Past Near/Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies Events
2022-2023
September 19: Symposium, Medieval (and Premodern) Muslim Scholars at Work: A Symposium in Honor of Etan Kohlberg. Convenors: Joseph Witztum (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem) and Sabine Schmidtke (Institute for Advanced Study). To be held virtual from 3:00-9:00 pm Jerusalem time (8:00 am-2:00 pm EST).
October 13: The Author's Voice, The Perils and Joys of writing on the Arabs before Islam, Ayad Al-Ani, Professor for Change Management and Consulting, Associate Member of the Einstein Centre Digital Future, Berlin, and Professor extraordinary at the School of Public Leadership, Stellenbosch University. For a political scientist, the contradictory themes surrounding the Arabs and their region before the coming of Islam often seem strange and incomprehensible. Although there are no major barriers posed by rivers or mountain ranges, numerous civilizations are identified in the region each with their own language. As such, there is little opportunity for an Arab identity to emerge among those groups, despite the fact the Arabs themselves, as well as the Romans, seemingly had no problem identifying "Arabs". Some discussions on the theme have revealed a hesitancy in delineating the Arab language and script before the 5th century, rendering the appearance of the Qur’an mysterious. The majority of Arabs in the Roman East were Christians by this same period, and some still believe that monotheistic informants of the prophet need to be identified. Once these contradictions are unraveled a fascinating longue durée of events can emerge, which provides a common historical space between the East and the West, with religious ideas flowing from the periphery to the center. This talk will explore the process of dealing with these and other contradictions by adding a political and sociological lens to this stretch of history which focuses on the disappearance of the Arabs from history before Islam, their sudden appearance behind the banners of the Prophet, and the powerful and traumatic effect this emergence into world history has had on the relationship between the Arabs and the West. A recording of this event can be seen here.
Hosted by: Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS).
December 8: The Author's Voice, Through the Prism of Wisdom: Elijah the Prophet as a Bearer of Wisdom in Rabbinic Literature, Hilla N. Alouf-Aboody, an independent scholar of Second Temple literature, the Dead Sea Scrolls, and rabbinic texts, who holds a PhD in Hebrew and Judaic Studies from New York University. This presentation will explore the nature of the Elijah traditions in rabbinic literature and their connection to the wisdom tradition. By examining the diverse Elijah traditions in connection to the wisdom and apocalyptic traditions, I aim to shed new light on the manner in which Elijah’s role developed in rabbinic literature. A recording of this event can be seen here.
Hosted by: Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS).
January 20 to April 21: Scholarly Correspondences Among Orientalists during the Early and Late Modern Period as a Historical Source: A Series of Lectures.
The object of this lecture series is to bring together scholars and librarians engaged with collections of correspondences and/or include related projects that use appropriate digital tools to map and analyze such corpora. It is hosted by Sabine Schmidtke (NES@IAS) and María Mercedes Tuya (Digital Scholarship @IAS). Additional information: https://albert.ias.edu/20.500.12111/8044
January 20 - Sabine Schmidtke, Scholarly Correspondence: The Case of Oriental Studies During the Late 19th and Early 20th Century. A recording of this event can be seen here.
January 27 - Rukayyah Reichling and Kotoz Abdelhafiz Ahmed, Goldziher between European Orientalism and the Arab Nahda: Digitally Mapping a Far-Reaching Network. A recording of this event can be seen here.
February 10, 9:00 am (EST) - Ernst Herb, Leo Strauss's Letters to the Arabist Paul Kraus, between the Search of the Hidden Truth and Exile in Mizraim. A recording of this event can be seen here.
February 17 - Stefan Dumont, CorrespSearch–Connect and Search Scholarly Editions of Correspondence. A recording of this event can be seen here.
March 3 - Kinga Dévényi, “So far away, yet so close”: The correspondence of Ignaz Goldziher between 1863 and 1922. A recording of this event can be seen here.
March 10 - Paul Babinski, A Taste for the Difficult and Abstruse: A Seventeenth-Century Paris Librarian and His Orientalist Network. A recording of this event can be seen here.
March 17 - Isolde Lehnert, The Life of Max Meyerhof through his correspondence. A recording of this event can be seen here.
March 31 - Celeste Gianni, A library lost in translation: Paul Sbath’s correspondence with Eugène Tisserant. A recording of this event can be seen here.
April 7 - Garrett A. Davidson, The Correspondence between the orientalist and manuscript dealer Abraham Shalom Yahuda (d. 1951) and the Cairo-based publisher and manuscript dealer Mohammad Amin Khanji (d. 1938).
April 21 - Jan Just Witkam, Lives and letters. The correspondence of Christiaan Snouck Hurgronje (1857-1936).
January 25: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Building OCR/HTR Models, a Corpus, and a Lexical Database for Syriac, George A. Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute).
February 1: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Writing on the Walls? Perspectives on Qaraquyunlu and Aqquyunlu Epigraphy (15th century CE), Georg Leube (IAS School of Historical Studies and Universität Bayreuth).
February 8: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Averroes in the Islamic East: The Safavid Reception, Reza Pourjavady (IAS School of Historical Studies and Otto-Friedrich-Universität Bamberg).
February 15: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Israel and Ishmael in Court: Jews in the Islamic Court according to Al-Mesawwadeh, Uri Melammed (IAS School of Historical Studies and The Hebrew University).
February 22: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Traveling Nowhere: The Myth of the Medieval Jewish Globetrotters, Simcha Gross (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Pennsylvania).
March 8: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Against the Centre: Writing Azeri Turkish Narratives in Iran, Leila Rahimi Bahmany (IAS School of Historical Studies).
March 23-24: Workshop, Yemen under the rule of Imam Yaḥyā, 1904 through 1948: A critical assessment of the sources. Convenors: Marieke Brandt (Austrian Academy of Sciences), Valentina Sagaria Rossi (Institute for Advanced Study), Sabine Schmidtke (Institute for Advanced Study), and Jan Thiele (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas). The workshop will be held at the Austrian Academy of Sciences, Institute for Social Anthropology (ISA) in Vienna. Funding provided by the Gerard B. Lambert Foundation. For additional information see: https://albert.ias.edu/20.500.12111/8047.
April 5: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, The Apocalypse of Pseudo-Methodius: Between Syriac Christianity and Byzantium, Christopher Bonura (IAS School of Historical Studies).
April 12: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Islamic Ethics and the Spirit of Capitalism: Commerce and Corruption at the Port of Malacca in the 15th-century, Joel Blecher (IAS School of Historical Studies and The George Washington University).
April 19: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, Reading looted books: Nazi confiscated property in the Library of the Heidelberg University of Jewish Studies, Philipp Zschommler (Heidelberg University of Jewish Studies). Virtual event from 12-1pm.
May 4: NES Workshop: Multilingual Manuscripts in Middle Eastern Manuscript Traditions. Conveners: Sabine Schmidtke (Institute for Advanced Study) and George A. Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute). Additional information here.
June 28-30: Mainz History Talks Conference, Reflections on Byzantium from a Global Perspective II: Byzantium and the Islamicate World. Convenors: Zachary Chitwood (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz), Johannes Pahlitzsch (Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz), and Sabine Schmidtke (Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton). A conference organized under the auspices of the Gutenberg International Conference Center, in cooperation with the School of Historical Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton. The conference will be held at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.
July 5: Historical Studies-Social Science Library Book Conversation featuring Georg Leube. A conversation with Georg Leube, Member in the School of Historical Studies, where he will talk about his book: Relational Iconography: Representational Culture at the Qaraquyunlu and Aqquyunlu Courts (853 / 1449 CE to 907 / 1501 CE). 4:00 pm White-Levy Room and virtual.
2021-2022
September 2-3: Near Eastern Studies Workshop, Colophons in Middle Eastern Manuscripts. Conveners: Sabine Schmidtke, School of Historical Studies, IAS and George A. Kiraz IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute. Program.
September 16: The Author's Voice: Sasanian Iran: A Personal View, Michael R. Jackson Bonner, Canadian writer, political adviser and independent historian of Iran. Hosted by Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS). A recording of this event can be seen here.
November 5-6: International Symposium, Prince Baysunghur, Before & After: Timurid Manuscripts in Context. This inaugural symposium of the Persian Manuscripts Association and hosted by Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, celebrates the 600th anniversary of the first manuscript produced at the royal library-atelier of the Timurid Prince Baysunghur (1399-1433) in Herat. The full program for this event can be seen here.
November 10: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship @IAS joint lecture. The Study of Pre-modern Hebrew Philosophical and Scientific Terminology as a new Chapter in the Intellectual History of Europe and the Islamicate World: PESHAT in Context. Speakers: Giuseppe Veltri (University of Hamburg), Reimund Leicht (Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Michael Engel (University of Hamburg) and Florian Dunklau (University of Hamburg). A recording of this event can be seen here.
November 12-13: Conference, Ignaz Goldziher and his Correspondents: Islamic and Jewish Studies around the Turn of the Twentieth Century (Conveners: Schmidtke, Sabine; Günther, Sebastian; Dévényi, Kinga; Becker, Hans-Jürgen).
December 9: The Author's Voice: Ash‘arism Encounters Avicennism: Sayf Al-Dīn Al-Āmidī (d. 631/1233) on Creation, Laura Hassan, Associate Faculty Member, Faulty of Oriental Studies, University of Oxford. Hosted by Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS). A recording of this event can be seen here.
January 12: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Al-Suddī and his sources for rewriting the Quran, Joseph Witztum (IAS School of Historical Studies and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem).
February 9: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Unorthodox Patronage: Persian manuscript production in 15th-century Iran, Shiva Mihan (IAS School of Historical Studies).
February 16: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, From Compilation to Indexing: Tracing the Practice of Early Modern Orientalist Scholarship, Paul Babinski (University of Copenhagen). A recording of this event can be seen here.
February 23: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, An Ottoman Fiscal Codex and Financial Tales of 134 Women and Men, Ali Yaycıoğlu (Stanford University).
March 9: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, The Auspicious Rise of the Seka: Revisiting the Islamic Conquest of Bengal, Ayesha A. Irani (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Massachusetts-Boston).
March 10: The Author's Voice, Angels Hastening: The Karbalāʾ Dreams, Christopher Clohessy, resident faculty member of Pontifical Institute for Arabic and Islamic Studies (PISAI), and visiting lecturer at the Pontifical Beda College also in Rome. Hosted by: Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS). A recording of this event can be seen here.
March 16: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Reconstructing al-Suddī, Joseph Witztum (IAS School of Historical Studies and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem).
March 23: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, Setting out from Mecca in 1481: About the possibly oldest extant Arabic travelogue from the Mashreq, Björn Bentlage (Orientalisches Institut, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg).
March 29-April 1: Conference, Power, Religion and Wisdom: Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy in al-Andalus and Beyond. Convened by Godefroid de Callataÿ (Université catholique de Louvain). Sponsored by Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS).
March 30: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Conversion, Revolution, and State Formation in the Mountains of the Medieval Islamic World.
April 1: Simtho: Hands-on Workshop in Syriac Corpus Search. Sponsored by NES and DS at the Institute for Advanced Study and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute. The recordings of this event can be seen here.
April 27: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship @IAS joint lecture, The Preservation of Documentary Heritage in the MENASA Region: The Role of the QNL, Stephane Ipert, LL.M., Director of distinctive collections at the Qatar National Library (QNL). A recording of this event can be seen here.
June 23: The Author's Voice, The symbolic language of Ethiopian crosses: Explorations through form and ritual, Maria Evangelatou, Professor of Mediterranean Studies in the History of Art and Visual Culture Department, at the University of California Santa Cruz. Hosted by: Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS). A recording for this event can be seen here.
2020-2021
October 21: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, Maghribi Theology in Manuscript: Reason, Belief, and the Common Folk, Caitlyn Olson (Harvard University) and Jan Thiele (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas [CCHS-CSIC], Madrid). For the recording of this event click here.
October 28: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship Conversations @IAS Joint Lecture, Hidden gem of a bygone era: A polythematic work from Rasulid era, Kinga Dévényi (Corvinus University of Budapest, and The Oriental Collection of the Library of the Hungarian Academy of Sciences). For the recording of this event click here.
November 11: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, The Egyptian Army in the Six-Day Arab-Israeli War, Khaled Fahmy (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Cambridge). For the recording of this event click here.
November 17: IAS Ethiopian Studies Series*, The Beta Israel and Ethiopian Christian Views of Jews and Judaism. Panelists: Steven Kaplan (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), Sophia Dege-Müller (Ruhr-Universität Bochum), Marcia Kupfer (Washington, DC), and Aaron Butts (Catholic University of America / Institute for Advanced Study). Moderator: Samantha L. Kelly (Rutgers University / Institute for Advanced Study). For the recording of this event click here.
* Conveners for this series are: Suzanne Akbari (IAS), Aaron Butts (CUA/IAS), Samantha L. Kelly (Rutgers U/IAS), Sabine Schmidtke (IAS).
November 18: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Early modern pilgrimage: literature and practice in the Arab East, Björn Bentlage (IAS School of Historical Studies and Orientalisches Institut, Martin-Luther-Universität Halle-Wittenberg).
December 2: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Understanding Sect and Sectarianism in the Early Modern Middle East: Ottomans, Safavids, and the Qizilbash, Ayşe Baltacıoğlu-Brammer (IAS School of Historical Studies and New York University).
December 9: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Compendium of Pleasure: a 10th Century (?) Arabic Erotic Manual and its Sources, Pernilla Myrne (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Gothenburg).
December 16: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Beyond and Beside Text: What Objects Can Tell Us, Amanda Phillips (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Virginia).
January 27: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Historical Consciousness and the Rise of the Ottoman Empire in the Fifteenth Century, Dimitri J. Kastritsis (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of St Andrews).
February 3: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship Conversations @IAS Joint Lecture, The History of the Arabic Book: A New Chapter, Mathew Barber (The Aga Khan University, KITAB), Lorenz Nigst (The Aga Khan University, KITAB), Sarah Bowen Savant (The Aga Khan University-ISMC), Peter Verkinderen (The Aga Khan University, KITAB). For the recording of this event click here.
February 10: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, The European Qur’an: The Qur’ān in European Religious and Cultural History, Mercedes García-Arenal (Consejo Superior de Investigaciones Científicas [CCHS-CSIC], Madrid), Jan Loop (Københavns Universitet), John Tolan (Université de Nantes) and Roberto Tottoli (Universita degli Studi di Napoli L'Orientale). For the recordings of this event click here.
February 19: IAS Ethiopian Studies Series, The Turn to the Medieval in Ethiopian Studies – The Turn to Ethiopia in Medieval Studies I. Panelists: Andrea Achi (Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters at the Metropolitan Museum), Marie-Laure Derat (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique), Kristen Windmuller-Luna (Cleveland Museum of Art), Felege-Selam Yirga (The University of Tennessee Knoxville). For the recordings of this event click here.
February 24: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, Early Modern European Humanism and the Syriac New Testament, George A. Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute). For the recording of this event click here.
March 10: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Preserving a Medieval Syriac 'Treasure' of 'Vocalized Words and Readings' from the Bible and Related Literature, Jonathan Loopstra (IAS School of Historical Studies).
March 17: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship Conversations @IAS Joint Lecture, An Egyptian Sheikh’s Literary World, Adam Mestyan (Duke University) and Kathryn Schwarz (University of Massachusetts Amherst). For the recording of this event click here.
March 19: IAS Ethiopian Studies Series, The Turn to the Medieval in Ethiopian Studies – The Turn to Ethiopia in Medieval Studies II. Panelists: Alessandro Bausi (Universität Hamburg), Verena B. Krebs (Ruhr-Universität Bochum), Eyob Derillo (The British Library), and Samantha L. Kelly (Rutgers and IAS). The video recordings for this event can be seen here.
March 25: The Author's Voice Inaugural Talk: The Road to the Quran Keyword Database, Elie Wardini, Professor of Arabic, Department of Asia, Middle Eastern and Turkish Studies, Stockholm University. Hosted by Sabine Schmidtke, School of Historical Studies, IAS and George A. Kiraz, School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press. For the recording of this event click here.
March 31: Near Eastern Studies Lecture, Castle to Castle: The Saadian Library in the El Escorial Collection, François Déroche (Collège de France, PSL, Paris) and Nuria de Castilla (École Pratique des Hautes Études, PSL, Paris). For the recording of this event click here.
April 14: Near Eastern Studies and Digital Scholarship Conversations @IAS Joint Lecture, Bibliotheca Arabica - A Digital Home for the Arabic Manuscript Tradition, Verena Klemm (Institute of Arabic Studies, University of Leipzig, Germany), and Stefanie Brinkmann, Boris Liebrenz, Thomas Efer (Sächsische Akademie der Wissenschaften zu Leipzig). For the recording of this event click here.
April 23: Simtho: The Syriac Thesaurus. Launch of a Syriac textual corpus portal hosted by Sabine Schmidtke and George A. Kiraz from the Institute for Advanced Study. For the recording of this event click here.
May 20: IAS Ethiopian Studies Series, Beyond Ethiopia: The Islamic Intellectual History of the Horn of Africa. This is the fourth and final event of a webinar series IAS Ethiopian Studies. Panelists: Maria Bulakh (Institute for Oriental and Classical Studies, National Research University Higher School of Economics, Moscow), Alessandro Gori (University of Copenhagen), Hassen Muhammed Kawo (University of Cape Town, South Africa), Paul M. Love (Al Akhawayn University), Anne Regourd (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris). The video recordings for this event can be seen here.
June 17: The Author's Voice: The Goddess Isis and the Kingdom of Meroe, Solange Ashby, Adjunct Assistant Professor at Barnard College. Hosted by Sabine Schmidtke (School of Historical Studies, IAS) and George A. Kiraz (School of Historical Studies, IAS and Editor-in-Chief, Gorgias Press) in cooperation with Angelos Chaniotis (School of Historical Studies, IAS). For the recording of this event click here.
2019-2020
October 2: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Intersections between Arabic and Aramaic: The Case of Syriac Christians, Aaron Butts (IAS School of Historical Studies and The Catholic University of America).
October 17: The Historical Studies-Social Science Library Conversations: The Syriac Orthodox in North America (1895-1995): A Short History, George Anton Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute).
October 23: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, The Political Subtexts of Copto-Arabic Pseudepigraphy: Stories of the First Church of Mary as Responses to Territorial Dispossession, Mary Farag (IAS School of Historical Studies and Princeton Theological Seminary).
December 4: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, The Arabia of Abraha, Christian Robin (IAS School of Historical Studies and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique).
December 11: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, The Kidnapping of a 14th Century Rasulid Sultan: The Case of al-Malik al-Mujāhid ‘Alī, Daniel Martin Varisco (IAS School of Historical Studies and American Institute for Yemeni Studies).
January 21, 23, 28, 30 and February 13: Near Eastern Studies Workshop. Documents/Inscriptions from pre-Islamic Southern Arabia, a series of hands-on lectures led by Christian Robin (IAS School of Historical Studies and Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique) and sponsored by Professor Sabine Schmidtke.
January 27: Iran at the Crossroads of Civilization: Scholars and Lawyers Speaking about Iranian History and Cultural Heritage. A Panel Discussion. The panel showcases the incredibly rich cultural heritage of Iran beyond political considerations. Speakers: Irina Bokova (former Director-General of UNESCO, 2009-2017), Touraj Daryaee (University of California, Irvine), Ani Honarchiansaky (Princeton University), Rudi Matthee (University of Delaware), Matthew T. Miller (University of Maryland, College Park), Alexander Nagel (State University of New York/Smithsonian Institution, Washington, DC), and Thomas G. Weiss (The Graduate Center, City University of New York). It is sponsored by Sabine Schmidtke, Professor of Islamic Intellectual History at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ. Event program. For video of the event click here.
January 29: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Medicine, God, and the Occult in 17th Century Morocco, Justin Stearns (IAS School of Historical Studies and New York University Abu Dhabi).
February 5: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Tribal Dynamics and Nation Building in Yemen, Najwa Adra (Institute for Social Anthropology, Austrian Academy of Sciences).
February 12: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Mathematical Methods in the Soviet Historiography of Medieval Islamic Architecture, Igor Demchenko (IAS School of Historical Studies and Columbia University).
February 19: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Why Yemen Matters: The Heritage of a Land in Crisis, A Panel Discussion with current IAS Scholars: Najwa Adra (IAS), Hassan Ansari (IAS), Glen Bowersock (IAS), Nathalie Peutz (New York University Abu Dhabi), Christian Robin (Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris), Sabine Schmidtke (IAS), and Daniel M. Varisco (American Institute for Yemeni Studies). Meeting from 5:00-6:30 pm in the White-Levy room at IAS. This event is part of the Near Eastern Studies Workshops sponsored by Professor Sabine Schmidtke (IAS). Event materials can be found here.
CANCELED: April 24-25: Near Eastern Studies, Syriac and Arabia Symposium (Hugoye Symposium VI). Conveners: Aaron Butts, The Catholic University of America, George A. Kiraz IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute, Sabine Schmidtke, School of Historical Studies, IAS, and Jack Tannous, Princeton University.
CANCELED: June 2-5: Near Eastern Studies Conference, Power, Religion and Wisdom: Bāṭinism between Orthodoxy and Heterodoxy in Tenth-Century al-Andalus. Convened by: Godefroid de Callataÿ, IAS School of Historical Studies and Université catholique de Louvain, sponsored by Sabine Schmidtke, School of Historical Studies, IAS.
CANCELED: June 12-13: Near Eastern Studies Workshop, Colophons in Middle Eastern Manuscripts. Conveners: Sabine Schmidtke, School of Historical Studies, IAS and George A. Kiraz IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute.
2018-2019
October 3: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Pier Mattia Tommasino (IAS School of Historical Studies, Columbia University), Reading the Qur'an Backward: Some hypotheses on a seventeenth-century manuscript.
October 8: Brown Bag Lunch Series, Department and Program in Near Eastern Studies, PU, Scott Lucas (IAS School of Historical Studies, University of Arizona), Qadi Ja'far and the Revival of Zaydi Islam in the 6th/12th century Yemen.
October 10: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Tommaso Tesei (IAS School of Historical Studies and Van Leer Jerusalem Institute), Medinan verses in a Meccan sura or exegetical glosses? The case of Qur'an 91.
October 12: IAS Friends Talk, Sabine Schmidtke (IAS School of Historical Stories Faculty), Uncovering 80 Years of Research into the Near and Middle East at the Institute for Advanced Study.
October 17: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Matthew Melvin-Koushki (University of South Carolina), Shi'izing Iran -- with Sunni Occult Science.
October 25: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Nuria de Castilla (Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes, PSL, Paris), A little bit more than just bindings.
October 31: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Nükhet Varlık (IAS School of Historical Studies, Rutgers University-Newark and New Jersey Institute of Technology), Making the Self: Death and Individuality in Early Modern Ottoman Society.
November 6: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Scott Lucas (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Arizona), How Many Laws are in the Qur'an? Answers from Zaydi Yemen.
December 3: Brown Bag Lunch Series, Department and Program in Near Eastern Studies, PU, Marilyn Booth (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Oxford), Girlhood translated? Fénelon’s Traité de l’éducation des filles (1687) as a Text of Egyptian Modernity (1901, 1909).
December 4: The Historical Studies-Social Science Library Book Conversation: Sabine Schmidtke (IAS School of Historical Stories Faculty), Salvaging the Zaydi Manuscript Tradition: The Fate of Private and Family Libraries in 20th-century Yemen.
December 5: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Marilyn Booth (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Oxford), Reading and refinement: Arabic conduct pedagogy, 1870s-1920s.
December 6-7: Shii Studies Research Program, International Conference, Yemeni Manuscript Collections and Zaydi Studies. Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ.
December 12: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Christian Mauder (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Leipzig), Sultan al-Ghawri's Salons and the Question of Confessional Ambiguity at the Mamluk Court.
December 17: Project presentation, Christian Mauder (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Leipzig), The Intellectual, Social, and Cultural History of the Arab and Islamicate World in Transregional Perspective, 16th to 18th Centuries.
February 6: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Hassan Ansari (IAS School of Historical Studies), Akhbar al-fakhkh, a forged text for propaganda purposes.
February 27: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Tommaso Tesei (IAS School of Historical Studies and Van Leer Jerusalem Institute), Alexander's Gate against Gog and Magog and the 6th c. Byzantine-Sasanian Wars.
March 26: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Martino Diez (IAS School of Historical Studies and Catholic University of Milan), Al-Makin’s Thirty Wonders of the World.
April 3: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Johannes Pahlitzsch (IAS School of Historical Studies and Johannes Gutenberg-Universität Mainz), Melkites under the rule of sultan an-Nāṣir Muḥammad and an-Nuwayrī’s account of the fire of Cairo in 721/1321.
April 10: Near Eastern Studies Seminar, Alejandro García-Sanjuán (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Huelva), Al-Andalus and Reconquista in current Spanish political and academic context.
April 23-24: Muslims & Manuscripts: The Message and the Messengers, Tehseen Thaver (Princeton University) and Christiane Gruber (University of Michigan), Tuesday, April 23 at 6:30 pm (Betts Auditorium, PU); The Praiseworthy One, a book talk with author Christiane Gruber, Wednesday, April 24 at 5:00 pm (White-Levy Room, Institute for Advanced Study).
May 10-11: Near Eastern Studies Workshop, Scribal Habits in Middle Eastern Manuscripts. Conveners: Sabine Schmidtke and George A. Kiraz.
August 25-31: Shi'i Legal Theory Summer School. The focus on the summer school will be Shi’i Legal theory – that is, the discipline of uṣūl al-fiqh and related disciplines in the various Shi’i scholarly traditions (Ithna-Ashari, Zaydi, Ismaili). The Summer School is a collaboration between the Shii Studies Research Program and the Institute for Advanced Study (SSRP, funded by the Carnegie Corporation of New York) and the Law, Authority and Learning in Imami Shiite Islam at the University of Exeter (LAWALISI, funded by the European Research Council).
2017-2018
October 13: IAS Friends Talk, Sabine Schmidtke (IAS School of Historical Studies), "Salvaging the Rational Heritage of Islam: The Zaydi Manuscript Tradition Project".
October 17: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Lecture Series 2017/2018, Mohammed Abattouy (Mohamed V University in Rabat, Morocco), "The Corpus of the Arabic Science of Weights: Textual Tradition, Theoretical Scope and Significance in the History of Mechanics".
October 25: Jan Thiele (Visitor, Shii Studies Research Program and Consejo Superior de Investigaciones) and Hassan Ansari (IAS School of Historical Studies), " 'Unconventional' kalām texts: Examples from the Zaydī literature".
November 15: Near Eastern Studies Seminar - Panel Discussion, George A. Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute), Konrad Schmidt (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Zurich), Sabine Schmidtke (IAS School of Historical Studies), and Stefan Schorch (IAS School of Historical Studies and Martin Luther University Halle-Wittenberg), "The Bible in its Near Eastern Contexts (Ancient, Medieval, Modern): Philological Perspectives on the Pentateuch, Syriac, Samaritan, and Arabic Bibles".
November 22: Eduard Mühle (IAS School of Historical Studies and Westfälische Wilhelms-Universität Münster), "The Perception of Slavs/Saqaliba in Arabic Sources of the 9th-12th centuries".
November 29: Will Hanley (IAS School of Historical Studies and Florida State University), "A Names Ontology for Middle East History".
December 6: Sebastian Günther (IAS School of Historical Studies and University of Goettingen), "Isaiah, a Biblical Prophet and his Message in Islamic Tradition".
December 7-9: Shii Studies Research Program International Conference, "Shii Studies: The State of the Art," Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ.
December 7: 2017/2018 S.T. Lee Lecture, Ulrich Marzolph (Georg-August-University, Göttingen), "The Visual Culture of Iranian Twelver Shiism in the Qajar Period".
February 28: George Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute), "The Syriac Community in the Late Ottoman Period: Digging in the Archives of Mardin".
March 21: Anna Izdebska (Jagiellonian University, Krakow), "How to translate arcane knowledge: devising an Arabic rendition of a Pythagorean terminus technicus”.
March 28: Kevin Martin (IAS School of Historical Studies and Indiana University), " 'We have discovered America': The US in the Syrian imagination, 1946-1963".
April 12-14: Patricia Crone Memorial Conference, "The Majlis revisited: Inter- and intro-religious and cross cultural disputations in the Islamicate world," Casa Árabe, Cordoba, Spain.
May 14-15: Israel Institute for Advanced Study (Jerusalem) and Institute for Advanced Study (Princeton) Joint Workshop in the Humanities, "Literary Genres and Their Changing Functions among Jews, Christians & Muslims in Late Antiquity & the Middle Ages," The Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Israel.
June 4: Van Leer Jerusalem Institute and Tel Aviv University Workshop: "Near Eastern Studies after Patricia Crone," The Van Leer Jerusalem Institute, Israel.
June 6-10: Shii Studies Research Program Conference, "The Zaydi Manuscript Tradition," Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ.
June 28-29: Near Eastern Studies Workshop, "Dots, Marginalia and Peritexts in Middle Eastern Manuscripts Workshop," conveeners: Sabine Schmidtke (IAS School of Historical Studies) and George A. Kiraz (IAS School of Historical Studies and Beth Mardutho: The Syriac Institute). Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton.
2016-2017
October 5: Helmut Zander (IAS and Université de Fribourg), "Grammar of Religio-Political Structures in Islam and Christianity".
October 12: Art History Seminar, Emine Fetvaci (IAS and Boston University), "Album Making in Seventeenth Century Istanbul: The Sultan and the City."
October 13: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Lecture Series 2016/2017, Prof. Dr. Gita Dharampal-Frick (University of Heidelberg) "Mahatma Gandhi and Islam".
October 26: Jane Hathaway (IAS and The Ohio State University), "The Ottoman Chief Harem Eunuch in an Era of Crisis and Change".
November 2: Book release of Patricia Crone's Collected Studies in Three Volumes, Historical Studies-Social Sciences Library Book Talks Series.
December 14: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Lecture Series 2016/2017, Sarah Stroumsa (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), "Jewish and Islamic Philosophical Thought in al-Andalus: New Perspectives".
January 25: Antoine Borrut (IAS and University of Maryland), "Forgetting al-Khwārizmī’s History".
February 1: Patrick O'Banion (IAS and Lindenwood University), "Arabic at the Fringes: Islamic Prayers, Rituals, and Traditions in Early Modern Castile".
Feburary 15: Anastasios (Tom) Papademetriou (IAS and Stockton University), "Consolidating Ecclesiastical Authority: The Case of the Patriarchate of Constantinople in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire".
February 22: Roberto Tottoli (IAS and Università degli Studi di Napoli L'Orientale), "Editing the Qur'an in the 16th- and 17th-century Europe: Inter-religious polemics, print culture, and Arabic philology".
February 24: Workshop: "Why Syriac Matters". This workshop aims to highlight why and how Syriac matters today in many fields of research — Classics, Late Antique, Byzantine, Medieval, and Islamic studies as well as Sasanian, Arabian and Central Asian Studies, History of Christianity, Patristics and Church History, Theology, and Digital Humanities.
March 8: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Lecture Series 2016/2017, Thomas Burman (University of Notre Dame), "Ramon Martí: Engaging Islam and Judaism on the Edge of Scholastic Christendom".
March 22: Rudi Matthee (IAS and University of Delaware), "The Eighteenth Century in Iranian Historiography: Nader Shah: Warlord or National Hero?".
March 29: Emine Fetvaci (IAS and Boston University), "Calligraphy in the Album of Ahmed I (ca.1609)".
April 5: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Lecture Series 2016/2017, Maribel Fierro (Institute for the Languages and Cultures of the Mediterranean, Spanish National Research Council [ILC, CSIC]), "Qur’anists in al-Andalus?".
April 7-8: Dept. of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University and Near Eastern Studies at IAS, Workshop "Editing Arabic and Persian Manuscripts" led by Hassan Ansari and Sabine Schmidtke of the Institute for Advanced Study.
April 11: Permanent Mission of Germany to the United Nations and Afsaneh Beschloss, President and CEO, The Rock Creek Group and Trustee, Institute for Advanced Study, invite you to the launch of The Zaydi Manuscript Tradition: A Digital Portal with a talk by Sabine Schmidtke (IAS, School of Historical Studies) entitled Preserving, Studying, and Democratizing Access to the World Heritage of Islamic Manuscripts.
April 20-21: Near Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies Conference, “The Arabic Literary genizot Beyond Denominational Borders”. Convenors are Geoffrey Khan (Cambridge University), Sarah Stroumsa (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem), and Sabine Schmidtke (Institute for Advanced Study).
2015-2016
October 8, The Permanent Mission of Germany to the United Nations and Carnegie Corporation of New York present a talk by Sabine Schmidtke (IAS, School of Historical Studies) Islamic Thought beyond Denominational Borders: Challenges and Perspectives for a Comprehensive Approach, and a conversation with Vartan Gregorian (Carnegie Corporation) and Robbert Dijkgraaf (Institute for Advanced Study).
October 21, Eric (L.W.C.) van Lit (Yale University), will talk about "The transmission of an idea, the genealogy of its sentence: The 'world of image' (ʿālam al- mithāl) from the twelfth century up until today".
October 28, Nahyan Fancy (IAS, DePauw University), will talk about "Studying the Transmission and Development of Ibn al-Nafis’s Physiology in the Mamluk-era commentaries on the Qānūn and the Mūjiz".
November 18, Rozaliya Garipova (IAS, University of Pennsylvania), will talk about "Shar‘ification and Russification: How did Muslims Divide their Inheritance in Imperial Russia?".
December 2, Stefan Kamola (Princeton University), will talk about "Fixing the past: Hafiz-i Abru and the Jami` al-tawarikh".
December 9, Maurice Pomerantz (IAS, New York University, Abu Dhabi) will talk on Rogue Fictions: Thoughts on the Form, Circulation and History of the Arabic Maqama.
January 13, Firoozeh Kashani-Sabet (University of Pennsylvania) will talk about "Crossing Empires: Shi'i Pilgrims of the Sultan and the Shah".
January 20, Hassan Ansari (IAS, School of Historical Studies) will talk about "On the Authorship of the K. Tathbīt dalāʾil al-nubuwwa".
January 22, Jan Thiele (Spanish National Research Council, CSIC) will talk about "Post-Almohad Intellectual History: Ashʿarite Teaching in Ifrīqiya (13th–16th century)".
January 27, Public Lecture: Devin J. Stewart (Emory College of Arts and Sciences), "The Transmission of Knowledge in Abbasid Iraq: Problems in the Interpretation of the “Catalogue” of Ibn al-Nadim". This lecture made possible by the Dr. S.T. Lee Fund for Historical Studies.
February 10, Carlo Scardino (IAS, Heinrich-Heine-Universität Düsseldorf) will talk about "Problems in the Translation of Greek Agricultural Terms into Arabic".
March 2, Margaret Graves (IAS, Indiana University, Bloomington), will talk about "With Blessings and Metaphors: The Medieval Islamic Art of the Object".
March 9, Arnold Franklin (Queens College) will talk about "Constructing Lineages: Jews, Muslims and nasab in the Middle Ages".
April 13, Negin Nabavi (IAS, Montclair State University) will talk about "Creating Publics: Newspapers and Newspaper Culture in Qajar Iran".
May 27, Near/Middle Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies and New York University-Abu Dhabi,Workshop "The Maqama and its Readers: A Workshop on arabic and Hebrew Literature".
June 9-10, Near/Middle Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies, “Allographic Traditions” among Arabic-speaking Christians, Jews and Samaritans: Workshop on the Writing Systems of Garshuni, Judeo-Arabic and Samaritan-Arabic.
June 20-24, Near/Middle Eastern Studies at the Institute for Advanced Studies, Digital Ottoman Platform II Workshop.
2014-2015
October 15, Mykhaylo Yakubovych (IAS, The National University of Ostroh Academy) will talk about "Early origins of Islamic Philosophical Tradition in Crimea".
October 29, Noah Salomon (IAS, School of Social Science) will talk about "Between Texts and Textual Practices: Initiating a Conversation between the Schools of Historical Studies and Social Science in the Study of Islam".
November 12, to continue our discussion on the various methodological approaches to the field of Islamic Studies as well as pertinent national scholarly traditions, we will be watching the Israeli movie "Footnote" (הערת שוליים). Written and directed by Joseph Cedar, 2011.
December 10, Jack Tannous (Princeton University), will talk on "Greek, Syriac, and Arabic: The road from late antiquity to the Middle Ages".
December 17, Maryam Tiouri (Freie Universität Berlin) will talk on "Some Notes on the History and Theology of the Karrāmīya - the Tafsīr-I Sūrābādī Responding to Anti-Karrāmī Polemicists".
January 14, Moulie Vidas (IAS, Princeton University) will talk on "The Birth of the Rabbinic isnād: Citation and Attribution in Talmudic Literature".
January 21, Anver Emon (IAS, School of Social Science) will talk about "Americanization of Islamic Legal Scholarship".
January 28, Leigh Chipman (Johns Hopkins University) will talk about "Why study the reception of Galen? Transmission of knowledge from late antiquity to the Islamic world".
February 4, Amy Singer (IAS, Tel Aviv University), will talk about "Digital Ottoman: What? Why? How?".
March 4, Marion Katz, (IAS, New York University) will talk on "What Housework Signifies: Domestic Labor in Legal Manuals of the 11th-12th Century CE".
March 18, Geoffrey Khan (IAS, University of Cambridge) will talk on "Arabic Documents from the Early Islamic Period".
March 25, Nader Sohrabi (IAS, Carleton College), will tak on "Gens or Guns: The End of the Ottoman Empire and the Young Turks, 1908-1918".
April 1, Hassan Ansari (Institute for Advanced Study) will talk on "Critical Approaches to the Philosophy of Avicenna: Sharaf al-Din al-Mas'udi and Afdal al-Din al-Ghaylani".