” outlook of Afghanistan’s foremost Persian-language newspaper, Sirāj-ul Aḳhbār, as it negotiated new political futures for the region. Launched by Mahmud Tarzi, an emigre activist with firm networks within Ottoman and Indian reformist milieu, Sirāj was an attempt to project Afghanistan as a “Muslim utopia” (Green 2011) to readers spread across Persianate geographies.
Information: www.interfaith.cam.ac.uk/south-asia-24 . Registration: https://forms.office.com/e/Z4kN3ahf1i
4. ONLINE Colloquium “Persianate Hinduism in Colonial India: Revisiting Rammohun Roy’s Tuhfat al-muwahhidin” by Supriya Gandhi, University of Cambridge, 12 April 2024, 16:00 – 17:30 BST
Rammohun Roy (d. 1833) is a pivotal figure in the global history of Unitarianism, liberalism, and modern religious reform. Although his early years remain shrouded in obscurity, he eventually soared to fame during his lifetime and gained the status of a legend after his death. By the twentieth century, the epithet “Father of modern India” was routinely appended to his name.
Information: www.interfaith.cam.ac.uk/south-asia-24 . Registration: https://forms.office.com/e/Z4kN3ahf1i
5. HYBRID Seminar “The King`s Song: Poet Kings in the Islamic East” by Professor Ali Karjoo-Ravary, Columbia University, 18 April 2024, 5:00 EST
This talk looks at the political importance of poetic production by kings in the Islamic east in the late medieval period by considering what kings aimed to accomplish through the production of their own divans. Focusing on the Turkic poetry of Burhan al-Din of Sivas (d. 1398), it contextualizes his divan in the convergence of Sufism and political power that marked the post-Mongol Islamic east.
Deadline for registration: 11 April 2024.
Information: https://blogs.cuit.columbia.edu/islamicbooks/religionwriting/
6. ONLINE Book Presentation “Lives in the Margins: Ethnic and Religious Minorities in the Middle East” by Dr. Güneş Murat Tezcür (Arizona State University), Middle East Librarians Asso-ciation (MELA), George Washington University, 19 April 2024, 9:00 pm CET
Why do some religious minorities, lacking any significant power and presenting no imminent threat, provoke the ire of popular groups and become targets of violent attacks? This talk focuses on the experience of Yezidis, a paradigmatic liminal minority, who were targets of genocidal attacks in the hands of the self-styled Islamic State in 2014.
Information and registration:
https://northwestern.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJcpd-CuqjwtHdR7qoBkhjNmxgSkUJ0zjaGo#/registration
7. HYBRID Book Launch “Welfare as Gift: Local Charity, Politics of Redistribution, and Religion in Turkey” by Hilal Alkan, Leibniz-Zentrum Moderner Orient, Berlin, 30 April 2024, 5:00 pm
Based on an ethnography of charitable organizations in contemporary Turkey, this monograph examines the ways in which the redistributive task of poverty alleviation and welfare provision has been taken over by gift networks. It offers an in-depth analysis of the relationships between donors, volunteers, and beneficiaries, as well as an exploration of the historical institutional framework and religious imaginary that inform these orga-nizations.
Information and registration:
8. Panel on “Iran after Woman Life Freedom: Domestic and International Politics”, 16th Congress of the Italian Society for Middle East Studies (SeSaMO), Unversity of Cagliari, Sardinia, 3-5 October 2024
The panel seeks submissions that speak to the questions of state-society relations; diaspora politics; political activism and social movements; Iran’s diplomatic, security and international politics; the domestic and transnational gender politics in and of Iran; cultural production and counter-hegemonic cultural expressions; ethnicity and race politics in Iran and the Persianate world.
Deadline for abstracts: 7 May 2024. Information: https://www.sesamoitalia.it/wp-content/uploads/2024/04/31.-Rivetti-Ghaffari-Zakeri-Open-panel.pdf;
contact paola.rivetti@dcu.ie
9. Two Research Assistants (Doctoral Researchers, 75 %, 3 Years), Center for Conflict Studies, University of Marburg
Profile: MSc-degree or equivalent in social sciences; interest in quantiative methods in social sciences; experience with data collection and analysis; familiarity with Afghanistan; knowledge of at least one local language (e.g. Dari or Pashto); interest in research on protest movements and rebel governance. Disposition to own scientific qualification (e.g. a doctorate project in social sciences) is expected.
Deadline for applications: 12 May 2024. Information:
https://stellenangebote.uni-marburg.de/jobposting/9c90be611c968a3cbb8185ad64a7e19823d571480
10. Doctoral Fellowships, Orient-Institut Beirut (OIB)
The fellowships are lasting 7-10 months beginning on 1 September 2024 or shortly thereafter, specifically designed for doctoral candidates engaged in outstanding research projects in the humanities and social sciences. We invite applications across disciplines, time periods, and geographic coverage outlined in our mission statement.
Deadline for applications: 1 May 2024.
Information: https://www.orient-institut.org/support/fellowships/doctoralfellowships.html
11. Postdoctoral Fellowships, Orient-Institut Beirut (OIB)
The OIB is offering visiting fellowships normally lasting 7-10 months beginning on 1 September 2024 or shortly thereafter, to junior scholars in the early stages of the postdoctoral research, in support of excellent projects in the humanities and social sciences.
Deadline for applications: 1 May 2024.
Information: https://www.orient-institut.org/support/fellowships/postdoctoralfellowships.html
12. Visiting Assistant Professor (1 Year) in Middle Eastern Studies, Virginia Tech, Blacksburg, Virginia
Qualification: PhD in History, Religious Studies, or a closely related field; College-level teaching experience, including the ability to teach courses on history of the Middle East and Islam; A strong research agenda in a related field.
Deadline for applications: 30 April 2024. Information: https://careers.pageuppeople.com/968/cw/en-us/job/529204/visiting-assistant-professor-in-middle-eastern-studies
13. Spring School of the European Network for Islamic Studies (ENIS): “Peripheral Islam: Muslims on the Geographical, Normative, Political and Religious Margins”, Université de Lausanne, 4-7 June 2024
This Spring School focusses on these results of Muslims living, working and writing in the periphery and welcomes papers that show how, where and why peripheral Muslims – varying from marginalised areas and controversial scholars to ostracised politicians and heterodox sects – have shaped this periphery and have been shaped by this periphery.
Deadline for registration: 1 May 2024.
Information: https://nisis.sites.uu.nl/2024/02/09/call-for-papers-enis-spring-school-2024/
14. Joint English-language M.A. Program in Ottoman History (2 Years), Department of History and Archaeology, University of Crete/Institute for Mediterranean Studies/FORTH
Students are required to complete: Five history courses (four in Ottoman History, and one in Medieval or Modern History); Four Turkish language courses; Four Ottoman language and palaeography courses. Furthermore, students are required to write an original M.A. thesis based on the critical analysis of Ottoman archival, epigraphic or narrative sources.
Deadline for applications: 20 May 2024. Information: https://www.history-archaeology.uoc.gr/en/graduate-studies/programs-of-post-graduate-studies/joint-english-language-m-a-program-in-ottoman/?lang=en
15. 7 Awards and Prizes by the “Ottoman and Turkish Studies (OTSA)”
Deadline for applications: 15 May 2024. Information:
https://networks.h-net.org/group/announcements/20029790/otsa-call-submissions-2024-awards-and-prizes
16. Newsletter Promoting the Field of Middle Eastern Christianity in the Homelands and the Diaspora (from approx. 1800 until the Present)
This newsletter seeks to connect scholars working on these topics. It appears three times a year and features upcoming events, peer-reviewed publications, open positions and funding opportunities, ongoing projects.
Next deadline to submit content: 15 April 2024. Information: https://etfst.univie.ac.at/ueber-uns/team/anna-hager or to join the network, please contact Anna Hager, University of Vienna, anna-hager@univie.ac.at
17. LACIM 2024 International Conference: Grammaticalization in Anatolia-Caucasus-Iran-Mesopotamia area (LACIM2024)
Dec. 4, 2024 – Dec. 5, 2024
The second international conference organized by the European network on linguistics and languages of the Anatolia-Caucasus-Iran-Mesopotamia area (LACIM) will be held in Paris from 4 to 5 December, 2024. It will be dedicated to grammaticalization in Anatolia-Caucasus-Iran-Mesopotamia area.
LACIM is a European network of linguists engaged in research on the languages of Anatolia, the Caucasus, Iran and Mesopotamia. We are primarily interested in the interplay of contact and heritage that has shaped the region’s current linguistic ecology, through millennia of interaction. As such, our research program transcends the boundaries of the different language families that are present in the region and pursues an interdisciplinary approach.
Grammaticalization is often defined as “ … a process which turns lexemes into grammatical formatives and makes grammatical formatives still more grammatical…”. (Lehmann 2002 [1985]:ix). While grammaticalization is commonly viewed as a type of language change, its extent can vary across different studies and theoretical frameworks. Over the past four decades, research on grammaticalization has expanded to include various cross-linguistic theoretical perspectives (Lehmann 1985 [2015], Traugott and Heine 1991, Heine & Hünnemeyer 1991, Bybee et al. 1994, Newmeyer 1998, Haspelmath 1998, 1999, Bisang et al. 2004, Narrog & Heine 2011, Heiko & Heine 2018, Kuteva et al. 2019), as well as to deepen its language-specific description and analysis (Narrog & Heine 2018, Bisang & Malchukov 2020).
The primary aim of the current conference is to thoroughly explore the grammaticalization clines and sources in the languages of Anatolia-Caucasus-Iran-Mesopotamia from both diachronic and synchronic perspectives, with a particular emphasis on capturing the areal dimension as comprehensively as possible. Potential discussion topics may include, but are not limited to, the evolution of:
- Adpositions into cases,
• Verbs transforming into auxiliary verbs,
• Information structure in regard with grammaticalization,
• Differential object/subject marking,
• Preverbs,
• Determiners and pronouns,
• Periphrastic constructions,
• Relative clauses,
• Subordinate clauses, etc.
Furthermore, proposals are encouraged on broader topics within the current study of grammaticalization that offer relevant empirical/analytical insights. These might include the inferences from frequency in the realm of the empirical turn in linguistics, or the delimitation between grammaticalization and other types of language change (e.g. reanalysis, metaphoric transfer, metonymic transfer etc.).
Timelines
Submission deadline: June 10, 2024
Notification of acceptance: July 10, 2024
Conference: December 4-5, 2024
Submission instructions:
Proposals must:
• contain at most 1000 words for 30 minute talks, examples included, references excluded,
• be formatted as a PDF,
• include (1) the proposal title and (2) three or four keywords describing the topics of the paper at the top of the proposal,
• be in English or in French,
• submitted via Linguist List at the following link: https://easyabs.linguistlist.org/conference/LACIM2024/
Submissions are limited to 1 individual and 1 joint abstract per author, or 2 joint abstracts per author.
Please direct questions/concerns to lacim.conference2024@gmail.com.
Submissions open: April 2, 2024 – June 10, 2024
Abstract review period: June 11, 2024 – July 10, 2024
18. University of North Dakota – Teaching Assistant Professor, Pre-1600 World History
https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=67107
Closing date: April 15, 2024
19. The Association for the Study of the Middle East and Africa (ASMEA) is offering several opportunities in conjunction with its Seventeenth Annual Conference taking place in Washington, D.C. on November 2 – 4, 2024.
- Research Grant – Grants of up to $2500 will be awarded to support topics in Middle East and African Studies that deserve greater attention (Deadline April 30).
- Travel Grant – Grants of up to $750 will be awarded (Deadline April 30).
- North African Studies Travel Grant Program – Grants of up to $750 will be awarded to those whose research topics are related to the study of North Africa (Deadline April 30).
In addition, we have issued our general Call for Papers and Panels (Deadline May 15) and Call for Poster Proposals.
If you have any further questions about ASMEA, the Annual Conference, or any of our Grant Opportunities, contact info@asmeascholars.org .
URL
https://www.asmeascholars.org/upcoming-conference
20. Hybrid: UCLA Pourdavoud Lecture with Robert Rollinger
The “Persian Wars” An Alternative Perspective?
Wednesday, May 1, 2024 at 4:00pm Pacific
Royce Hall 306
Hybrid Zoom Option Available
21. Embodying Devotion in Indo-Muslim Painting, 1500-1800
Murad Khan Mumtaz
Islamic art is often misrepresented as an iconophobic tradition. As a result of this assumption, the polyvalence of figural artworks made for Hindustan’s Muslim audiences has remained hidden in plain view. By combining an art historical survey with an analysis of primary Indo-Persian literature, this series of seminars shows how figurative painting was intimately linked to a unique Indo-Muslim religious expression that had a wide circulation across South Asia.
DURATION – April 17, 18, 19, 2024
Timing: 6:30 – 8:45 pm IST
For more information and to register: https://www.jp-india.org/programmes/embodying-devotion-in-indomuslim-painting-15001800
URL
https://www.jp-india.org/programmes/embodying-devotion-in-indomuslim-painting-1…
- April 09, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.The first cycle of the Iran Heritage Foundation’s 2024 grant programme, with the deadline of 30th May, 2024, is now open for receipt of application. With the overall aim of fostering knowledge and appreciation of Iran’s rich cultural heritage research grants in various academic disciplines are awarded. The particular emphasis (in alphabetical order) is on archaeology, arts, history, linguistics, and literature, though applications from other disciplines will also be considered.
Projects to be supported may include the most various academic initiatives, from fieldwork to workshops to building databases and digitising images, and will – as previously – privilege new research such as editions and translations of key texts. In order to support multiple initiatives grants of up-to a maximum of £3,000 will be considered.
The application process and conditions for the grants can be viewed on our website.
To apply please click here.
For Terms and Conditions please click here
2. NEW Deadline:
Translanguaging and Linguistic Diversity in Arabic
Conference | University of Cambridge | 18 April 2024
Registration is open for the 4th Biennial Conference on Arabic Language Teaching and Learning in HE which will be hosted at the University of Cambridge. The conference aims to delve into Translanguaging and Linguistic Diversity in Arabic, and provide a platform for robust discussions and networking opportunities.
The new deadline for registrations is 10 April 2024.
More information
3. What They Ate in Old Baghdad, and How We Know with Charles Perry
Tuesday, April 9, 2024 – 7p PST
Los Angeles County Museum of Art, Los Angeles, CA
Who were medieval Middle Eastern cookbooks written for? What were they used for? To answer these questions, culinary historian Charles Perry delves into the Kitab al-Tabikh (The Book of Dishes), the earliest surviving Arabic cookery text. This 10th-century manuscript is currently on view in Dining with the Sultan: The Fine Art of Feasting. This event is free and in-person. A recording of the lecture will be available on LACMA’s YouTube and Vimeo channels. For more information on this event, please visit LACMA’s event calendar.
Charles Perry is a Los Angeles-based food historian with deep knowledge of medieval cookbooks, the preparation of the associated cuisines (in both theory and practice), and the Arabic nomenclature of recipes. He has led a long and exceptionally varied career, beginning as a journalist for Rolling Stone and including a longtime stint as food writer for the Los Angeles Times. He tests historical recipes in his own kitchen, and has become known, admittedly in narrow circles, for hosting from time to time a complete Abbasid-era banquet. His translated cookbooks include Scents and Flavors: A Syrian Cookbook (2017) and A Baghdad Cookery Book (2005).
Contact Email
URL
https://www.lacma.org/event/what-they-ate-old-baghdad
4. A Stroll in the Enchanting Sphere of Persian Wisdom, Language, and Culture
A Series of Courses Introducing Masterpieces of Persian Literature
Course 1:
With Sa‘di in the Delightful Gardens of Golestan
Lecturer: Dr Isa Jahangir
Fee: £100
April 16 – July 16
Tuesdays 6-7:30 pm
Venue: The Islamic College 133 High Road London NW102SW
To register please complete this form or contact the Short Course Department by email: shortcourses@islamic-college.ac.uk
5. CfP: ‘Beyond History: Revisiting the Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean Connectivity’
Call for Papers: Journal of Gulf Studies
Special Issue: ‘Beyond History: Revisiting the Arabian Gulf and the Indian Ocean Connectivity’
Guest Editor: Dr Amna Sadiq
View the full call here>>
https://www.intellectbooks.com/journal-of-gulf-studies#call-for-papers
At the geographical convergence of East and West, both regions have been shaped by a dynamically complex system of dependency. The nature of this dependency has transformed over time, moving from early dhows transporting pilgrims and Omani merchants to British oceanic steamship services and, more recently, to China’s Belt and Road Initiative. The subsequent advent of the Arabian Gulf region and South Asia as geostrategic and economic powers has shifted the practical means of cooperation across the ocean, from a simple economic corridor to a more sophisticated inter-regional cooperative system.
Today, this inter-regional cooperation plays a significant role in shaping the international system rather than merely being shaped by it. As a result, both regions are involved in a relational and dynamic rather than geographical and static relationship. Tracing the internal dynamics of the connections between the Arabian Gulf and Indian Ocean has important implications for our understanding of this relationship. By approaching the development of both regions as an evolving process, we can clarify the conditions under which their dependency functions, along with the associated complexities of regional power struggles.
Although the study of the Arabian Gulf and Indian Ocean has drawn increasing academic interest, scholars have thus far paid scant attention to the changing nature and scope of their system of dependency. Influenced strongly by historical inquiry, the Indian Ocean is frequently conceptualized as a mere container of economic activity, and the Arabian Gulf is seen simply as an economic corridor. This Special Issue of the Journal of Gulf Studies invites scholars and readers to move beyond this tradition and learn about the changing dynamics and contemporary developments in the Arabian Gulf–Indian Ocean relationship.
In this issue, we aim to engage with the latest scholarly trends while also addressing the historical roots of this relationship, offering forward-looking, fresh readings and new approaches to the study of Arabian Gulf–Indian Ocean interactions. We seek to map the rapidly changing patterns of political, economic, and social interactions between both regions as well as clarify the ramifications of these interactions for the international system.
Scholars interested in contributing to this Special Issue are encouraged to pay attention to the timeline identified below:
Abstract submission: Please contact the journal (gulfstudiesj@outlook.com) by 30 April 2024 with a short bio and an abstract of around 300 words. The authors will be informed of their papers’ inclusion into the special issue on a rolling basis.
Delivery of the final paper: 31 September 2024.
For editorial inquiries you can reach the journal at: gulfstudiesj@outlook.com
More information about the journal can be found at: https://intellectdiscover.com/content/journals/jgs
Kayvan Tahmasebian, Rebecca Ruth Gould
International Journal of Middle East Studies
doi: 10.1017/S0020743824000266, 17 pages. Published Online on 1 April 2024
7. Zoom: The Islamic College Monthly Talk:
‘The Development and Significance of Muslim Chaplaincy’
A Talk by Professor Sophie Gilliat-Ray
Wednesday 24 April 2024
6.00 P.M. – 7.30 P.M. (LONDON TIME)
on Zoom
Meeting ID: 884 0412 9777
Passcode: 821079
https://us06web.zoom.us/j/88404129777?pwd=obDh0uVhiKchTaPvAS1B04dKbYhQAp.1
8. The inter-university association Routes de l’Orient, in partnership with the Institut du Monde Arabe and Archaïos, is organizing an international symposium entitled “On the Roads of Arabia: Itineraries by Land and Sea”, to be held at the Institut du Monde Arabe (Paris) on the 12th, 13th and 14th December.
The aim of the symposium is to study the overland and maritime routes of the Arabian Peninsula and the exchanges they made possible, through archaeology, history, philology, religion and life sciences. This topic will be addressed in the longue durée, from the Bronze Age to the Islamic period. The symposium will also examine the networks of exchanges with border regions such as the Indian subcontinent, the Horn of Africa and Egypt, as well as the empires of the Ancient Near East, and the Greek and Roman empires.
This wide-ranging, interdisciplinary and diachronic theme, will be of interest to researchers, lecturers and doctoral students from various international institutions. This symposium is also intended as a meeting place for senior scholars, young researchers and students. It will encourage exchanges between disciplines, in line with current scientific methodologies.
We invite papers from archaeologists, historians, art historians, epigraphists, ceramologists, philologists, ethnologists, anthropologists, biologists, archaeozoologists and others. In this way, we hope to provide a comprehensive overview of the movement of goods and people across the Arabian Peninsula from the Bronze Age to the Islamic period.
During the three days of the symposium, the following themes will be addressed:
• The structures associated with land and sea routes: caravanserais, roads, post houses, trading posts and ports, etc. This theme focuses on the archaeological study of the structures necessary for the movement of goods and people;
• The actors involved in the movement of goods in and around the Arabian Peninsula: traders, buyers, patrons, producers, travelers, camels, etc. From the production of goods to their transport, from the reception of travelers to the financing of expeditions, this theme will explore the identity and function of the actors involved in these commercial, cultural and religious flows;
• Pilgrimage routes: ancient and Islamic pilgrimages. From pre-Islamic sanctuaries to religious practices in the trading outposts of the 1st millennium , from the Darb Zubayda to the Hijaz railway, this theme looks at pilgrimage routes and the practices of pilgrims;
• From coastal shipping to navigation on the high seas: maritime routes, pilots and nautical knowledge. This theme looks at the use of maritime spaces as a means of spreading goods and cultures;
• Circulation of goods, materials and techniques: dissemination and exchange of know-how and raw materials. This theme seeks to better understand the spread of certain craft techniques, chaînes opératoires, raw materials and finished products such as ceramics, metallurgy and glass;
• Leaving one’s imprint, quantifying goods or making a dedication: linguistic and epigraphic diffusion. This theme seeks to understand the linguistic circulation in the Arabian Peninsula.
Conditions for submissions:
Deadline: Friday 17th May 2024
Contributions will take the form of a 20-minute lecture followed by 10 minutes of questions.
An abstract of no more than 300 words should be sent as an attached file (.docx) to surlesroutesdarabie@gmail.com by Friday 17th May 2024. This file must also include the full name, email address, status and affiliation of the author(s), the title of the paper and the chosen topic.
Papers can be submitted in English or French.
The proceedings of this conference will be published digitally in a special issue of our journal Routes de l’Orient.
In line with the objectives and values of Routes de l’Orient, we strongly encourage young researchers (masters, doctoral and post-doctoral students) to submit their contributions.
Contact Information
Sterenn Le Maguer-Gillon
Contact Email
URL
https://www.orient-mediterranee.com/activity/colloque-sur-les-routes-darabie-it…
9. CFP – Arabic Pasts Workshop, October 2024
This annual exploratory and informal workshop offers the opportunity to reflect on methodologies, research agendas, and case studies for investigating history writing in Arabic in the Middle East, North Africa, and beyond in any period from the seventh century to the present.
We are interested in papers that consider the practical and conceptual challenges of working on history writing in Arabic. Papers might elucidate the following sorts of questions:
- How did adherents of different confessional or juristic traditions, men and women, and members of different social classes within societies that became “Islamic” imagine the shape and meaning of their specific societies’ own pasts, and their relation to the universal history of the Islamic community? Which ways of writing, remembering, or commemorating did they develop?
- How can marginalised communities and varieties of Arabic be given due attention?
- How can we broaden our scope beyond just textual historiography?
- In what ways do educational institutions, museums, media organisations and proponents of heritage use history writing to shape loyalties and senses of belonging in society?
- How can works of fiction contribute to our understanding of the past?
- How is the past used in creative arts, re-enactment, games, and augmented reality?
- How can we explore the past algorithmically? Can digital methods enhance our understanding of the past? Can they also limit or even alter it? Which new digital tools are being developed? What seem to be particularly promising approaches? What is lacking?
- How does, or could, artificial intelligence alter historiographical work?
Contributions are invited from scholars at all career levels, addressing any period and any part of the Middle East and North Africa, broadly defined. This year we anticipate running the workshop from the Aga Khan Centre in London and in Lisbon, with the possibility to have an online component featuring participants who are unable to travel to the UK or Portugal.
Arabic Pasts is co-convened by Hugh Kennedy (SOAS), James McDougall (Oxford), Lorenz Nigst (AKU-ISMC), and Sarah Bowen Savant (AKU-ISMC).
Please submit an abstract of 300 words or less in word document by Friday, 17 May 2024 to ArabicPastsConf@aku.edu. Please specify whether you wish to participate in London, Lisbon, or online.
The workshop dates: 3-5 October 2024
Contact Information
Anjum Alam
Contact Email
URL
https://www.aku.edu/ismc/events/pages/event-detail.aspx?EventID=2537&Title=Arab…
10. *Iran by Maps*
*CARAVAN ROUTES IN THE CENTRAL ALBORZ **AT THE BEGINNING OF THE TWENTIETH CENTURY*
/Caravan routes in central Alborz, //Caravan routes in central Alborz/
http://www.irancarto.cnrs.fr/record.php?q=EA-050309&f=local&l=fr <http://www.irancarto.cnrs.fr/record.php?q=EA-050309&f=local&l=fr>
- April 06, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.ONLINE Second Colloquium “Interreligious Interactions in South Asia”, University of Cambridge, 3-12 April 2024
In this online series of table talks, we seek to bring together scholars from a wide spectrum of perspectives to inquire into the kinds of critical tools that are currently deployed to probe interreligious interactions in South Asia over the last eight hundred years or so.
Information, program, abstracts and registration:
https://www.interfaith.cam.ac.uk/interreligious-interactions-south-asia
2. HYBRID Conference “Middle East, Law, and Practice”, NYU Law School’s Middle Eastern and North African Law Students Association, 9 April 2024, 9:00 am – 4:00 pm EST
The conference is about fostering insightful discussions on legal practice in the MENA region. There will be three panels: Environmental Law in the Middle East. – Islamic Law’s Influence on Legal Practice. –Impact of Terrorism Laws: A Global Perspective.
Information and registration: https://www.eventbrite.sg/e/middle-east-law-practice-tickets-824884199847?aff=ebdsoporgprofile&keep_tld=1
3. ONLINE Workshop on “Alternative Careers for the Islamic Art History PhD”, Historians of Islamic Art Association, 17 April 2024, 12:00 EST
This workshop offers an introduction to “alt-ac” (alternative-academic) and “alt-cu” (alternative-curatorial) career paths for specialists in the discipline. Topics that will be taken up include: How alt-ac and alt-cu jobs provide meaningful and fulfilling outcomes to a doctoral program; how to develop the connections to work outside of the professoriate and the curatorial sphere; and where to find the material resources to support additional training.
Information and registration: https://networks.h-net.org/group/announcements/20028999/hiaa-online-workshop-alternative-careers-islamic-art-history-phd
4. Symposium “The Idea of Iran: Qajar Iran on the Cusp of Modernity”, SOAS, University of London, 11-12 May 2024
The nineteenth century saw the consolidation of the Qajar State and changed relations with the European powers that had been transformed by political, industrial and agricultural revolutions, among them the loss of Britain’s American colonies and the rise of an independent power on the global scene. What does the Idea of Iran mean at this period? What did Iran look like? How does modern scholarship define the distinctive aspects of the period? Etc.
Information and registration: https://www.soas.ac.uk/about/event/idea-iran-qajar-iran-cusp-modernity
5. Conference “The “Excluded Third” in the Co-Production of Judaism, Christianity, and Islam” (Project: The “European Quran”), Como Lake, Italy, 10-13 June 2024
Judaism, Christianity, and Islam are often understood as an ensemble of three (‘Abrahamic,’ ‘monotheistic,’ scriptural, or prophetic) religious communities and traditions. But often when adherents of two of these “sibling” religions interact, the third is treated as a figure to be marginalized, stigmatized, or instrumentally exploited vis-à-vis the others. Our conference proposes to explore this dynamic of the excluded third.
Deadline for abstracts: 1 June 2024. Information: https://euqu.eu/2024/03/12/call-for-papers-the-excluded-third-in-the-co-production-of-judaism-christianity-and-islam/
6. HYBRID International Conference of the Center for Middle East Strategic Studies (CMESS): “Middle East after Abolition of Caliphate”, Center for Middle East Strategic Studies, Kharazmi University, Tehran, 14 November 2024
Topics: Abolition of Caliphate and Islamic Movements – Inheritance of Dissolution / Abolition of Caliphate for Middle East Countries – Impacts of Abolition of Caliphate on Türkiye , Iran and Arab World Policy – The Possibility of Revitalizing Caliphate in the Middle East.
Deadline of abstract: 20 June 2024. Information: nasri@khu.ac.ir; research.imess@gmail.com
7. Atelier doctoral “Des musées (post)coloniaux en Méditerranée? Muséographies, recon-figurations politiques et fabrique des identités”, par REM, École des hautes études hispa-niques et ibériques (Madrid), Institut Jacques-Berque (Rabat), IRMC (Tunis) et École française de Rome, Madrid, 25-28 novembre 2024
La perspective interdisciplinaire de l’atelier doctoral, convoquant l’histoire, la géographie, l’anthropologie, la museologie, l’archéologie, la science politique, l’art, etc., permettra de décloisonner des langages et des approches sur le monde muséal et ses reconfigurations spatiales, matérielles, symboliques et sociales à différentes échelles temporelles.
Application au plus tard le 22 avril 2024. Information: https://irmcmaghreb.org/aac-atelier-doctoral-des-musees-postcoloniaux-en-mediterranee-museographies-reconfigurations-politiques-et-fabrique-des-identites/?fbclid=IwAR0n8vPGx3lzdWaN5GIhq8bVgzpCOjWnZVeDz1-kmzrYzFPtBYhb2e9s40w_aem_AR792-PvS1Ni13AF97y5wZFCLS2n1dWvdmaH8HfpP2PSz8LQhnqQo7amjyOPI0_rq0Y
8. MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships in the Project “[HORIZON EUROPE] Horizon Insights”, Universiteit Gent, Belgium
Deadliner for applications: 11 September 2024.
Information: https://bozi.ugent.be/nl/bozi/c83B4eMbBdJ53L2tNRm3WJ/
9. Visiting Assistant Professor of History and International Studies (1 Year, Focus Middle East), Marymount Manhattan College, NewYork
Qualifications: PhD in History, Political Science, International Relations, or related social science field; Regio-nal expertise complimented by a legal sub focus; Demonstrated teaching excellence as well as an active scholarly agenda.
Review of applications will begin on 1 April 2024, and will continue until the position is filled.
Information: https://www.mmm.edu/offices/human-resources/faculty-positions.php
10. International MA Program (4 Semesters): “Mediterranean History”, University of Konstanz, Info Session via zoom: 17 April 2024, 10:00 am – 11:30 a.m. CET
This unique MA study program examines trans-Mediterranean dynamics and entanglements over a period of 3,000 years: from antiquity to the 21st century. It provides bachelor graduates in history and cultural studies with a cross-period knowledge of the history, cultures and languages of Mediterranean societies, which is equally important for academic careers and non-academic professions. You will acquire practical skills and regional expertise about a key region of the world,
Deadline for applications: 30 April 2024. Information: https://www.geschichte.uni-konstanz.de/en/study/ma-mediterranean-history/prospective-student/prospective-students/
11. ONLINE Seminar “Mediterranean Art History: An Introduction” by the Mediterranean Seminar, 17-20 June 2024, 10:00 am – 12:00 pm and 1:00 pm – 3:00 pm MDT
This seminar provides participants with an overview of key concepts and methodologies in the study of Mediterranean art history. The course will address the themes of mobility, connectivity, and encounter in relation to the visual culture of peoples and territories across the sea. Participants will acquire an art historical tool kit to assist them in conducting their own research on the visual culture and artistic production of the medieval Mediterranean
Deadline for applications: 15 April 2024.
Information: https://www.mediterraneanseminar.org/overview-mediterranean-art-2024
12. Summer School “Comparative Habsburg-Ottoman Paleography” of the Turkology Department (University of Vienna) and Institute for Habsburg and Balkan Studies (Austrian Academy of Sciences), Vienna, 1-12 July 2024
Participants will join morning lessons taught by experienced teachers and listen to lectures given by recog-nized experts in the afternoons. Included are also visit to the imperial archives (HHStA), the military museum (HGM), and the Ottomans Museum in Perchtoldsdorf, a guided tour of Vienna’s historical highlights that have direct and subtle references to the history of Ottoman-Habsburg encounters.
Deadline for applications: 30 April 2024. Information: https://orientalistik.univie.ac.at/fachrichtungen/turkologie/veranstaltungen/summer-school-of-comparative-habsburg-ottoman-paleography/
13. International Journal of Islamic Architecture (IJIA) Special Issue:
“Gender and Architecture in the Islamic World: Restrictions, Reactions, and Actions”
Thematic volume planned for June 1, 2026
Proposal submission deadline: June 15, 2024
Guest Editor: Dr. Gül Kale, Carleton University
In-house editor: Dr. Alex Dika Seggerman, Rutgers University
Gender and Architecture in the Islamic World: Restrictions, Reactions, and Actions
Real and imagined spaces are inherently gendered based on widely accepted heteronormative and patriarchal ways of living, thereby affecting how buildings and cities are accessed, used, and experienced. Moreover, spatial practices associated with such heteronormative and gender binary systems impact design ideas that shape the built environment. The imposition of traditional gender roles in architecture from patriarchal and heteronormative views affect urban policy making, architectural education, and decision making in the building and transformation of cities. Even the word ‘architect’ was and still is often gendered both in historical and contemporary perceptions of the society due to the male-dominated professional field despite the involvement and contributions of women in the transformation of the built environment for centuries. Hence, space and gender are intrinsically linked and mutually construct one another. Against these complex yet urgent ongoing questions, this special issue of the International Journal of Islamic Architecture aims to interrogate the relation between gender and architecture focusing on feminist, queer, non-binary, and trans perspectives with an interdisciplinary approach from the past and present. However, in order to have a nuanced understanding of diverse dynamics shaping spaces and spatial practices, contributions will need to have an intersectional approach encompassing race, sexuality, age, disability, class, religion, and ethnicity. Moreover, studies mustderive from specific social, cultural, and political contexts and localities to prevent essentialist approaches to Islamic and diasporic communities.
This special issue raises questions around three themes: restrictions, reactions, and actions. On the one hand, while looking at gender history to see the restrictions imposed on various marginalised groups through socio-political structures and institutions, it is crucial to avoid victimising them by also underscoring their reactions, resistance, and attempts to reclaim their rights. On the other hand, it is equally important to show how marginalised and racialized groups took these rejections of heteronormative and patriarchal power dynamics as a starting point to build alternative communities based on their spatial experiences and embodied creative design ideas and practices. The purpose of this threefold approach is to have a well-rounded and nuanced grasp of the role of gender in architecture beyond passive and top-down narratives.
Regardless of traditional gender binary roles that associated women with domestic space and duties, women have contributed to the shaping and building of cities, communities, and spaces for centuries. But when one considers the restrictions imposed on not only women, but also nonbinary people, and their use, design, and experience of architecture in the past, the lack of historical records comes to the forefront as a serious obstacle. Given the scarcity of the primary sources, scholars look at different places for bits of information or read sources through new lenses to construct a narrative about women and marginalised non-binary people, who were not mentioned or centred in state records because they did not belong to courtly circles or other dominant groups. Hence, contributors will need to introduce an interdisciplinary approach and willingness to engage with diverse socio-political and cultural discourses and realities to reveal their hidden histories. For example, in the last decades, court records have emerged as an important source for understanding women’s lives and engagements with the city. These records show that diverse material, visual, and textual sources have the potential to contribute to writing new architectural histories disclosing the lives and spatial practices of women and non-binary groups from ordinary backgrounds. The lack of histories on women and non-binary people cannot be considered distinct from the restrictions imposed on them during spatial practices. What were the restricted spaces for them in the past? This historical perception of gender binary roles is also important in understanding contemporary architectural practices that privilege heteropatriarchal ways of shaping spaces and cities today, which affects the spatial experiences of queer, non-binary,and trans groups. Architecture can be a tool of suppression and segregation, sometimes in spite of the initial intentions behind it. Governing groups have used cities and buildings to subjugate women, queer, and trans communities, both in the past and today. These restricted spaces can expose various issues related to the intersection of gender and access. Spaces built according to a standard, able-bodied male model ignore other bodies outside of this norm. Contributors can examine real or imagined alternative spaces that challenge this normative patriarchal model. Considering the movement and impact of diverse bodies in space, it is equally important to look at the creation of alternative spaces of resistance and action during migration. Wars, authoritative states, or disasters, such as earthquakes and epidemics, cause displacements and relocations for people. Gender plays a critical role in generating spatial injustices and inequalities, particularly for women, queer, and trans communities, who are often made vulnerable to health and hygiene issues caused by gender normative or male-centred spatial organisations insensitive to their needs. Moreover, when people immigrate and settle in new places forming diasporic communities, they might reproduce traditional patriarchal structures such as the practice of sex segregation in religious or educational spaces. In diaspora, people of colour encounter diverse obstacles during urban experiences and through spatial segregations at the intersection of gender, race, and architecture. The contributors are invited to explore private, public, or in-between spaces where women, queer, non-binary, and trans people reclaim their autonomy, pushing the limits by creating new zones of resistance, action, and interaction.
Every restriction causes a reaction. Whereas traditional gender roles affected the various restrictions imposed on people in cities, for centuries women found creative ways to claim their right to experiencing the city even under strict control and patriarchal hierarchies. Modern city planning intersected with women’s movements and new rights. Modern architects introduced houses and buildings for a new way of living that reimagined gender roles and normative spatial measures. It is however important to question how progressive these modern transformations and designs were in terms of considering women’s changing role as well as promoting gender inclusivity and diversity. Architectural representations, drawings, and models can provide insight into understanding these conceptions. Looking closely at the designers who suggested changes to the private spaces particularly can disclose underlying and ongoing heteronormative and patriarchal structures despite the claim of progress as well as gender equality and inclusivity. At this juncture, it is crucial to hear, for example, how women reacted to traditional as well as modern spatial arrangements that acted as norm makers or gatekeepers. But women’s reactions were not limited to discourses. When and how did women gain full access not only to using but also working in and shaping public buildings such as hospitals, schools, libraries, and universities that empowered them? For example, contributors are encouraged to investigate women leaders in medicine, who developed spatial facilities and hospitals that supported women, queer, and trans people’s mental and physical wellbeing. Women who shaped architectural education and changed heteronormative studio practices will be another important topic to examine. Women in labour history as well as women working in architectural offices in diverse capacities emerge as another area to investigate further to understand the formation of the built environment outside the work of the male architect figure. There has been an ongoing effort to alter structural barriers in architecture to propose innovative design solutions overturning suppressed bodies and ideas and to create safe spaces for women, queer, non-binary, and trans people’s empowerment as well as gender inclusive spaces. Contributors might examine gender-neutral and gender inclusive spaces today, and in the past, tracing the alterations in social perceptions within time along with changing political discourses that target marginalised communities. Architecture can be used by power structures to hinder gender fluidity in spaces. But feminist, queer, and trans groups reclaim architecture to create gender fluid and safe spaces as agents of change for themselves and their communities. Contributors are invited to write on the erased, forgotten, or simply ignored contributions of women, queer, non-binary, and trans people to the spatial, social, and technological development of communities, neighbourhoods, and cities, from small scale workshops to alternative educational settings. Just as the male able-bodied model and its measures became the norm for forming spaces, their experiences also became the standard to imagine new spaces and who occupied these spaces. Papers interrogating this understanding to reimagine and reclaim women, queer, non-binary, and trans people’s emotional and multisensory history and lived experiences in architecture, which go beyond positivist and orientalizing discourses focused on the duality between body and the mind or the senses and the intellect are most welcome.
Equally important to underscore is writing about women, queer, non-binary, and trans people’s spatial experiences from their perspective by giving space to supressed voices. This includes a new assessment of the seeming contradiction between the notions of traditional and modern, both of which were often defined according to the heteropatriarchal gaze imposing how, for example, women should look and act. What do attempts to create safe spaces through gender inclusive washrooms, athletic facilities, women only gym classes, women in mosques movements, and shelters offer in terms of protecting one’s privacy and freedom while supporting spatial justice? What kind of a relationship do they establish with the public sphere that can be exposed to gender-based violence? The dichotomy caused by looking at private and public as two strictly separate zones defined by gender binary roles has already been challenged by scholars. They, for example, showed how working at home didn’t prevent women from participating in social, cultural, and economic activities, hence the link between public and private spaces is fluid. For centuries, knowledge has been produced in diverse spaces. It is thus important to delve into this relationship by looking at contemporary interpretations of private space and the notion of privacy by also incorporating changing lived realities and perceptions of gender beyond heteronormative, gender binary, and patriarchal norms.
Some further questions one might consider within the Islamic context might include:
- What are the legal policies that impact women, queer, non-binary, and trans people’s spatial actions and urban experiences today and/or in the past?
- Where can we locate architectural movements and alternative participatory practices that initiated real change for women, queer, non-binary, and trans people in specific neighbourhoods or cities?
- What is the impact of women, queer, non-binary, and trans people’s liberation movements in opening and forming new safe spaces?
- What are the real and virtual sites of resistance for women, queer, non-binary, and trans communities, ranging from gathering at small community meetings to occupying the squares?
- How can we rewrite the history of women’s participation in architectural education from an intersectional perspective?
- What can intersections of critical race theory and gender studies offer to reconsider travel literature and representations produced to convey urban narratives?
Editors welcome articles dealing with similar issues related to gender and architecture from an intersectional and interdisciplinary perspective, encompassing a wide variety of areas including, but not limited to, legal history, law, critical race theory, labour history, environmental history, history of emotions, and history of science.
Articles offering historical and theoretical analysis (Design in Theory; DiT) should be between 6000 and 8000 words. Those on design and practice (Design in Practice; DiP) should be between 3000 and 4000 words. Practitioners, urbanists, art historians, specialists in literary, religious, and gender studies, curators, archivists, librarians, archaeologists, anthropologists, geographers, sociologists, and historians whose work resonates with the topic of this special issue are welcome to contribute discussions that address the critical themes of the journal. Collaboratively authored articles are also welcome. Please send a title and a 400-word abstract to the guest editor, Gül Kale, Carleton University (IJIAgender@gmail.com), by June 15, 2024. Authors of proposals will be contacted by July 30, 2024, and may be requested to submit full article drafts for consideration by January 30, 2025. All submissions will undergo blind peer review, editing, and revision. For detailed author instructions, please consult: www.intellectbooks.com/ijia.
Contact Information
Dr. Gül Kale, Carleton University
Contact Email
14. Hybrid: The Inaugural Catherine B. Asher Lecture in South Asian and Islamic Art on April 19, 4:30pm CDT, Online & Elmer L. Andersen Library 120, at the University of Minnesota.
This event honors the legacy of Cathy’s scholarship and mentorship in both fields. We very much hope that you will join us in honoring and remembering her through the presentation of new scholarship in the domains for which she cared so deeply.
The lecture, “Tactile Histories of the Mughal Album,” will be delivered by Dr. Yael Rice.
As compilations of discrete, fragmentary images and texts in codex format, Mughal albums lend themselves to ocularcentric analysis. How else, if not by sight, would one read a book? Yet the Mughals’ word for album, muraqqa’—Arabic for “patched” or “mended”—, foregrounds other modes of sensory engagement, namely touch. While the term clearly evokes the tactile processes of trimming and pasting together employed in the production of such albums, it also suggests the frequent episodes of repair that any excessively handled book would demand. Following this linguistic cue, this talk situates the Mughal album at the center of a complex matrix of both visual and tactile practices. It examines how physical touch and haptic perception factored in the organization, construction, and use of seventeenth- and eighteenth-century albums both within and beyond the Mughal court. It furthermore places these materials within a broader constellation of stitched textiles and gardens with and in which albums were enjoyed. Thus, this talk also builds on the important work of Catherine Asher, whose scholarship opened up new and vital ways of understanding the Mughal lived environment.
Please join us either in person or online (register here).
This event will be streamed online but it will not be recorded.
15. Tradu/izioni d’Eurasia Reloaded
Liquid Frontiers and Entangled Worlds
2,000 Years of Visual and Material Culture From the Mediterranean to East Asia
Curated by Nicoletta Fazio, Veronica Prestini, Elisabetta Raffo and Laura Vigo
12 April – 1 September 2024
MAO Museo d’Arte Orientale, Turin
Download the press kit https://bit.ly/Traduizioni_reloaded
12 April marks the public opening of the refurbishment of Tradu/izioni d’Eurasia, the exhibition organised by MAO for the 700th anniversary of Marco Polo’s death.
The most significant changes include numerous important loans from the Uffizi, the Biblioteca Laurenziana, Florence, the Musei Civici, Bologna and the Museo della Ceramica Duca di Martina, Naples and site specific works by the French-Moroccan artist Yto Barrada.
The exhibition is accompanied by a rich programme of talks, concerts, screenings and performances, offering visitors opportunities for reflection and new readings of the complex, fascinating story that has unfolded along the Silk Road across the centuries.
On 12 April, MAO is unveiling the refurbishment of Tradu/izioni d’Eurasia, an exhibition that tells the fascinating story of the journey of art, culture, traditions and language from East Asia to the Mediterranean basin (and back) through a new, well-chosen selection of pottery, textiles, metalwork and manuscripts.
Like Marco Polo, people travelled along the caravan routes that connected Asia and Europe across thousands of years. Travelling alongside with them were ideas, motifs and knowledge, an entire migrating heritage – material and immaterial – that put down roots everywhere it arrived through a steadfast process of adaptation.
Tradu/izioni d’Eurasia tells this story, a tale made up of connections, influences and betrayals: it is our story, a narrative that unites far-flung corners of the Eurasian continent more than we are inclined to believe and shows that the concept of ‘border’ has always been illusory and arbitrary.
The story unfolds in thematic sections alternating with forays into the contemporary world and united by a new version of Chiara Lee and freddie Murphy’s site-specific sound installation Distilled, which has been developed and added to beyond its October 2023 iteration.
The new display opens with an installation by the Berlin studio Zeitguised and explodes with the theme of blue, often paired with contrasting white: precious vases, plates and bowls of disparate provenance (from China to Delft, passing through Iran), on loan from the Museo delle Civiltà, Rome, the Museo Internazionale delle Ceramiche, Faenza and the Museo Nazionale della Ceramica Duca di Martina, Naples, and two masterpieces by Giovanna Garzoni, from the Gallerie degli Uffizi, Florence.
The paintings, both of which are vibrant still lifes, feature a Chinese vase and cup decorated with typical white and blue motifs, attesting to the fluidity with which objects and iconographic themes have always circulated across Eurasian, whether brought as gifts or sold along the trade routes.
Through painting, Garzoni depicted the ties between Asia and Europe and the powerful fascination with the exotic that began bewitching the European courts, especially that of the Medici in Florence, in the fifteenth century. Art talking about art, in a play of references and decorative motifs that echo – familiar, yet different – at distant latitudes and in remote periods.
The next section is devoted to the theme of grapes and, by extension, wine. Central to Sogdian culture, wine was used not only for libations and during Zoroastrian rituals but also trade. In the exhibition, the decorative motif of the bunch of grapes is represented by pottery from China, Turkey and Iran – attesting to its wide circulation – and an extraordinary Japanese obi by the master artisan Yamaguchi Genbei: a five-metre length of fabric decorated with the well-wishing grape motif.
The heart of the reload is a series of site-specific works by the French-Moroccan artist Yto Barrada, the exhibition’s guest of honour.
Drawing inspiration from Color Problems: A Practical Manual for the Lay Student of Color by Emily Noyes Vanderpoel (1842–1939), for Tradu/izioni d’Eurasia Reloaded Barrada made a series of eight medium-sized canvases that take an at once both archival and poetic approach to exploring the subject of colour and its meanings in works in the MAO collection.
The series is of course an homage to Noyes Vanderpoel, a scholar, activist, artist and patron of the arts who was based in New York in the early twentieth century, but it is especially a narration of subterranean and subordinate stories linked to the theme of diaspora and cultural influence. A story that dispenses with words in favour of the silken materiality of velvet.
Yto Barrada’s project was realised in collaboration with the Fondazione Merz, where the artist will hold a solo exhibition in the autumn of 2024. She is the winner of the fourth Mario Merz Prize, a biennial award instituted in 2013 with the aim of identifying and supporting individuals in the fields of international contemporary art and music.
Yto Barrada’s works have been placed in dialogue with textiles and pottery on loan from the Fondazione Bruschettini per l’Arte Islamica e Asiatica. The new selection of works includes refined exemplars of Ottoman art decorated with the cintamani motif, an ancient religious symbol of Buddhist origin that was reformulated and reinterpreted as a symbol of sovereignty, power and well-wishes in Iran and Turkey and, more generally, the Islamic world. These artefacts are paired with a precious sixteenth-century illuminated manuscript of The Shahnameh or Book of Kings, by the Persian poet Ferdowsi, on loan from the Biblioteca Medicea Laurenziana, Florence. In some of the volume’s numerous and extremely fine illuminations, the Persian hero Rustam is wearing a mantle embellished with the cintamani motif.
Thanks to support from MAO and the Istituto per l’Oriente Nallino, Rome, The Book of Kingshas been restored and digitalised: it was a complex, difficult project, but indispensable for being able to display the volume in the museum and for future use by the scholarly community. The manuscript will also be the subject of a public study day planned for June.
The next section explores at the scale motif, with metal and ceramic tableware from India, Turkey, Iran, China and Italy on loan from the Musei Civici, Bologna and a few important private collections.
The scale pattern, symbolising good health and riches, was the result of multiple cultural and artistic encounters and can be considered an emblem of the ‘entangled worlds’ at the heart of the exhibition. It returned, translated and readapted, in the symbol of the dragon and in that of the carp, just as the pilgrim’s flask type re-emerged, represented in the exhibition by a splendid majolica exemplar from fifteenth-century Pesaro.
Next to the room of metalwork from the Aron Collection there is a new selection of seventh- and eighth-century samite, silk textiles used in the past for vestments and sumptuous clothing and embellished with animal motifs (lions and bulls in niches and birds in beaded circles). These textiles are echoed in a seventeenth-century Japanese painting of a Buddhist monk wearing a kesa (the traditional Buddhist mantle) that is as richly decorated as the fabric that covers his chair.
The exhibition ends with a poetic, immersive installation, Anila Quayyum Agha’s Shimmering Mirage (Black), 2018, which transports visitors to an imaginary elsewhere, and a reading room by the Milan publisher by the same name, Reading Room (specialised in independent publications and artists’ books), where there is also a video work by the Lebanese artist Ali Cherri, The Watchman (2023). The video follows Sergeant Bulut (a postmodern version of Lieutenant Drogo in The Desert of the Tartars), who is stationed in a watchtower on the southern border between the self-proclaimed Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus and the Republic of Cyprus. There, immersed in a world caught between reality and imagination, the soldier passes endless days and equally endless nights waiting for an enemy that never comes, until vague lights appear on the horizon that give the film a ghostly final twist. It is a powerful and needed reflection on the concepts of border and death, the intrinsic violence of the frontier and the absurdity of war rhetoric.
The final component of the exhibition is the light installation MOSADEGH (2023) by the Iranian artist Shadi Harouni, which invites reflection on themes like democracy and hope through the poetic and fierce account of the complex history of modern Iran, in dialogue with one of the 100 fragments of the copy of a Caucasian carpet made for the Pergamon Museum, Berlin as part of ‘CULTURALXCOLLABS – WEAVING THE FUTURE‘, a participatory art project that goes beyond museum walls to engage with the community and create a dialogue between past, present and future, in an exchange between culture, museum and individuals with different stories and sensibilities.
The project begins with the extraordinary story of a seventeenth-century Caucasian carpet decorated with a dragon motif. It entered the collection of the Berlin museums in 1881, but it was partially destroyed by a fire bomb during World War II, which spared only a few fragments. Using these fragments, a complex restoration project was launched in 2004 that gave the carpet the look of an almost graphic puzzle. In 2022, a copy of the carpet was made by hand in India for CulturalxCollabs – Weaving the Future and cut into 100 equal fragments, which began to circulate around the world, creating a tangible link between the museum, which is currently closed for renovations, and people, with the aim of generating a collective, shared narrative at the end of the project, planned for 2027.
The fragment-copy is displayed with two precious Caucasian carpets from the seventeenth century: alarge carpet with a floral pattern and two fragments of a carpet with a dragon motif, both from the Bruschettini Collection. These motifs, tied to traditional Chinese and Persian symbolism, evoke cosmological myths about the opposition of light and darkness, fertility and the origin of life, and symbolise power and spirituality.
In keeping with all of MAO’s exhibition projects, this refurbishment is also accompanied by a rich public program of musical events and performances, once again by Chiara Lee and freddie Murphy, and a series oftalks and meetings that offer the public new opportunities for reflection on complex themes intimately tied to current issues.
Finally, a booklet containing texts that take a closer look at and expand upon the themes of the exhibition will be distributed free of charge in the museum.
The reload of the exhibition is accompanied by the rehang of the Islamic Asian Countries gallery, including the display of an extraordinary group of Kerman carpets, a particular type of rug from the Safavid period (1501–1722) called ‘vase carpets’: twelve precious fragments from the collection of the Fondazione Bruschettini per l’Arte Islamica e Asiatica and a rare large exemplar from MITA, the Museo Internazionale del Tappeto Antico, Brescia.
Produced in the Iranian city that gives them their name, Kerman carpets are a type of Persian rug marked by technical refinement and innovative taste and distinctive for their vast variety of patterns, an especially rich colour range and remarkable durability. The quality of these carpets tells us that although Kerman was never the seat of the Safavid court, it was an especially important city and entrusted to princes close to the sovereign. ‘Vase carpets’ have a large, often monumental, vase motif in the middle, filled with stylised flowers, plant motifs and geometric shapes. The borders of this carpet type are generally relatively thin in relation to the middle field.
The display of these carpets is a new instalment of the project Flowers in Wool, which began in Genoa in 2022 with the exhibition I magnifici tappeti Sanguszko, and the next instalment of which is an upcoming major exhibition of Kerman carpets from Italian collections.
16. Simon Fraser University – Farley Distinguished Visiting Scholar in History
https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=67088
17. NEW Deadline
The Arabic Language and Literature department at UAE University is currently advertising a full-time professor position in Classical Arabic. They are seeking a scholar who can teach in Arabic and possess a distinguished profile in Scopus in terms of publications and citations. UAEU provides exceptional benefits, including free accommodation, a tax-free salary, a children’s school allowance, return tickets in the summer, and comprehensive health care coverage. Please feel free to reach out if you require further information.
The new deadline is 15/4/2024. Here is the link to apply:
https://jobs.uaeu.ac.ae/Postings/PostingDetails/3996
18.New interdisciplinary journal on Amazigh Studies launched
As part of a wider project aimed at establishing Amazigh Studies Program at UCLA, Professor Aomar Boum of UCLA Anthropology, a CNES Faculty Advisory Committee member, and Professor Brahim El Guabli of Williams College, launched the first issue of the new Tamazgha Studies Journal (TSJ). Drawing on the Amazigh Cultural Movement’s use of Tamazgha to refer to the historical Amazigh homeland extending from the Canary Islands to southwest Egypt, TSJ will use the new developments in Amazigh Studies to create new knowledge in this field of study. A detailed history of Amazigh studies at UCLA and the role of CNES in its establishment is explored in one of the articles featured in the issue.
19. Of Language and Identity in Early Islam
The 2024 Giorgio Levi Della Vida Award presentation and conference
Thursday, May 16 – Friday, May 17, 2024
10:00 am
Charles E. Young Research Library
UCLA
The award will be jointly presented to Michael Cook, Class of 1943 University Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University, and Hossein Modarressi, Bayard Dodge Professor of Near Eastern Studies at Princeton University, in recognition of their decades-long collaboration and their enormous contributions to the fields of Near Eastern and Islamic Studies.
https://www.international.ucla.edu/cnes/event/16624
- April 02, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.The Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations of the University of Chicago is honored to have Prof. Dominic Parviz Brookshaw as the fourth speaker in the Franklin Lewis Lecture Series of 2022-2025. The lecture will be in person and on zoom on Friday, April 19 at 5:00-7:00 PM US Central Time.
Title: ‘Illusory Originality: Appropriation, Repurposing, and Response in the Poems of Tahira Qurrat al-‘Ayn’
Zoom link:
https://uchicagogroup.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJ0ocuqpqzkuHdC41RztwbolJdTYUouiJ6d1#/registration
2. At the end of last year, GINGKO published Precious Materials: The Arts of Metal in the Medieval Iranian World.
First published in French in 2021, the book showcases the pre-Mongol metalwork held at Louvre in Paris and has now been translated into English in an edition revised by the author, Annabelle Collinet.
3. Online: “The Introduction of Islamic Coinage in 697-98″
with Michael Bates, Stephen Heidemann, and Stuart Sears.
Friday, April 5th, @12 noon EST
https://www.gc.cuny.edu/events/introduction-islamic-coinage-697-98-and-after
4. Caliphate and Imamate
An Anthology of Medieval Muslim Texts on Political Theology
H Ansari, N Husayn, eds.
Cambridge, 2023
https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/caliphate-and-imamate/93727020916F4855058FD7DC472C8EBD
5. World Cultures Curator (Arabic and Persian)
The University of Edinburgh
This post sits within Heritage Collections, Research Collections team working within the Centre for Research Collections in the Main Library in George Square. It reports to The University Archivist and Research Collections Manager. The working hours and pattern are usually 35 hours a week with much of this on campus working with the collections.
Deadline | 4 April 2024
More information
6. Bennett Boskey Fellowship in Modern Global History (1700 -present)
University of Oxford
Exeter College invites applications for the Bennett Boskey Fellowship in Modern Global History (1700-present). The Fellowship, which is strictly temporary, will be tenable for a period of up to 36 months (with effect from 1 September 2024, or as soon as possible thereafter). We particularly seek applications from candidates who focus on the history of the Middle East (including North Africa) or the South Atlantic (West Africa and Latin America).
Deadline | 5 April 2024
More information
7. Irish Research Council (IRC) Doctoral Researcher
University College Dublin
Applications are invited for a PhD doctoral researcher within the UCD School of Politics and International Relations to deliver the research objectives of a project funded by the Irish Research Council. The project applies methods from quantitative text analysis/NLP in Arabic and cognitive mapping (Axelrod 1976) to examine interviews with participants in Muslim resistance movements.
Deadline | 8 April 2024
More information
8. Lecturer in Arabic Studies
The University of Manchester
To further strengthen our teaching portfolio, the Department of Modern Languages and Cultures wishes to appoint a Lecturer in Arabic Studies. The post is tenable from September 1st 2024 to June 30th 2027. This post in Arabic Studies is a teaching and scholarship position. Applicants must have a relevant PhD and demonstrate the ability to meet flexible curricular and teaching needs and demonstrate capability to contribute organisationally to the wider Departmental community.
Deadline | 8 April 2024
More information
9. Research Associate in Early Modern Global History (Islamic World Focus)
The University of Manchester
Applications are sought for a full-time Postdoctoral Research Associate to work with Dr Edmond Smith, conducting research for the ERC-selected, UKRI-funded project “Institutional Transformation and the Entangled Commercial Cultures of International Trade, 1450-1750” (INTRECCI). The successful applicant will hold a PhD in the field of early modern, global, or economic history, or in another relevant field, with expertise in the history of trade and empire in the Islamic World.
Deadline | 10 April 2024
More information
10. Research Associate in Early Modern Global History (Islamic World Focus)
The University of Manchester
Applications are sought for a full-time Postdoctoral Research Associate to work with Dr Edmond Smith, conducting research for the ERC-selected, UKRI-funded project “Institutional Transformation and the Entangled Commercial Cultures of International Trade, 1450-1750” (INTRECCI). The successful applicant will hold a PhD in the field of early modern, global, or economic history, or in another relevant field, with expertise in the history of trade and empire in the Islamic World.
Deadline | 10 April 2024
More information
11. Evans-Pritchard Lectureship 2024-25
All Souls College, Oxford
Applications are invited for the Evans-Pritchard Lectureship, to take place during the academic year 2024-2025. The Lecturer will deliver a series of four to six lectures in the course of a month, usually during May, based on fieldwork or other indigenous primary materials concerning Africa, the Middle East or the Mediterranean, and offering an empirical analysis of social relations.
Deadline | 7 May 2024
More information
12. Call for Submissions | Second Symposium on Middle Eastern, North African and Central Asian Dances, Music and Performing Arts
Symposium, Pomona College (Claremont, CA), 3-6 October 2024
Submissions are invited for the second scholarly symposium on MENA and Central Asian dances. This year’s topics include music and performing arts from the same regions. The goal is to gather as many scholars as possible in one academic environment to present their most recent research. All submissions must be accompanied by an abstract (150-250 words).
Deadline | 1 April 2024
13. Hudood: Rethinking boundaries
Exhibition | Brunei Gallery | 11 July-21 September
The exhibition introduces contemporary art from the Barjeel Foundation, with a focus on the overarching theme of “Boundaries” as both a subject and a tool for meaningfully accessing a diverse array of art from the SWANA region. Delving into the profound implications of walls and borders on artistic expression, the exhibition prompts the question of whether it is the artist’s perspective that ultimately transcends these boundaries.
More information
14. ONLINE Webinar “Staging Piety: The Takkiyya Muʿavin al-Mulk in Kermanshah”
With Nahid Massoumeh Assemi
British Institute of Persian Studies (BIPS), 4 April 2024, 5:00 pm UK Time
This talk gives a brief account of the development of the rituals of commemoration of the Battle of Karbala in Iran, and their patronage by the state and the elites of society, who solicited the loyalty of the broader public by building takkiyyas, providing the venues for pious forms of entertainment. It also argues for the role of takkiyyas in creation of a sense of community and group identity; the formative stage of the emergent idea of nationhood at the time.
Information and registration:
https://us06web.zoom.us/webinar/register/3717098146803/WN_Wc0se2GzSxC0F4HCmWxgEg#/registration
- March 30, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.HYBRID Lecture “Roads to Civilization: Imagining, Mapping, and Integrating Dersim into the Ottoman Empire and the Turkish State” by Cevat Dargın, New York University, 11 April 2024, 10:30 pm CET
This talk explores the historical journey of Dersim in eastern Anatolia with a predominantly Kizilbash Kurdish population, as it transitioned from the Ottoman Empire to the modern Turkish state. It analyzes how racialized ideologies and colonial policies influenced the treatment and perception of this ethno-religious group across both the empire and the nation-state. The talk provides critical insights into broader issues of identity, violence, and statecraft in the region.
Information and registration: https://nyu.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJYvcOutqjIjGNH17xw2qwwQRtSOZdzulNtE#/registration
2. „DAVO-Werkstattgespräche” to Promote Young Scholars during the Congress of the German Middle East Studies Association (DAVO), University of Goettingen, 26-28 September 2024
Young scholars will have the chance to present their scientific theses (Master thesis, PhD) in progress in German or English language. Since the general idea of the workshop is not to present finished works, young scholars are explicitly invited to contribute their projects in an early stage of conception or implementation.
Deadline for proposals: 15 May 2024. Information: contact Dr. Tobias Zumbrägel (tobias.zumbraegel@uni-heidelberg.de)
3. Conference “The Social Sciences and Humanities in Iran: Possibilities and Constraints”, Iranian Studies Unit of the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies, Doha, Qatar, 9-10 October 2024
The conference will reflect on the state of social sciences and humanities in theory, methodology, and practice, and will examine how they are taught and researched in Iran. In addition to looking at some of the key institutions that have shaped social sciences and humanities research in Iran, the conference will examine the impact of the Islamic Republic’s establishment and its policies on research and teaching.
Deadline for abstracts: 17 April 2024. Information:
https://www.dohainstitute.org/en/Events/iranian-studies-unit-2024-conference-/Pages/index.aspx
4. International Conference “A Decolonial Mediterranean? Disparities, Imaginations, Power Relations“, Merian Center for Advanced Studies in the Maghreb (MECAM), Tunis, 4-6 November 2024
The conference aims at critically investigating the legacies of European colonialism in the subsequent states around this maritime space and at addressing different or complementary representations of the Mediterranean within the Maghreb or other regions of the world, such as the interconnections between “White”, “Red” and “Black” Sea, put forward by intellectuals and politicians of the Ottoman Empire or other spatial imaginations, historical legacies, ideas and practices.
Deadline for abstracts: 30 April 2024.
Information: https://application.trafo-berlin.de/procedure/6c6c7876-9bf8-4349-8b45-1504b5a4b033
5. Workshop “State Islam and Authoritarian Rule: Comparing Control Over Religious Institutions in Muslim-majority States”, Lancaster University, 11 December 2024
Contributions should discuss the role of state Islam in a Muslim-majority state or states within a particular region, including the Middle East and North Africa, sub-Saharan Africa, Central or South Asia, or East Asia. What is the extent and form of state control over religious institutions? In what ways have these controls been shaped by historical state-religion relations? Why do states intervene in the religious sector? To deny space for Islamist opponents to operate? To combat the threat of religious extremism?
Deadline for abstracts: 31 May 2024.
Information: https://www.sepad.org.uk/announcement/call-for-papers-state-islam-and-authoritarian-rule
6. University Assistant (PhD Position), Department of Islamic Theology and Religious Education, University of Innsbruck
In this position you are expected to write a dissertation in a stimulating environment using the university’s infrastructure. You will hold your own lectures, tutor students and participate in administration. 50% of the working time is reserved for the thesis
Deadline for applications: 1 April 2024.
Information: https://lfuonline.uibk.ac.at/public/karriereportal.details?asg_id_in=14072
7. Postdoctoral Researcher (12 Months), Institute of Asian and Oriental Studies / Gender Studies and Islamic Studies, University of Zurich
This is a position in the research project “Fragmented Sovereignties in the Colonial Age: ʿAbd al-Qādir al-Jazāʾirī (1808-1883) and the Making of an ‘Arab Hero'” funded by the Swiss National Science Foundation. Your profile: PhD in Middle Eastern Studies/Islamic Studies or a related field; relevant research expertise in the area; proficiency in both Arabic and French is essential; knowledge of Ottoman Turkish is desirable.
Deadline for applications: 31 March 2024. Information:
https://jobs.uzh.ch/offene-stellen/postdoctoral-researcher/3403c21c-9fb1-4a40-a70a-8eb202065f28
8. Postdoctoral Fellowships of the Marie S. Curie Actions (MSCA), Ghent University
The European Fellowships provide postdocs with a budget to work for one or two years at a European institution in a different country from where they have been working and residing in the past years. With a Global Fellowship, postdocs can go to an institution outside of the EU Member States or Associated Countries for 1 to 2 years, and then come back to a European institution for the final year of the fellowship.
Deadline for applications: 11 September 2024.
Information: https://bozi.ugent.be/nl/bozi/c83B4eMbBdJ53L2tNRm3WJ
9. ERC Postdoctoral Researcher for the “Invisible East Research Programme”, University of Oxford
You will be responsible for carrying out research on medieval writing in the Islamicate East and its connections with the history of language. You will contribute to building an online digital corpus of documents written in Persian, Arabic, Bactrian, Pahlavi, Hebrew and other languages of the medieval Islamicate East. You will have expertise in a language of the Islamicate world, and knowledge of the history and civilisations of Islamicate world.
Deadline for applications: 2 April 2024.
Information: https://my.corehr.com/pls/uoxrecruit/erq_jobspec_version_4.display_form
10. Project Manager in Conflict Transformation in Erbil, Iraq, forumZFD
You will support local communities and contribute to non-violent conflict transformation. Your profile: University degree in social/political sciences, law, peace and conflict studies or other relevant discipline. – Minimum of 5-years professional experience in conflict transformation and peacebuilding in a conflict or post conflict setting. – Experience as Civil Peace Service Expert and regional knowledge of the Iraqi context is an asset.
Deadline for applications: 31 March 2024.
Information: https://www.forumzfd.de/en/job/project-manager-mfd-erbil-iraq-3
11. ONLINE Intensive Course “The Tenth Yemen Exchange”, Sana`a Center and The Exchange Foundation, 22 April – 3 May 2024
The course is designed to provide unique access to information, perspectives, updates, and analysis on Yemen for those seeking to develop a working background on the country as well as those already thoroughly versed in its dynamics.
Deadline for application: 31 March 2024.
Information: https://sanaacenter.org/event/the-tenth-yemen-exchange
12. Summer School for “Current Issues in Middle East Politics”, Bodrum Institute, Bodrum/Turkey, 2-7 June 2024
The program will focus on the Middle Eastern regional order, regional conflicts, alliances, wars, and peace-making as well as the state-society dynamics. The course will cover the Arab world, Iran, and Israel.
Deadline for applications: 15 April 2024. Information: http://www.bodruminstitute.com/index.php/educations/126-current-issues-in-middle-east-politics
13. Grant of the British Yemeni Society for Academic Study Related to Yemen (up to £1,000)
Applications are invited from anyone carrying out research in, or on Yemen, at a university, preferably one that is based in Britain or Yemen. Applicant’s nationality is irrelevant. Applications may be made to assist with study in any subject or field, so long as it is concerned with Yemen, and is for a specific qualification (e.g., BA, MA, PhD etc.).
Deadline for applications: 31 May 2024. Information: https://britishyemenisociety.org.uk/what-we-do/
14. Articles for “Keshif: E-Journal for Ottoman-Turkish Micro Editions”
Ottoman Studies is a manuscript science, and all scholars who work on manuscripts know this situation: one “discovers” accidentally short texts in manuscripts–single poems, letters, contracts, and marginal notes of different, often private matters. Our vision for Keshif is to provide a forum for researchers to make these frag-ments accessible to a wider audience, i.e. to bring together the many pieces of the mosaic, such that complete pictures gradually emerge.
Deadline for contributions: 5 June 2024. Information: https://journals.univie.ac.at/index.php/keshif/index
15. Arabic Lectureship, UC Santa Barbara
The Department of Religious Studies at the University of California, Santa Barbara invites applications for a lecturer position in Modern Standard Arabic beginning in the 2024-2025 academic year.
Responsibilities consist of teaching both first-year Arabic (Introductory Arabic) and second-year Arabic (Intermediate Arabic). The total teaching load is six courses over the three quarters of the academic year. A reasonable estimated full-time rate for this position is $66,259-$72,404. Position percent time is 67%. The anticipated start date for this Appointment begins July 1, 2024.
This lecturer position will complement core faculty in Islamic Studies (Religious Studies), Middle Eastern history, Global Studies, Comparative Literature, Middle Eastern Ethnomusicology, and other disciplines. In addition to its strong graduate program in Islamic Studies, the department of Religious Studies administers an undergraduate B.A. degree in Middle East Studies. UCSB is also home to a vibrant Center for Middle East Studies (www.cmes.ucsb.edu).
The department is especially interested in candidates who contribute to the diversity and excellence of the academic community through research, teaching, and service. UCSB has recently been designated a Hispanic serving institution under the U.S. Department of Education’s guidelines (where total Hispanic enrollment constitutes a minimum of 25% of total enrollment).
Applicants should submit: (1) cover letter; (2) curriculum vitae; (3) statement of teaching pedagogy; (4) summary of teaching experience; (5) summary of teaching evaluations; and (6) arrange to have three letters of recommendation submitted through UC Recruit at https://recruit.ap.ucsb.edu. Inquiries may be addressed to the department’s Academic Personnel Coordinator, Kasey Odell, at kodell@hfa.ucsb.edu.
16. Breathtaking Revelations:
The Science of Breath from The Fifty Kamarupa Versesto Hazrat Inayat Khan
by Carl W. Ernst & Patrick J. D’Silva
This contains translation of a 14th-century Persian text on the power of breath and yogic practices, The Fifty Kamarupa Verses, plus an English text on the same topic written by Hazrat Inayat Khan and edited by Patrick J. D’Silva.
The book is available from Suluk Press at https://sulukpress.com/books/breathtaking-revelations/
There will be an author chat about the book on Saturday, April 27 at 3-4:15pm EST at Breathtaking Revelations Author Chat Tickets, Sat, Apr 27, 2024 at 3:00 PM | Eventbrite
17. Course name: Arabic Manuscripts Codicology and Philology
Course venue: Library of the Academy of Science, Lisbon, Portugal
Course dates: 08 – 11 July 2024
Course details: https://www.aku.edu/ismc/events/pages/event-detail.aspx?EventID=2533&Title=Arabic%20Manuscripts%20Codicology%20and%20Philology
18. Where did Homo sapiens go after leaving Africa? New study has an answer
19. Hybrid event – Edinburgh’s Alwaleed Centre is delighted to be hosting Dr Shabana Mir (American Islamic College, Chicago) for a special hybrid seminar this coming Thursday 28 at 4pm GMT.
‘Campus Connections and Ruptures: Muslim Students in the United States’ will explore the first ethnographic study of Muslim American college students, asking listeners to reflect on their implications for Muslim belonging, in the United States especially but in Western nations generally.
This event is available to attend in-person at the Alwaleed Centre, University of Edinburgh, or online via Zoom.
For further information and to register for free, click here: www.alwaleed.ed.ac.uk/events/shabana-mir
20. Centre of Islamic Studies Cambridge Events:
Wednesday 27 March
Afterlives of Urban Muslim Asia
Paul Anderson with Professor Magnus Marsden & Dr Vera Skvirskaja
2:00 – 3:30 – Faculty of Asian & Middle Eastern Studies
Booking email address: cis@cis.cam.ac.uk
All talks are free and open to all.
21. Armenian School of Languages and Cultures – ASPIRANTUM is organizing the seventh 16-week Persian language semester program in Yerevan, Armenia. The 16-week semester program of Persian language will start on August 18, 2024, and will last till December 6, 2024 (111 days, 300 hours of Persian language instruction).
For more details and to apply, please visit https://aspirantum.com/courses/study-persian-language-semester-abroad
During the Persian language summer classes, the following components will be covered every day to foster the Persian language knowledge of participants:
Grammar: Every day class will cover the main grammatical concepts of the modern Persian language as well as parallels with classical Persian.
Vocabulary: During the 16-week course, it is anticipated that the participants will learn more than 3000 new Persian words from literary language and words used in everyday life.
Listening: The classes are scheduled so that participants, with the guidance of an experienced instructor, learn the Persian language through songs and movies, watching and listening to news and other short videos about interesting and sometimes funny topics and stories about Iranian realities.
Speaking: Every day, the Persian language classes will push the students to exercise their speaking abilities through discussions, conversations, and role-plays about different texts and topics.
Writing: Each day, the participants of the Persian language class will have assignments and homework to complete for the next day, and the homework will primarily involve writing assignments.
Reading: Every day, students will read and discuss political texts, prose and poetry, conversations, and news. The corpus of texts to be read and discussed during the classes comprises different prominent Persian authors, daily conversations, and news of the day.
You can check the video testimonials of our previous students here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OQXUOf6S4Po
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vfQMbcNJrvY
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F0BG9AJb-XU
During our summer school, we have planned exciting trips to some of Armenia’s most renowned cultural heritage sites. These include the Quba Mere Diwane Yezidi Temple, the Garni Pagan Temple, the Geghard Monastery, the Mausoleum of Kara Koyunlu Emirs, the Amberd Fortress, and the picturesque Lake Sevan. We will also visit Martuni, Ayrivank on Lake Sevan, Ejmiatsin, Tsaghkadzor, Bjni, Khor Virap, Noravank, and more.
These tours offer students a unique opportunity to immerse themselves in local culture. They will have the chance to milk and shear a sheep, savor cheese under a shepherd’s tent, and sample the finest Armenian cuisine in traditional restaurants. Additionally, they can enjoy a refreshing swim in Sevan Lake, which is 1900 meters above sea level, and Kari Lake, which is at an elevation of 3185 meters.
To get a glimpse of what these tours entail, you can watch a recap of our previous excursions here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R3PmyCWDsvg and here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4R4JlteBOxw
Participation fee:
The participation fee is 12,900 USD for the 16 weeks of the Persian Language course.
Discount: The participation fee will be 10,900 USD if you apply before April 25, 2024, and pay by April 30, 2024.
For more details and to apply, please visit https://aspirantum.com/courses/study-persian-language-semester-abroad
22. Uyghur Women Activists in the Diaspora
Restorying a Genocide
Susan J. Palmer, Dilmurat Mahmut and Abdulmuqtedir Udun
Bloomsbury, 2024
https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/uyghur-women-activists-in-the-diaspora-9781350418332/
- March 26, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.Le CeRMI a le plaisir de vous convier à laprochaine séancedu séminaire “Sociétés, politiques et cultures du monde iranien”, qui se tiendra le jeudi 04 avril 2024, 17h-19h, en salle 3.15 à l’INaLCO (65 rue des Grands Moulins, Paris XIII, 3e étage
Nous sommes heureux d’accueillir Mme Camille Rhoné-Quer, Maîtresse de conférences à l’Université d’Aix-Marseille en délégation au CeRMI, pour une conférence intitulée : « Histoire environnementale du monde turco-iranien médiéval : état des lieux, perspectives et étude de cas (bassin versant de l’Amou Darya) ».
Résumé
L’histoire environnementale, qui analyse les rapports des sociétés à l’environnement, est née aux États-Unis dans les années 1970 et connaît un important renouveau depuis les années 2000. Toutefois, cette approche a encore été peu adoptée par les historiens des espaces turco-iraniens médiévaux. Les facteurs de ce « retard », multiples, incluent notamment la persistance d’un cloisonnement disciplinaire et épistémologique. Or, depuis quelques années, l’essor des études sur le paléoenvironnement de l’Iran oriental et de l’Asie centrale (archéobotanique, archéozoologie, etc.) permet de renouveler nos connaissances et de pallier en partie les lacunes des textes.
Lors de cette conférence, seront abordés les apports des études paléoenvironnementales des vingt dernières années sur les espaces turco-iraniens (thématiques et zones étudiées ; disciplines impliquées), ainsi qu’une réflexion sur la place qu’occupe l’époque islamique médiévale dans ces travaux, souvent consacrés à la longue durée. Nous nous intéresserons aussi aux limites scientifiques et épistémologiques de ce champ.
Enfin, après avoir abordé rapidement, en guise d’exemple, le débat historiographique sur les facteurs des migrations turkmènes et des conquêtes seldjoukides, nous proposerons une étude de cas sur l’Amou Darya : quels rapports les sociétés des premiers siècles de l’Islam entretiennent-elles avec ce fleuve ? De quel type de données (sources textuelles, archives « naturelles ») dispose-t-on pour proposer une histoire environnementale de l’Amou Darya ?
Orientations bibliographiques
- Arezou AZAD.“The Ecology and Economy of Khurasan in the 7th-8th Century,” dans A. Marsham (ed.). The Umayyad World. Londres: Routledge, 2020, p. 332-354.
- Guillaume BLANC, Élise DEMEULENAERE, Wolf FEUERHAHN (dir.). Humanités environnementales. Enquêtes et contre-enquêtes. Paris: Éditions de la Sorbonne, Série histoire environnementale, 2017.
- Richard BULLIET. Cotton, Climate, and Camels in Early Islamic Iran: A Moment in World History. New York: Columbia University Press, 2009.
- Basira MIR-MAKHAMAD, Sirojidin MIRZAAKHMEDOV, Husniddin RAHMONOV, Sören STARK, Andrey OMEL’CHENKO, Robert N. SPENGLER III.“Qarakhanids on the Edge of the Bukhara Oasis: Archaeobotany of Medieval Paykend,” Economic Botany, 75, 2021, p. 195-214.
- Jürgen PAUL.“Nomads and Bukhara. A Study in Nomad Migrations, Pasture, and Climate Change (11th century CE),” Der Islam, 2016, 93 (2), p. 495-531.
- PORTERO, A. FUSARO, R. PIQUÉ, J. M. GURT, M. ELORZA, S. GABRIEL, & S. R. PIDAEV.“The Environment in the Islamic City of Termez (Uzbekistan): Zooarchaeology and Anthracology of a 9th-century tannur,” Journal of Islamic Archaeology, 8 (1), 2021, p. 1-21.
- Liang Emlyn YANG, Hans-Rudolf BORK et alii(eds.). Socio-Environmental Dynamics along the Historical Silk Road. Cham: Springer, 2019.
Pour rappel, vous retrouverez le programme 2023-2024 du séminaire mensuel de recherche “Sociétés, politiques et cultures du monde iranien” sur le site du CeRMI :
2. Call for Papers: Graduate Interdisciplinary Conference, 27th and 28th June 2024
Deadline for proposals: 30th April 2024
University of Cambridge (In Person)
Seeing, whether through the lens of perception or representation, plays a pivotal role in shaping our understanding of the world and of those who inhabit it. Within this web of visual perception, knowledge construction, and power dynamics, we take ‘Muslimness’ as a focal point at which various modes of seeing converge, intersect, and often clash. This inquiry encompasses a study of ‘Muslimness’ as expressed in literature, film, culture, architecture, food, animal studies, fashion, and more broadly, as ‘presence’ in physical digital and spectral forms. The act of seeing goes beyond mere observation; it influences our perception, understanding, and further representation of Muslimness. These modes of seeing, whether they be oppressive, digital, communal, individual, self-perpetuating, or self-fulfilling, create discursive notions of authenticity, representation, and self-fashioning within Muslim communities. We seek to explore the multifaceted dimensions of seeing, presenting, and representing Muslimness and its profound impact on being. Building on scholarship that considers Muslimness as a plural and heterogenous social category, we aim to query what epistemological hierarchies determine how Muslimness is seen, shown and performed. What are the affective responses to Muslimness, and how do they manifest? In other words, what does Muslimness do, and what does seeing Muslimness do.
We invite scholars, researchers, and practitioners from across disciplines and genres to unpack these complex ways of seeing Muslimness and question its forms, formations and transformations. We welcome interdisciplinary perspectives from scholars engaged in fields such as cultural studies, sociology, anthropology, media & film studies, digital humanities, literature, and architecture. Potential paper topics include but are not limited to:
- Gaze, surveillance, and stereotyping
- Ideas of ‘Muslimness’ in animals, the supernatural, and the extra-human
- Digital/Physical Visual symbols in local, vernacular and global contexts
- Built and Digital Infrastructures
- Muslimness in Everyday Life: personal and communal experiences.
- Cross-border and cross-cultural Muslimness: Diasporic and migrational perspectives
- Politics of unseeing, exclusion, and erasure
- Politics of secularization
- Violence (material and non-material)
- Digital Activism
- The Spectacle and the Narrative in art, media and popular culture
- Muslimness in/as Environmentalism
- Humanist and Posthumanist Perspectives
Please submit an abstract, not exceeding 300 words, along with a brief biography.
Deadline for submissions: 30 April 2024
Notification for final acceptance: May 15 2024
Please note that this is an in-person conference. Participants will be required to be present in Cambridge on the date of the conference. We would not be able to provide travel or accommodation bursaries for the participants.
Please direct all queries to seeing.muslimness@gmail.com
For more info, please visit: https://www.crassh.cam.ac.uk/events/41566/#description
3. IJIA OPEN FORUM ON GETTING PUBLISHED
Wednesday, March 27, 2024 (Noon–1:00PM US Eastern Time)
The International Journal of Islamic Architecture (IJIA) invites readers and potential authors – researchers, graduate students, university faculty, and professionals in architecture and related fields (including art history, urban planning, landscape design, sociology, anthropology, preservation, archaeology, etc.) – to join members of its editorial staff on Wednesday, March 27, 2024, Noon–1:00PM US Eastern Time for an open conversation on research and the publication process. The informal session will provide an opportunity for a discussion, questions, and answers regarding the IJIA publication process, the state of publication in the field, potential avenues for publishing success, and the journal’s perspective on the future of architectural studies in the Islamic world.
Please sign up at this link in order to register for this free event and for access to the Zoom session link.
4. UCLA Pourdavoud Lecture Series with Hilmar Klinkott
Consolidation of Law, Legal Order, and the Question of Constitutionalizing Processes in the Achaemenid Empire
Wednesday, April 17, 2024 at 4:00pm Pacific
Royce Hall 306
Hybrid Zoom Option Available
5. The Arabic Language and Literature department at UAE University is currently advertising a full-time professor position in Classical Arabic. They are seeking a scholar who can teach in Arabic and possess a distinguished profile in Scopus in terms of publications and citations. UAEU provides exceptional benefits, including free accommodation, a tax-free salary, a children’s school allowance, return tickets in the summer, and comprehensive health care coverage. Please feel free to reach out if you require further information.
The deadline is 31/03/2024. Here is the link to apply:
https://jobs.uaeu.ac.ae/Postings/PostingDetails/3996
6. Women Fighters in the Kurdish National Movement Transforming Gender Politics and the PKK
M Topal
Bloomsbury, 2024
7. Islam in North America
H Rashid et al eds.
Bloomsbury, 2024
https://www.bloomsbury.com/uk/islam-in-north-america-9781350385085/
8. MIT Aga Khan Program for Islamic Architecture 2024-2025 POSTDOCTORAL / POST-PROFESSIONAL DEGREE FELLOWSHIPS FOR RESEARCH IN ISLAMIC ART, ARCHITECTURE, URBANISM, DESIGN, AND PRESERVATION
Closing date 11.4.24
https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=67076
9. Call for Applications – Resident Scholar Program for Lebanon-based and Lebanese Scholars
The Finnish Institute in the Middle East in Beirut is excited to announce the call for applications for its Resident Scholar Program for the period of 1 September 2024 to 28 February 2025. The application period is now open, ending on 21 April 2024.
https://www.h-net.org/jobs/job_display.php?id=67073
10. Registration is now open for the conference ‘Arts of the Indian Ocean’.
April 27 (online), May 2 – 4 (in person and online), Toronto, Canada
Registration for one or more days and the full conference program can be found on this link:
https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/dvs/arts-indian-ocean
All presentations will be livestreamed and can be viewed virtually.
Attending the conference virtually is free of charge, but registration is required.
The in-person conference (May 2-4) is free to students, but others will be asked to contribute $50 CAD, which covers refreshments and receptions
We look forward to seeing you online or would love to welcome you in Toronto!
Conveners:
Ruba Kana’an
Zulfikar Hirji
Sarah Fee
Sanniah Jabeen
Arts of the Indian Ocean brings together knowledge producers working on the Indian Ocean’s arts from diverse backgrounds and scholarly arenas to present and discuss research and work on the materialities and artistic expressions in the Indian Ocean world, across geographies — from eastern and southern Africa, through the Gulf and Red Sea to South and Southeast Asia and the south China Sea — as well as across temporalities — from antiquity up until the present-day. Through the examination of the creation, production, and circulation of material culture in a wide range of forms including the visual arts, portable objects, manuscripts and maps, ships and navigational instruments, landscape, architecture, and the built environment, textiles and dress, photography and film, as well as the digital and plastic arts, the conference seeks to: provide a platform for scholars and artists to exchange current research; map the field of Indian Ocean arts; and open up new questions on Indian Ocean pasts, presents, and futures.
Contact Information
Sarah Fee, Sr. Curator, Royal Ontario Museum
Contact Email
URL
https://www.utm.utoronto.ca/dvs/arts-indian-ocean
11. Please join the National Museum of Asian Art online on Tuesday, March 26, 12 pm EST for Partying Like It’s 599: On Feasting in Iranshahr with Touraj Daryaee, University of California, Irvine.
Multiple sources, both textual and pictorial, document banquets and feasting in late antique Iran. At the court and among the local notables of Iranshahr (Empire of the Iranians), the banquet, which in Persian is called bazm, created solidarity among the elites and imposed itself culturally among the populace. But to eat at the table of the ruler also symbolized one’s status in an empire that stretched from Balkh to the Euphrates and from the Caucasus to Arabia. The sharing of food with the king at his table meant one was held in the highest esteem and implied the distribution of the king’s glory, power, and beneficence to those seated with him. In this program, professor Touraj Daryaee will discuss the forms and ways of feasting that took place at the court of the king of kings, which reached its zenith in the sixth century CE.
Touraj Daryaee is the Maseeh Chair in Persian Studies & Culture and the director of the Dr. Samuel M. Jordan Center for Persian Studies & Culture at the University of California, Irvine. His work revolves around the history of the Sasanian Empire and the Iranian world. He is the author of Sasanian Persia: The Rise and Fall of an Empire (I.B. Tauris, 2009) and is the editor in chief of the E.J. Brill Ancient Iran Series. He is also the editor of Sasanian Studies (Harrassowitz, 2022) as well as Dabir, an online journal at UC Irvine.
Register here
View the event listing here
Contact Information
Lizzie Stein, Scholarly Programs and Publications Specialist
National Museum of Asian Art
Contact Email
URL
https://asia.si.edu/whats-on/events/search/event:173394391/
12. The Dunhuang Foundation (https://dunhuangfoundation.us/) announces our first in-person event for 2024. Dr. David Roxburgh, the Prince Alwaleed Bin Talal Professor of Islamic Art History at Harvard University, will be presenting his lecture, “Herat, the Pearl of Khurasan: Urban and Cultural Transformation under Shahrukh (r. 1409-1447)”.
The lecture will be held at the Lynn Wyatt Theater at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston, on Wednesday, April 10th from 6:00 – 7:00 PM. The lecture is free, but does require registration. Please visit: https://bit.ly/RoxburghLecture.
Abstract
“Herat, the Pearl of Khurasan: Urban and Cultural Transformation under Shahrukh (r. 1409-1447)”
Following Timur’s death in 1405, his son and successor Shahrukh (r. 1409-1447) established Herat as the capital and embarked on a program of redevelopment. Joined by other patrons of the Timurid elite, especially his son Baysunghur, Shahrukh created optimal conditions for cultural production in the arts. His rule also witnessed a resurgence in contacts with east Asia under Ming dynasty emperor Yongle (r. 1402-1424), exchanges that brought a new wave of contemporary objects from China to the “western lands.” Focusing on selected elements of the city and its life in the 1420s and 1430s, the lecture explores the dynamics and outcomes of a cultural achievement which secured Herat’s importance as an artistic center for centuries.
Contact Information
Rachel Parikh, Deputy Director
Contact Email
URL
https://bit.ly/RoxburghLecture
13. UCLA Iranian Studies Program:
And, Towards Happy Alleys
A Film Screening
Wednesday, April 3, 2024 at 4:00pm Pacific Time | Royce Hall 314
https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/iranian-studies-and-towards-happy-alleys-film-screening/
- March 23, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.Conference “Muslims in Britain, 1800‒1970, and Beyond: Historical Approaches & Why”,
Muslims in Britain Research Network (MBRN), University of Westminster, 17-18 June 2024
Topics: • Intersectionality in historical Muslim identity in Britain • Post- and de-colonial approaches within
history • Contemporary impact of historical British Muslims • Experiences of racism in early British Muslims •
Histories of Muslim Institutions • Contestations in ‘British Muslim’ identity • Socio-political activism to date •
Significant ‘British Muslim’ public figures • Recent publications on the history of Islam and Muslims in Britain.
Deadline for abstracts: 11 May 2024. Information: https://www.everydaymuslim.org/events/conference-muslims-in-britain-1800%E2%80%921970-and-beyond-historical-approaches-why/
2. Panels for the Session 13 “Politics, Religion and Conflicts” at the Conference of the Società Italiana di Scienza Politica (SISP), Triest, 12-14 September 2024
Topics: Public role of religions – Use of religious symbols/discourses in politics – Religion, politics and marketing – Religion and populism – Religion and (social) media – Religion and gender – Religious pluralism – Religion, rights and freedoms – Religion and education – Transnational religious movements – Religion and international politics – Religious mobilization and authority between war and peace – Religious extremism, radicalization and de-radicalization.
Deadline for panels: 5 April 2024. Information: https://www.sisp.it/en/conference2024/sezioni_upd
3. Annual Conference of the DGFG-Working Group Geographies of Religion: “Religion and Space in the Digital Age”, University of Jena, 21-22 November 2024
Topics: Changing relationships between space, society, religion, and digitality. – Case studies on various forms of religious socialization. – Digitalization, digital media, digital religion, e-religiosity, and the media turn in the context of religious studies and religious geography research. – Societal contexts of digitalization movements in the religious field. – Specific forms of digitality. – Places of religion in the digital realm. – Etc.
Deadline for abstracts: 31 May 2024.
Information: https://vgdh.de/wp-content/uploads/2024/02/AKReligionsgeographie-2024-Jena-Call-eng.pdf
4. “2024 Suad Joseph Student Paper Award” of the “Association of Middle East Anthropology (AMEA)”
Eligibility: A graduate student at any stage in an MA or PhD program. Paper components: 15-35 pages long.
– Anthropological focus.- Regional focus on the Middle East and/or North Africa and/or diasporic communities. – Excellent standards of writing, argumentation, evidence, and ethnographic representation. – Significant contribution to knowledge production.
Deadline for paper: 1 September 2024.
Information: https://mideastanthro.com/suad-joseph-student-paper-award-2/
5. Articles for Journal “Forum Islamic-Theological Studies”
Papers in English and German are invited in the following areas:- Qur’anic Studies and Qur’anic Exegesis (tafsīr) – Hadith Studies – Sufism – Islamic Legal Theory and Hermeneutics (fiqh) – Islamic Ethics – Islamic Philosophy – Systematic-Discursive Theology (kalām) – Islamic Religious Education – Sociology of Religion on Muslims in Europe or the West – Contributions on current discourses on Islam and Muslims in Europe – Islam and Pluralism, Islam in Europe – etc.
Deadline for abstracts: 1 October 2024. Information: https://ojs.nomos-journals.de/index.php/fits/CfP
6. CFP: The map as the “eye of history” (16th-18th centuries)
The map as the “eye of history” (16th-18th centuries)
The idea of geography being the “eye of history” is a common expression in the early modern period, but it is articulated in a specific way if we take the cartographic object as the point of observation. The aim of this study day is to reinvestigate the relationship between maps and history in the chronological span from the 16th to the 18th century, in Europe and its imperial extensions, from three angles: the analysis of the place of maps in the teaching and reading of history, an investigation into history on and through maps, and a reflection on the porosity between the producers of historical and cartographic knowledge.
Terms and conditions of submission
Proposals in English or French, no more than 300 words long and accompanied by a brief curriculum vitae, should be sent to oeildelhistoire2024@gmail.com by May 15, 2024.
Organisational arrangements
With the support of the Centre Alexandre-Koyré (CAK) and the Bibliothèque nationale de France (BnF), the study day will take place on Tuesday 8 October 2024 in the conference room of the Maps and Plans Department of the BnF on the Richelieu site (Paris).
The organisers will cover meals, travel expenses and, where possible, overnight accommodation. The study day will take place exclusively on site.
Organisers
Oury Goldman, doctor from EHESS and associate researcher at TEMOS
Lucile Haguet, doctor and curator at Le Havre municipal library
Catherine Hofmann, Curator, Maps and Plans Department, BnF (French National Library)
Geoffrey Phelippot, doctor from EHESS and member of CAK
7. AKU-ISMC: 13 Dec 2023 Virtual Open Day
Join AKU-ISMC students, staff and academics online for a Virtual Open Day on Wednesday 17 April 2024 3 December at 12:00 -13:00 (London Time) to learn about our MA in Muslim Cultures, find out about admissions, quiz current students on academic life, and have the opportunity to ask your own questions.
https://www.eventbrite.co.uk/e/aku-ismc-virtual-open-day-tickets-863008119517?aff=oddtdtcreator
The Aga Khan University Institute’s for the Study of Muslim Civilisations
Handyside Street
London, | N1C 4DN United Kingdom
8. Middle Eastern SciFi Translation Contest
The Center for Middle Eastern Studies at the University of Texas at Austin is holding a Middle Eastern Science Fiction translation contest open to all translators of languages from the MENA region.
The winner will receive $1000 and the winning translation will be published in the fall issue of Y’alla: A Texan Journal of Middle Eastern Literature.
The deadline is July 1st, 2024.
More at:
https://sites.utexas.edu/yalla/?page_id=32
9. Persian Composer Ahmad Pejman Honored at UCLA (Video)
- March 19, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1. Approaching Architecture in the Muslim World: Novel Paths of Investigationsquestions the historiography of the field of ‘Islamic Architecture’ by scoring particular instances that fractured its foundations or methods that shaped its objects of study. Collectively, the contributions in this issue address the topic from theoretical concerns as well specific case studies andaddress three moments of rupture in the architecture of the Muslim world: ‘visuality’, ‘typology’, ‘displacement’. The aim of this issue, then, is to open new horizons for rethinking ‘Islamic’ architecture and suggest novel interrogative paths in order to challenge the canonical frameworks, which have dominated our approaches in discussing architecture in the lands of Islam, namely ‘typology’, ‘regionalism,’ ‘master narratives,’ and ‘patronage’.
See: https://brill.com/view/journals/mcmw/4/2/article-p279_8.xml
2. The Berlin-based Forum Transregionale Studien invites researchers to apply for up to 4 postdoctoral fellowships for the academic year 2024/2025 for the research program EUROPE IN THE MIDDLE EAST—THE MIDDLE EAST IN EUROPE (EUME).
Location: Berlin / Closing Date: 8 April 2024, 12.00h (noon) CEST
Also see:
The Berlin-based Forum Transregionale Studien invites researchers to apply for up to 4 postdoctoral fellowships for the academic year 2024/2025 for the research program EUROPE IN THE MIDDLE EAST—THE MIDDLE EAST IN EUROPE (EUME).
Location: Berlin / Closing Date: 8 April 2024, 12.00h (noon) CEST
Also see:
https://application.trafo-berlin.de/procedure/758011e1-f349-4f6a-bf79-ae9d9dee2e69
3. Mosque: Approaches to Art and Architecture,
Idries Trevathan, ed..
Routledge, 2024
4. The Sharafnāma as a Case Study in the Ecolinguistics of Kurdistan
Wednesday, March 20th, at 2 p.m. Eastern the third event in our Spring Speaker Series. (Note: Please check the time difference as daylight savings time started once again in the US.)
The event will take place on Zoom. It will be free and open to the public.
During this event, Sacha Alsancakli will present, “The Sharafnāma as a Case Study in the Ecolinguistics of Kurdistan.” Sacha is a cultural historian of the Islamic world, whose work focuses on historiography and the history of the book. His presentation will delve into the Sharafnāma, which is regarded as an important text on Kurdish history. He will examine its author’s discourse on the Kurdish language and the ecolinguistics of the multilingual land of Kurdistan.
Speaker Series: The Sharafnāma as a Case Study in the Ecolinguistics of Kurdistan
When: 2:00 pm Eastern, Wednesday, March 20th
Where: https://zoom.us/j/92784270041?pwd=MFhBUmtkMVR1OGN0V2JtQTZycGwwQT09
For more information on Zahra Institute and our upcoming events, visit our website: https://www.zahrainstitute.org/.
5. The Fulbright U.S. Scholar Program offers over 400 unique awards for U.S. citizens to teach, research, and conduct professional projects in more than 130 countries. Explore awards available in the 2025-26 competition.You can join the more than 400,000 Fulbrighters who have come away with enhanced skills, new connections and greater mutual understanding.
We encourage you to visit our website for application resources:
– Getting Started
– Application Guidance
– Open Awards in the 2025-26 Competition, searchable by discipline, country/region, etc.
– Webinar Schedule and Archive
– Office Hours, a great way to get your questions answered live by Fulbright staff
We look forward to receiving your application by our deadline of September 16, 2024. To receive program updates and application resources, connect with Fulbright.
6. CALL FOR SUBMISSIONS
‘Securitizing the Sacred: Pilgrims’ Trails across Digital Landscapes’
(University of Toronto, August 22-24th, 2024)
We invite abstracts for a three-day International Symposium on the state of pilgrimage (incorporating religious tourism) in the context of global security. The event will bring together specialists in different areas of pilgrimage, including academics, tourism providers and operators, local authorities and infrastructure administrators, religious communities, civil liberties organizations, art specialists and artists, and social media influencers. Our aim is to enable different stakeholders to collaborate in considering issues of digitality, security, datafication and mobility that form increasingly significant dimensions of the underlying socio-technical infrastructures of religious journeying.
THE THEMES OF THE SYMPOSIUM
Over the past two decades, physical travel has increasingly been aided by digital technologies. Some of the questions that drive our inquiry include: Who is responsible for gathering data on pilgrims, and how is such data used? What policies exist regarding types of information and knowledge that can be gathered from pilgrims? What aspects of pilgrims’ data can be deemed sensitive and in need of protection? Are there cross-cultural differences in data collection and practices over how pilgrims’ data is used? What are the implications for pilgrims regarding conditions or situations that may render them ineligible for or excluded from pilgrimage, and who gets to decide?
Behind such empirical questions are powerful concerns relating to data justice that we wish to explore: How might we determine whether there is sufficient transparency about where data is stored and processed, and by whom? What criteria should we use to decide these questions over justice, identity, and mobility? We also invite papers on broader conceptual and theoretical questions concerning the intersections of pilgrimage, mobility, and security.
SUBMISSIONS
In addition to our keynote speakers, we also seek submissions in the following categories:
- Papers (includes completed research papers and research-in-progress papers)
- Posters (need not be in English)
- Sessions (one or two hours) for Interactive Engagement (including hands-on workshops developed around case studies, panels with a range of stakeholders, scenarios, etc.)
- Alternative formats (we have an exhibit space for photographs, films, material objects that speak to the theme, and artefacts exemplifying data trails, etc.)
We invite abstracts from scholars and practitioners working on different religious traditions and disciplinary perspectives. We also encourage community engagement projects, and practical applications of theory. We welcome submissions from outside of Canada.
Examples of topics include:
- Pilgrims’ online activities including information gathering prior to the journey, or using web-based booking systems
- The role of social media in maintaining contacts and networks during and after the pilgrimage
- Pilgrims as producers of data that may be circulated and accessed through digital trails
- Travelers’ risks of exposure to multiple forms of bio- and market-related surveillance and associated data mining
- Roles played by political and commercial organizations who are increasingly significant gatherers of information from and about pilgrims
- Examples of assemblages of systems including booking systems, apps, CCTV, biometrics, Geographic Information Systems (GIS), ID cards, and other monitoring mechanisms
- Security measures, security infrastructure in sacred places and in pilgrim destinations
Submissions will be accepted through April 20, 2024 by 11:59pm EST. All submissions will be refereed and must be in English (even if for a poster). They must include the author’s name and position; full affiliation including email and telephone; a brief bio; presentation title, up to five keywords, and an abstract of no more than 500 words for individual submissions and no more than 1000 words for panels/sessions. Email your submissions to: securitizingthesacred@gmail.com
TIMELINE
- April 20, 2024 (11:59pm EST): Proposal submission deadline (extended abstracts).
- May 15, 2024: Refereeing/peer-review completed; acceptance/rejection decisions.
- August 22-24, 2024: Securitizing the Sacred Symposium, Toronto (Canada).
ORGANIZERS AND SPONSORS
The symposium will be held at the University of Toronto. The local organizers are Dr. Nadia Caidi (nadia.caidi@utoronto.ca) and Dr. Simon Coleman (simon.coleman@utoronto.ca).
For inquiries, email us at securitizingthesacred@gmail.com
7. The School of Law and the Alwaleed Centre for the Study of Islam in the Contemporary World at the University of Edinburgh seek to appoint a Lecturer in Law in the Globalised Muslim World for a September 2024 start.
This three-year fixed term appointment is ideal for scholars seeking to develop their teaching and research profile. The Lecturer will contribute to the development of the Edinburgh Law School and the Alwaleed Centre’s research profiles as well as to their teaching and outreach activities. The Lecturer will undertake programme and course organisation as part of the Edinburgh Law School and Alwaleed Centre’s MSc and Honours programmes. The Lecturer will also take the lead in teaching and dissertation supervision, as well as contribute to other subject areas as appropriate. Ideally the expertise of the successful candidate will enable them to cover key aspects of Islamic/Sharia law and positive law in the contemporary Muslim world.
For further information including how to apply, click here: https://www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DGK877/lecturer-in-law-in-the-globalised-muslim-world.
The closing date for applications is 5 April 2024.
8. The Journal, Iranian Studies, invites proposals for roundtables. Topics in all areas of social sciences are welcome.
Iranian Studies inaugurated the roundtable initiative in issue 2 of 2023, with a roundtable on Writing capitalism in Iran. Since then, three more roundtables have been commissioned: in issue 3 of 2023, we hosted a roundtable on the Woman Life Freedom movement, in issue 2 of 2024 one on minoritized communities in Iran, and one on diaspora politics is forthcoming.
Roundtables typically include 5-7 short pieces, each consisting of approximately 3,000 words, to showcase new research in the field, re-assess well-established interpretative trends by bringing to light new evidences or introducing new approaches, and/or offer focused analyses on important issues in current affairs, whose impact may be long lasting. Our goal is to centre the journal of Iranian Studies in discussions and exchanges between social scientists, introducing new debates and ground-breaking analyses in our journal.
Topics include, but are not limited to, the sociology and history of modern Iran, the Persianate world and their diasporas; social aspects of the arts, religions and literature; Iran’s domestic and international politics, and politics of the Persianate world and their diasporas; transborder and transcultural contamination in the arts, culture, political thought and policies, between the Persianate regions and the world; history and politics of slavery, capitalism, racism, transnational solidarities, civilizational exchanges and contemporary political mobilizations.
Proposals should include a 500-700-word description of the topic and rationale for the roundtable, highlighting its contribution to existing scholarly debates. Proposals may include a list of contributions, each with a title, author, and a 300- word abstract. Roundtables should have one or more editors. Editors will be responsible for leading the publication process and making sure that every contribution conforms to the journal style and is ready for peer review. All roundtable contributions go through an expedited review process, which assesses the quality of each piece and makes a recommendation about its feasibility for publication.
Submissions are accepted on a rolling basis. They are competitively selected on the basis of their quality and innovation.
You can submit your proposal to Dr Paola Rivetti at paola.rivetti@dcu.ie by June, 17, 2024.
9. 3rd Annual Khamseen Graduate Student Presentation Award
Khamseen: Islamic Art History Online offers Topic and Term talks to support teaching, learning, and research in Islamic art, architecture, visual culture, and related fields. Since the website’s launch in Fall 2020, new contributions by scholars in the field have consistently grown our catalogue. In 2022, we successfully launched the first annual Khamseen Graduate Student Presentation Award; Sylvia Wu’s winning contribution on the Ashab Mosque in Quanzhou, South China, can be viewed here. The second iteration followed in 2023, when Namrata Kanchan won the award for her talk on figural obliteration within an early modern South Asian manuscript, available here.
While the PhD is a requirement for general submissions, Khamseen‘s Graduate Student Presentation Award enables advanced PhD students to feature their expertise and contribute to Khamseen.
For the 3rd Annual Khamseen Graduate Student Presentation Award, we invite PhD candidates (ABD) to submit a polished script of ca. 1,500 words and an accompanying PowerPoint slide show for a Topic presentation. The award recipient will work with our team to revise and then record their presentation, and they also will receive a $500 honorarium upon their presentation’s launch on the Khamseen website.
Submission Guidelines:
Applications due: April 15, 2024
Notification of decisions: May 15, 2024
Eligibility:
PhD candidates (ABD) and advanced PhD students in their third year or above (for doctoral programs without candidacy) enrolled in a degree-granting program in Islamic art and allied fields. We do not accept applications from undergraduate and Masters students.
Application Procedures:
Candidates should submit a polished script of ca. 1,500 words and an accompanying PowerPoint slide show for a Topic presentation. Additionally, applications should include a 3-5 sentence summary of the presentation, a 2-page CV, and a note of support from a PhD advisor or dissertation committee member.
Please submit materials to TeamKhamseen@umich.edu; notes of support by advisors and queries by candidates also should be sent to TeamKhamseen@umich.edu.
10. Islamic Studies PhD and MA scholarships, Exeter
The Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies is pleased to announce it MA and PhD scholarships for the academic years 2024. Please do distribute them widely. These are dedicated funded scholarships for Islamic and Middle Eastern Studies students, and the details are as follows:
Al-Qasimi PhD Studentships can be viewed here.
IAIS Masters Excellence Awards
2x Home award here and 2x International here.
Shireen Abu Akleh MA Scholarship in Palestine Studies
1x Home OR International here.
- March 16, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.2 Postdoctoral Fellowships (2 years) for Scholars at Risk at the “Academy in Exile”, TU Dortmund University and Institute for Advanced Studies in the Humanities, Essen, Germany
Eligible are scholars from any country who have a PhD in the humanities, social sciences, or law, and who are at risk because of their academic work and/or civic engagement in human rights, democracy, and the pursuit of academic freedom. Academy in Exile fellowships give scholars the opportunity to continue their careers in Germany and to work on a research project of their own choosing in a multidisciplinary environment.
Application deadline: 15 April 2024. Information:
2. Postdoctoral Research Fellow (3-4 Years) for the Research Project “Beyond Restitution: Heritage, (Dis)Possession and the Politics of Knowledge (BEYONDREST)”, Europe in the Middle East (EUME), Berlin
Requirements: Completed dissertation in anthropology, (art) history, cultural studies, sociology, archaeology or a related field. – Established research focus on critical heritage studies, cultural policy, museum studies, politics of knowledge, material culture, and/or state violence. – Experience with ethnographic research and preferably also with archival research. – Regional expertise regarding the Near and Middle East and/or North
Africa.
Deadline for applications: 15 April 2024. Information: https://www.forum-transregionale-studien.de/en/news/news/details/job-postdoctoral-research-fellow-f-m-d-in-the-project-beyondrest
3. Visiting Assistant Professor (1 Year) for Comparative Politics (Focus Middle East), Department of Politics, Bates College, Lewiston, Maine
Applicants should show a strong commitment to excellence in undergraduate teaching. We strongly encourage applications from individuals with identities that have been historically marginalized in political science, and individuals who have followed non-traditional pathways to higher education due to societal, economic, or academic disadvantages.
Deadline for applications: 1 April 2024. Information: https://apply.interfolio.com/142258
4. 2024 Graduate Student Paper Prize of the “Journal of Middle East Women’s Studies (JMEWS)”
The prize is awarded to a graduate student in any discipline in the humanities or interpretive social sciences to recognize an original work on an aspect of Middle East women’s, gender, and/or sexuality studies. The 2024 prize winner will receive a $500 award and comments to prepare the manuscript for publication as an article in JMEWS.
Deadline for submissions: 31 May 2024. Information:
https://amews.org/2024/02/29/2024-jmews-graduate-student-paper-prize-call-for-submissions/
5. Chapters for Edited Volume on “The Practice of Pilgrimage in a Global Early Modern Context”
We are seeking contributions to a volume exploring pilgrimage in a global context from the mid-fifteenth to the mid-eighteenth century. We are seeking contributors working from the perspective of diverse disciplines (e. art history, history, literature, anthropology), religious traditions (ie. Buddhism, Shintoism, Islam, Judaism, Christianity) and regional contexts.
Deadline for abstracts: 31 March 2024. Information: https://networks.h-net.org/group/announcements/20026219/cfp-new-volume-practice-pilgrimage-global-early-modern-context
6. Articles for “Hamsa: Journal of Judaic and Islamic Studies” (10th Issue)
Hamsa aims to create a multi-disciplinary space in the fields of Jewish and Islamic studies in which all perspectives of Social and Human sciences can converge. Articles are invited which foster a comparative analysis of historiographical, philosophical, anthropological and sociological discourses ranging from medie-vality to contemporaneity.
Deadline for papers: 31 March 2024. Information: https://journals.openedition.org/hamsa/4389
BSOAS
Ruben Nikoghosyan
8. “All the world at the palm of the hand”: imagining history through the life of an early Afghan saint
BSOAS
T Ahmed
9. Philipp Bruckmayr
Islamic Reform as a Family Affair: The Tariq Shah Wali Ullah in Modern Malaysia
Monday Majlis Online on the 18th of March, 17:00-18:30 (UK time)
Centre for the Study of Islam, Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies, Exeter.
Register please on this link:
https://universityofexeter.zoom.us/meeting/register/tJUuce6gpzktHd1X7Yh_4lcbROZVV4U0x7ug
10. UCL Press is delighted to announce the publication of a new open access book that may be of interest to list subscribers: Arabic Dialogues: Phrasebooks and the learning of colloquial Arabic, 1798-1945, by Rachel Mairs.
Download it free: https://bit.ly/3T07Fik
- March 12, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment
Shii News – Academic Items
1.Arabic Literary Culture in Southeast Asia in the Seventeenth and Eighteenth Centuries
A.C.S. Peacock Brill, 2024
2. The Invisible East programme in Oxford is looking for a new Postdoctoral Researcher and for a Programme Co-ordinator to join the team!
We are looking for driven and organised individuals who can help us grow an exciting academic project with direct links to the wider public.
The job descriptions for the two positions can be seen at this link. The deadline to apply is 25 March 2024. We look forward to receiving your application!
3. In-person symposium on Literature and Religion in Modern Iran, sponsored by the Program for the Study of Religion and co-hosted by the UC San Diego Library and Middle East Studies program at UCSD, on March 12th.
Commencing at 2:30 p.m., the symposium kicks off with a compelling keynote address by Professor Nasrin Rahimieh from UC Irvine. Professor Rahimieh’s speech, Fictions of Self in Contemporary Iranian Women’s Writing, promises to offer intriguing insights into the literary landscape of Iran.
The symposium continues with a series of illuminating presentations by esteemed scholars. Dr. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA) will explore the intriguing relationship between mysticism and sexuality in the literary and critical works of Forugh Farrokhzad. Dr. Aria Fani (University of Washington) will present his recent publication, “Reading Across Borders: Afghans, Iranians, and Literary Nationalism,” which offers fresh perspectives on literary nationalism within the region. Additionally, Dr. Farshad Sonboldel (UC San Diego Library) will examine the profound impact of religious poetic forms on the process of literary modernization in Iran. Throughout the event, discussions will be expertly moderated by Dr. Babak Rahimi (UC San Diego).
Registration is not required.
Geisel Meeting Room
University of California San Diego, Geisel Library
9500 Gilman Dr, La Jolla
Contact:
Jen Cormier
4. King’s College London and the University of Kent are jointly offering up to fifteen fully-funded PhD studentships in medieval history, literatures and other disciplines (including up to three studentships for international students, and up to three Master’s Plus studentships available for low-income and/or ethnic minority applicants) through the new £2M Leverhulme doctoral training centre Knowledge Orders before Modernity.
Applicants can submit their own project through an open call, provided it falls broadly within the themes of the project (transmission, selection, production, reproduction and/or technologies of knowledge); or they can apply for particular projects proposed by potential supervisors at King’s and Kent.
For more information and on how to apply: https://www.komldsp.org.uk/about-us/ . The deadline this year will be 8 May 2024.
5. The Center for Research on the Iranian World (CeRMI, UMR8041 CNRS) is pleased to invite you to the XXV Iranian World Day, which will be held on Friday, March 22, 2024 from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. in the Auditorium of the INaLCO Languages and Civilizations Center, 65 rue des Grands-Moulins, 75013 Paris (Reception-café from 9:30 a.m.).
You will find information online on the CeRMI website: https://cermi.cnrs.fr/xxve-journee-monde-iranien/
6. Le CeRMI a le plaisir de vous convier à laprochaine séancedu séminaire “Sociétés, politiques et cultures du monde iranien”, qui se tiendra le jeudi 14 mars 2024, 17h-19h, en salle 3.15 à l’INaLCO (65 rue des Grands Moulins, Paris XIII, 3e étage).
Nous sommes heureux d’accueillir M. Yury Karev, spécialiste de l’histoire politique et sociale de l’Asie Centrale à l’époque pré-mongole et de la culture matérielle, Chargé de recherches au CNRS (UMR 8546 AOROC – CNRS PSL), pour une conférence intitulée: “Les Qarakhanides au Māwarā’annahr: traits identitaires de la dynastie centre-asiatique à travers leur art et les textes de l’époque (fin Xe – début XIIIe s.)“.
7. UCLA – Legacies of Ancient Persia: New Episode Available
https://pourdavoud.ucla.edu/legacies-of-ancient-persia/
https://linktr.ee/legaciesofancientpersia
8. IIS: Applications for the Farhad Daftary Doctoral Scholarship Programme are now open
Closing date: 31 March, 2024
https://www.iis.ac.uk/news/2024/february/iis-doctoral-scholarship-programme-2024/
9. IIS: The Central Asian Studies Unit is pleased to invite you to register in-person to attend “Historical and Contemporary Migrations of Central Asian Muslims: History, Culture and Identity”, which will take place 3-4 April 2024 at Aga Khan Centre (London).
The conference will bring together scholars from various disciplines to discuss and exchange ideas on a wide range of topics related to the historical and contemporary regional and transnational migrations of Central Asian Muslims. There are limited spots available to attend in-person, so register soon.
https://www.iis.ac.uk/events/migrations-of-central-asian-muslims/
10. The Oxford Handbook of Modern Egyptian History
11. Interreligious Interactions in South Asia: Second Colloquium, April 3–12, 2024
We are delighted to announce our second colloquium on “Interreligious Interactions in South Asia,” which will take place over Zoom from April 3 to April 12, 2024. The speakers for our colloquium are as follows:
Afsar Mohammad | Vernacular Sufi Texts and Hindu-Muslim Contexts
April 3, 2024 | 16:00–17:30 BST / 11:00–12:30 EDT / 20:30–22:00 IST
Purnima Dhavan | Resisting Religious Labels in Early Modern Punjab: Why Place Matters
April 4, 2024 | 18:00–19:30 BST / 13:00–14:00 EDT / 22:30–00:00 IST
Abdul Manan Bhat | Postures of Tradition: Corporeality and Islamic Ethics in Modern Urdu & Persian Poetry
April 5, 2024 | 16:00–17:30 BST / 11:00–12:30 EDT / 20:30–22:00 IST
Kashshaf Ghani | Sufism and Religious Interactions from South Asia
April 8, 2024 | 15:00–16:30 BST / 10:00–11:30 EDT / 19:30–21:00 IST
Tilak Parekh | Religious Leadership in Interfaith Interactions
April 9, 2024 | 16:00–17:30 BST / 11:00–12:30 EDT / 20:30–22:00 IST
Sumaira Nawaz | Reform Unbound: Afghanistan’s Sirāj-ul Aḳhbār (1911-19) and its Global Publics
April 10, 2024 | 16:00–17:30 BST / 11:00–12:30 EDT / 20:30–22:00 IST
Supriya Gandhi | Persianate Hinduism in Colonial India: Revisiting Rammohun Roy’s Tuhfat al-muwahhidin
April 12, 2024 | 16:00–17:30 BST / 11:00–12:30 EDT / 20:30–22:00 IST
Website: www.interfaith.cam.ac.uk/south-asia-24
Registration Link: https://forms.office.com/e/Z4kN3ahf1i
We envision our colloquium to be brainstorming sessions for examining how interreligious interactions are analysed and theorised in diverse disciplines today, and in what ways do historical sources and ethnographic data from South Asia elaborate such interactions. Some of our presenters have pre-circulated reading materials that would be helpful in understanding their arguments. If you would like to consult these reading materials, please email: trinbarua@gmail.com.
12. Call for Papers: National, Transnational, and Antinational Circuits in Literature
Our special issue aims to investigate the multifaceted developments of approaches to and accounts of the national concept as well as its inter-, trans-, and antinational inverses as they are manifested in literary texts across diverse geographies and cultures from the 19th century to the present. We invite contributors who engage with questions of the national, the international, transnational, and antinational, exploring their intricacies, challenges, and transformative potential within the broad field of literary studies.
We are interested in canonical works of internationalism, connected to Soviet ideology as well as to the non-aligned movement. But we are most interested in those works that explicitly speak to global capitalist exploitation on the conjuncture of other forms of violence, such as colonialism, racism, sexism, xenophobia, white supremacy, environmental exploitation, queer- and transphobia, and ableism. Importantly, we encourage authors to focus on those aspects, that are often ignored within analysis of internationalisms for example by Indigenous movements and individuals, or people with disabilities.
Papers may focus on, but are not limited to, the following themes:
- Literary representations of transnational, international, and antinational solidarity movements, and activism.
- Comparative analysis of literary texts exploring and theorizing different forms and concepts of nationalisms, nationhood, and belonging.
- Critical approaches of national narratives in literature, as well as ethical considerations and dilemmas.
- International solidarity in postcolonial and decolonial literature.
- Intersectional perspectives on antinational discourses.
- Transnational and/or antinational feminist alliances and solidarities in literature.
- The role of literature in fostering empathy and cross-cultural understanding.
- Literary responses to global capitalist exploitation on the conjuncture of other forms of violence, such as colonialism, racism, sexism, xenophobia, anti-migrantism, white supremacy, environmental exploitation, queer- and transphobia, and ableism.
- Literary engagements with global justice and human and non-human rights issues.
- International solidarities that are often ignored within analysis of internationalisms for example by Indigenous movements and individuals, or people with disabilities.
Submission Instructions:
Interested authors should submit a 250-word abstract and a short bio (250 words) by e-mail to the guest editors of this special issue of Comparative Literature (contact below). We aim for a special issue of 5-7 original articles, preceded by an introduction by the editors. Selected authors are expected to submit an original article of 6,000-8,000 words (likely early 2025). The deadline for abstract submissions is April 20th, 2024. Decisions will be communicated shortly thereafter. Accepted papers will still go through the regular peer-review process of the journal, therefore a selection doesn’t necessarily guarantee the publication of your article.
Guest editors:
Dr. Viktoria Pötzl at poetzlvi@grinnell.edu
Dr. Katharina Wiedlack katharina.wiedlack@univie.ac.at
13. Publication – Corinne Mühlemann, Complex Weaves: Technique, Text, and Cultural History of Striped Silks. Affalterbach: Didymos-Verlag, 2023.
Silk fabrics in the form of wearables and soft furnishings were omnipresent in medieval Islamic society, yet their presence has not always been acknowledged within the field of art history. Complex Weaves considers the interwoven historiography of textile studies and Islamic art history through focusing on lampas fabrics produced in the Mongol (Ilkhanate, Chagatai Khanate) and Mamluk territories during the 13th and 14th centuries. Attending to these complex striped silks offers new perspectives on the production, consumption, and intended use of medieval textiles. By analyzing the different weaving techniques, the Arabic inscriptions in the patterns of the striped silks as well as their representation in pictorial and written sources, Complex Weaves critically examines the technological knowledge and divisions of labour required to produce lampas fabrics. The iconography, materiality, and inscriptions of striped silks are placed in conversation with 13th century metal vessels and contextualized through the varied uses of wearable silks. From robes of honour (khilʿa, tashrīf) for the Sāqī (cup-bearer) to the textile propaganda of the Abū Saʿīd silk, the incorporation of specific silks was instrumental in constructing talismanic power and political messages. Silks affected both those who wore them, and those who observed them, offering researchers insight into Islamic art history.
Corinne Mühlemann is the Assistant Professor for the History of Textile Arts (Abegg-Stiftung professorship) at the University of Bern, Switzerland. She has been a Marie-Skłodowska-Curie Individual Fellow at the Centre for Textile Research at the University of Copenhagen. Her research contributes to the fields of textile studies and Islamic art history.
URL
https://www.didymos-verlag.de/produkt/complex-weaves-technique-text-and-cultura…
14. ITS Ramadan Discount 2024
In celebration of the holy month of Ramadan and the Eid, the Islamic Texts Society is offering a 15% discount on all titles.
Books from the ITS are an aid to deepening one’s worship in this holy month, and also make an ideal Ramadan and Eid gift for family, friends and loved ones.
In order to take advantage of this offer, please visit our website https://its.org.uk and enter the coupon code RAMADAN24 on the purchase page. This offer is valid from 9 March to 14 April 2024.
- March 09, 2024
- by Andrew Newman
- 0 Comment