2014-2015 Events

Workshop Coordinator: Elizabeth Sartell

 

Fall 2014

View our PDF schedule: IslamicStudiesWorkshop_Autumn2014.

Welcome (Back) Social Hour

Thursday, October 2 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201

Dr. Aasim Padela (Director, Initiative on Islam and Medicine), “Rooting the Universals of Bioethics and Human Rights in Natural Law: Theological Dissonance for Conversation with Sunni Islam”

Thursday, October 16 ▪ 12:00pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Prof. Timothy Gianotti (American Islamic College)

Prof. Johan Fischer (Roskilde University, Denmark) will present a formal lecture, “Global Halal Zones: Islam, Regulation and Technoscience”

Wednesday, October 29 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 106

Rodrigo Adem (NELC), “Q 3:7: The Pivot of Interpretive Authority in Islam”

Thursday, November 13 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Ed Hayes (NELC)

Cam Cross (NELC), “Finding Romance”

Thursday, November 20 ▪ 12:00pm ▪ Pick 218
with a response by Austin O’Malley (NELC)
(co-sponsored with the Middle East History and Theory Workshop)

Prof. Eduardo Manzano (Visiting Professor, UChicago), “The Role of the Umma in the Institutional Configuration of Early Islam”

Tuesday, November 25 ▪ 12:00pm ▪ Pick 218
with a response by Tim Gutmann (Divinity School)
(co-sponsored by the Middle East History and Theory Workshop)

Ayse Polat (Divinity School), “Human Jesus: An Ottoman Muslim Disputation on Jesus in 1922”

Monday, December 1 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Alireza Doostdar (Divinity School)

Lauren Osborne (Divinity School and Whitman College), “Teaching Islamic Studies in the Liberal Arts”

Thursday, December 11 ▪ 12:00pm ▪ Swift 201
Please join the Islamic Studies Workshop in welcoming back Lauren Osborne, assistant professor of religion at Whitman College, and a recent alumna of the Divinity School Islamic Studies PhD program.  She also has experience teaching at Carleton College and the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign.  Lauren will be talking about her experiences in creating and teaching Islamic Studies courses within the liberal arts disciplines as well as at liberal arts colleges.

 

Winter 2015

View our PDF schedule: IslamicStudiesWorkshop_Winter2015.

Alessandra González (Research Fellow, Princeton University), “Islamic Feminism in Kuwait”

Thursday, January 15 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Hafsa Kanjwal (University of Michigan)

Liran Yadgar (NELC), “The Islamic Sources of al-Murshid ilā al-tafarrud wa-l-murfid ilā al-tajarrud, a Mystical Treatise by David ben Joshua Maimonides (c. 1335-1414)”

Thursday, January 29 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Elizabeth Sartell (Divinity School)

An Introduction to Multiple Job Markets: Islamic Studies after the University of Chicago

Thursday, February 19 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
This presentation and Q/A session will introduce students in the Islamic Studies workshop to trends in academic, government, nonprofit, and corporate job markets, and discuss how to take next steps as a graduate student to prepare yourself for what comes after the University of Chicago.  Led by A-J Aronstein and  Leah Siskind.

Austin O’Malley (NELC), “Allegory and Symbolic Action in ʿAṭṭâr’s Moṣibat-nâma”

Friday, February 27 ▪ noon ▪ Swift 201
*please note the time/date change!*
with a response by Francesca Chubb-Confer (Divinity)

Master’s Week, featuring Allison Kanner, Alex Matthews, and Nora Zaki

Thursday, March 5 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
Allison Kanner, “Shaykhs and Shaykhas of the Shaykh al-Akbar in the Tarjuman al-Ashwaq
Alex Matthews, “Neoplatonic Thought in Ismaili Shi’ism”
Nora Zaki, “The Evolution in Meaning of the Qur’ānic Khalīfa”

Elias Saba (NELC at the University of Pennsylvania), “Systems and Taxonomies in Islamic Legal Thinking: Comments on Ḥanafī distinctions (furūq) literature”

Tuesday, March 10 ▪ noon ▪ Pick 218
with a response by Mariam Sheibani (NELC)
(co-sponsored with Middle East History and Theory Workshop)

 

Spring 2015

View PDF schedule: IslamicStudiesWorkshop_Spring2015

Mohamad Ballan (History), “The Politics of Islamic Ecumenism in the Afsharid Empire, 1736-1746”

Thursday, April 2 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Austin O’Malley (NELC)

Prof Elias Muhanna (Brown University), “Digital Scholarship in Islamic Studies: A Workshop”

Thursday, April 16 ▪ 4:30pm-6:30pm ▪ Swift 201
Prof. Muhanna heads the Digital Islamic Humanities Project at Brown University.  He will be leading a practical workshop on finding and using digital resources for research in Islamic Studies related fields.

Bertie Kibreah (Music), “Banter and Bricolage at the Burial Chamber: Negotiating Mystical Song in Bangladesh”

Thursday, April 30 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201

Karen Rhone (Political Science), “Legacies of Reform in Islam”

Thursday, May 21 ▪ 4:30pm ▪ Swift 201
with a response by Tim Gutmann (Divinity)

Prof Ahmad Shekarchi (Shahid Behesti University, Tehran), “Pursuit of Authority in Post-19th Century Iraq”

Tuesday, May 26 ▪ 12:00pm ▪ Franke Institute for the Humanities
with a response by Zach Winters (CMES)
Organized by the Shiʿi Studies group; sponsored by the MEHAT workshop, the Islamic Studies workshop, the Franke Institute for the Humanities, and Persian Circle

———–
and please come to the spring conferences our workshop is co-sponsoring:

Shiʿi Studies Symposium, “The Practical Authority of the Imams and their Representatives”

Friday-Saturday, April 3-4 ▪ Swift Hall Common Room
website and schedule: https://shii-studies-sites.uchicago.edu/

“Characterizing Astrology in the Medieval Islamic World”

Tuesday-Thursday, May 12-14 ▪ Swift Hall 3rd Floor Lecture Room
website and schedule: http://divinity.uchicago.edu/characterizing-astrology-medieval-islamic-world