Research Workshop

OIL’S DOMAIN: THE TYRANNY OF NATURE IN SAUDI ARABIA
Monday, November 2, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

TOBY C. JONES (History, Rutgers University) is currently a postdoctoral research associate on the Oil, Energy and the Middle East project at the Princeton Environmental Institute.  His main research interests focus on the history of state-building, politics, and Shia-Sunni relations in Saudi Arabia and the Gulf.

KARL APPUHN (History, New York University), author of A Forest on the Sea: Environmental Expertise in Renaissance Venice will serve as discussant.

Note:  All workshop participants must read the paper beforehand.  Copies are available in the Ettinghausen Library or by emailing Sarah Coffey at sc145@nyu.edu

Distinguished Lecture

A POST-U.S. IRAQ: AFTER THE PULL-OUT, THE DELUGE?
Thursday, November 5, 2009 | 12:45pm - 1:30pm

JOOST HILTERMANN (International Crisis Group, Middle East and North Africa)

The presentation will cover the current state of affairs in Iraq, primary fault lines, preparations for parliamentary elections, strength of state institutions, the role of neighboring states, and U.S. strategy before, during, and after the withdrawal of all combat troops by the end of August 2010.  Hiltermann is author of A Poisonous Affair: America, Iraq, and the Gassing of Halabja (2007).

Visual Culture Series, Program in Ottoman Studies

FILM SCREENING: THREE MONKEYS (Üç Maymun) by Nuri Bilge Ceylan  (Turkey, 109 minutes, 2008)
Friday, November 6, 2009 | 4:00pm - 6:00pm

A family is dislocated when small failings blow up into extravagant lies. In order to avoid hardship and responsibilities that would otherwise be impossible to endure, the family chooses to ignore the truth, not to see, hear or talk about it.  Three Monkeys premiered in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, where Ceylan won Best Director. After-film discussion with SIBEL EROL (New York University) and BILGE EBIRI (Independent Film Critic).

Visual Culture Series, Program in Ottoman Studies

FILM SCREENING: THREE MONKEYS (Üç Maymun) by Nuri Bilge Ceylan  (Turkey, 109 minutes, 2008)
Friday, November 6, 2009 | 4:00pm - 6:00pm

A family is dislocated when small failings blow up into extravagant lies. In order to avoid hardship and responsibilities that would otherwise be impossible to endure, the family chooses to ignore the truth, not to see, hear or talk about it.  Three Monkeys premiered in competition at the 2008 Cannes Film Festival, where Ceylan won Best Director. After-film discussion with SIBEL EROL (New York University) and BILGE EBIRI (Independent Film Critic).

Visual Culture Series - Screening and Discussion

PROJECT KASHMIR (2008, 89 Minutes) - www.projectkashmir.org
Friday, October 2, 2009 | 4:00pm - 7:30pm

Presented by directors SENAIN KHESHGI & GEETA V. PATEL

Two American friends from opposite sides of the divide explore the war in Kashmir and find their friendship tested over deeply rooted political, cultural and religious biases. Cosponsored with the Center for Religion and Media

Research Workshop

DOES TORTURE WORK?  A SOCIOLEGAL ASSESSMENT OF THE PRACTICE IN HISTORICAL AND GLOBAL PERSPECTIVE
Monday, October 5, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

LISA HAJJAR (Law and Society, UCSB) will address how torture works (i.e., why it has been used and its effects) in order to highlight the role of torture in the mutually constitutive histories of law-state-society relations. Hajjar is the author of Courting Conflict: The Israeli Military Court System in the West Bank and Gaza.
KAREN GREENBERG, Executive Director, Center for Law and Security at NYU and author of The Least Worst Place: Guantanamo's First 100 Days will serve as discussant.

Note:  All workshop participants must read the paper beforehand.  Copies are available in the Ettinghausen Library or by emailing Sarah Coffey at sc145@nyu.edu

Round table Discussion

IRAN IN CONTEXT: A ROUND TABLE DISCUSSION
Friday, October 9, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Featuring Ali Mirsepassi (NYU), Kaveh Ehsani (DePaul), Norma Claire Moruzzi (UIC), and moderated by Arang Keshavarzian (NYU)

Four researchers will discuss the 2009 presidential elections and subsequent events by situating them in Iran's larger history of social movements, political participation, and authoritarian rule.

POLITICAL PARTICIPATION IN IRAN: ELECTIONS AND THE EVERDAY
Saturday, October 10, 2009 | 10:00am - 2:00pm

The June 2009 Iranian presidential campaign and the contested election results that followed it inspired public protests that have been compared to those staged during the Islamic revolution. In this workshop, learn what has been happening since the recent Presidential election while investigating the general history of public political engagement in Iran.  Special attention will be paid to the important roles women have played in politics in recent years. The program will feature presentations by Kaveh Ehsani, Assistant Professor of International Studies at DePaul University; Norma Claire Moruzzi, Associate Professor of Political Science and gender and women’s studies at University of Illinois at Chicago; and Arang Keshavarzian, Associate Professor of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at New York University. A teaching resource packet, including digitized campaign posters from the recent election will be provided.  A lunch of Iranian food will be served.  For background reading by the authors, please see their recent co-authored essay published in the Middle East Report Online: http://merip.org/mero/mero062809.html

† Registration Deadline:  October 5, 2009

Visual Culture Series - New Book Series

ISLAMICATE CULTURES OF BOMBAY CINEMA (Tulika Books, 2009)
Monday, October 12, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Authors RICHARD ALLEN (NYU) and IRA BHASKAR (Jawaharlal Nehru Univ.) explore the rich influence of Muslim culture and traditions on the cinema of Bombay (now Mumbai) from the 1930s to present. Co-sponsored with Cinema Studies.

Arabic Literature Colloquium

A LETTER NAMED JIM
Monday, October 12, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm
Location: 19 University Place, 1^st Floor Great Room

MICHAEL BEARD (Univ. of North Dakota) will discuss the esthetic dimension of the Arabic alphabet visible in its calligraphy, but also present in its interface with the languages that have grown up inside and around it.

Program in Ottoman Studies

HISTORIES IN VERSE: OTTOMAN IMPERIALISM AND ITS SUPPORTERS IN EARLY SIXTEENTH CENTURY ISTANBUL
Thursday, October 15, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

EBRU TURAN (Fordham Univ.) researches the political, intellectual, and cultural history of the early modern Ottoman Empire, with special emphasis on the Muslim Mediterranean.

Visual Culture Series - Film Screening/Discussion

IN THE SHADOWS OF A LEADER: QADDAFI’S FEMALE BODYGUARDS (2004, 57 minutes)
Friday, October 16, 2009 | 4:00pm - 6:00pm

RANIA AJAMI will present her documentary film that gained unprecedented access to Libya in investigating the phenomenon of Qaddafi's elite female bodyguard corps and the social tensions these women embody.

A Cinema Across Borders: The First New York Kurdish Film Festival

October 21-25, 2009
Location: NYU Cantor Film Center, 36 E. 8th street, New York, NY

For a complete schedule of screenings and events, see www.arteeast.org 

Kurdish cinema speaks strongly to our times because it confronts the pain and promise of crossing borders: not only the borders that separate nations, but the lines that define gender, community, and culture, that demarcate the past and the future, and adjudicate between those with and those without hope. Yet despite being one of the great film cultures of the world, Kurdish cinema still remains largely unknown in the U.S.  The First New York Kurdish Film Festival: A Cinema Across Borders will showcase an exciting range of recent feature films, shorts, and documentaries by male and female directors from across the Kurdish region—including films from Turkey, Iraq, Iran, Armenia—and the Kurdish diaspora. What unites these diverse films is a powerful commitment to innovative storytelling and a concern to rethink imposed borders of whatever kind. The festival will bring a number of Kurdish film directors to the U.S. to connect directly with New York audiences, and will provide a unique educational opportunity for learning about Kurdish history and culture. The festival aims to enrich the diversity and cultural life of the city by opening up new routes for understanding and dialogue between different cultures and visions of the world.

The First New York Kurdish Film Festival: A Cinema Across Borders is directed by an independent organizing committee and is supported by the Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at NYU and ArteEast.  Cosponsored by the Center for Religion and Media at NYU.

Luncheon Seminar Series

Transnational Developments Affecting Peace and Conflict in Kurdistan: Recent Events in Historical Perspective
Thursday, October 22, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Turkey's relationship with its Kurdish citizens has recently become a hot topic in the Turkish press, though just a short time ago talk of things Kurdish was completely taboo.  JANET KLEIN, (University of Akron) will explore this shift in light of transnational factors often overlooked by peace and conflict analysts of Turkey and Iraq.

Visual Culture Series - New Book Series

THE KURDISH EXPERIENCE THROUGH THE VISUAL ARTS
Friday, October 23, 2009 | 12:30pm - 2:00pm

Featuring film director Müjde Arslan on Kurdish Cinema (Agora Bookhouse, 2009); Photographer Susan Meiselas on Kurdistan: In the Shadow of History (2nd ed, Univ. of Chicago, 2008); and human rights campaigner KERIM YILDIZ on Kurds: Through the Photographer’s Lens (Trolley Ltd., 2008).  Cosponsored with ArteEast.

THE KURDS: CULTURE, POLITICS AND HISTORY ACROSS BORDERS
Saturday, October 24, 2009 | 10:00am - 3:00pm

Who are the Kurds?  Despite varied historical experience and political realities over the past century and more, this large “minority” group in the Middle East shares a common identity, language, and aspirant nation across the borders of Syria, Iran, Iraq, Turkey and the diaspora.  On the occasion of the First Kurdish Film Festival of New York (hosted by NYU and ArteEast October 21-25, 2009), come and hear strategies for teaching about the complex realities of Kurds living across the Middle East today, while engaging with a rich palette of recent Kurdish filmmaking.  Featuring presentations by historian Janet Klein (Assistant Professor of History, University of Akron) and Jamsheed Akrami (Wiliam Patterson University, Columbia University).   A teaching resource packet including discussion guides for films recommended for use in U.S. high schools and complimentary passes to select festival events will be provided to workshop participants.   A lunch of Middle Eastern food will be served.  An optional screening of Yilmaz Guney’s classic film Yol (considered to be one of the most significant landmarks in Kurdish filmmaking) will begin at 1pm.  Co-sponsored by ArteEast and the committee of the First Kurdish Film Festival of New York.

† Registration Deadline:  October 19, 2009

Luncheon Seminar Series

RIYADH DRIFT: SOCIAL MARGINALIZATION AND URBAN UNREST IN SAUDI ARABIA
Thursday, October 29, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Every night, for more than 30 years, young men have been spinning stolen cars on the broad avenues of the Saudi capital, more often than not with disastrous results. 

PASCAL MENORET (Princeton University) will explore this urban phenomenon in the peculiar context of post-oil boom Saudi Arabia.

Arabic Literature Colloquium

A GENRE WITHOUT BORDERS?  THE ARABIC GHAZAL AND ITS PERSIAN COUSIN
Friday, October 30, 2009 | 12:30pm - 2:00pm

DOMINIC PARVIZ BROOKSHAW (University of Manchester) will explore areas of commonality and variance between the Arabic ghazal of early ‘Abbasid Baghdad (9th century CE) and the Persian short lyric of the Ghaznavid period (11th century CE).

Screening & Discussion, Visual Culture Series

Z32  (Israel/France, 2008, 81 minutes, Hebrew with English Subtitles)
Monday, Sep 09, 2009 | 6:00pm - 8:00pm

Acclaimed documentarian Avi Mograbi will present and discuss his latest film.  Z32 is built around a confession— a young man’s account of his participation in the revenge killing of two Palestinian police officers by the Israeli army in the occupied territories. Around the soldier’s account Mograbi interweaves a couple’s extended and often agonizing discussion of their relationship, punctuated by Mograbi himself characteristically addressing the camera.

Luncheon Seminar Series

MAKING THE SUDANESE MAHDI ‘ARAB’:  BRITISH CONSTRUCTIONS OF RACE IN THE MAHDI’S SUDAN
Tuesday, Sep 15, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Lisa Pollard, Associate Professor of History at UNC-Wilmington, researches gender, social organizations and colonial politics. Among other publications, she is the author of Nurturing the Nation: The Family Politics of Modernizing, Colonizing and Liberating Egypt, 1805-1923. Alightlunch will be served.

Luncheon Seminar Series

THE SHAHEEN COLLECTION: ARAB IMAGES IN AMERICAN POPULAR CULTURE
Thursday, September 24, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Jack Shaheen is the author of Guilty: Hollywood’s Verdict on Arabs After 9/11 and Reel Bad Arabs: How Hollywood Vilifies a People, among other publications.  In this session he will introduce his unique and expansive archive of Hollywood footage and other American pop culture artifacts featuring Arab images. A light lunch will be served. Cosponsored with the Asian/Pacific/American Institute and the Tisch School of the Arts.

Medieval Studies Seminar

CONVERTING CULTURES: ISLAMIZATION, ACCULTURATION, AND ETHNICITY IN MEDIEVAL EGYPT
Thursday, September 24, 2009 | 6:30pm - 8:00pm
Location: 13-19 University Place, Room 222, New York, NY

Tamer el-Leithy, Assistant Professor of History and Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at NYU, is completing a book manuscript on Coptic conversion to Islam in medieval Egypt. Cosponsored with the Medieval and Renaissance Center at NYU.

"Middle Eastern Art" in Translation:
A Conversation with Critics, Artists, and Curators

Friday, September 25, 2009 | 12:30pm - 4:00pm
Location: The Kevorkian Center, 50 Washington Square South (at 255 Sullivan Street)

The groundbreaking exhibit at the Queens Museum of Art, Tarjama/Translation, maps an influential subset of recent work from the Middle East and Central Asia and its diasporas. On the occasion of the exhibit's closing, a special symposium will examine the challenges and interventions of the exhibit and its implications for the contemporary art world.

 

Timings	Events
12:30pm	OPENING REMARKS Greta Scharnweber, NYU Livia Alexander, ArteEast Jessica Winegar, Northwestern University, Symposium Chair and Moderator
12:45pm - 2:15pm	TARJAMA/TRANSLATION: CRITICAL RESPONSES Critical theorists who have worked in the area of cross-cultural translation respond to Tarjama/Translation. Barry Flood, Art Hisotry, NYU Coco Fusco, Parsons The New School for Design Sukhdev Sandhu, English, NYU
2:30pm - 4:00pm	“MIDDLE EASTERN ART” IN THE U.S.:  CHALLENGES AND INTERVENTIONS Artists and curators speak about the challenges of making/curating visual arts in the U.S. John Jurayj, contributing artist to Tarjama/Translation Iftikhar Dadi, Cornell University, co-curator of Tarjama/Translation Maymanah Farhat, independent art writer and curator

A light lunch and afternoon refreshments will be provided.  For more information on the Tarjama/Translation Exhibit at the Queens Museum of Art, please see www.ArteEast.org or www.queensmuseum.org.  Contact kevorkian.center@nyu.edu with questions.

 

Event sponsored by the Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at NYU with ArteEast and the Center for Religion and Media

Screening  & Discussion, Visual Culture Series

REEL BAD ARABS: HOW HOLLYWOOD VILLIFIES A PEOPLE (USA, 2006, 60 minutes)
Friday, September 25, 2009 | 6:00pm - 8:00pm
Location: 721 Broadway, Room 648, New York, NY

Jack Shaheen will present and discuss his documentary film that analyzes the portrayal of Arabs throughout Hollywood’s cinematic history.  Cosponsored with the Asian/Pacific/American Institute, the Tisch School of the Arts and the Center for Religion and Media at NYU.

Symposium, Visual Culture Series

‘MIDDLE EASTERN ART’ IN TRANSLATION: Strategies and Tools for Teaching Culture
Saturday, September 26, 2009 | 10:00am - 3:00pm

Interested in learning and teaching about “Middle Eastern” Art?  Hear from Professor Jessica Winegar (Northwestern University) and independent art writer and curator Maymanah Farhat about the world of contemporary “Middle Eastern” art on its own terms.  This workshop will challenge conventional and reductionist views of cultural production based on geography and artist identity.  Curriculum tools based on new leading-edge works of art will be introduced in conjunction with a curator-led visit to the Tarjama/Translation exhibit open at the Queens Museum of Art.  Curator Iftikhar Dadi (Cornell University) will lead the tour.   Transportation between the Kevorkian Center and the Queens Museum will be provided, and a lunch of Turkish food will be served.  For a virtual tour of the exhibit, see www.arteeast.org/pages/virtualgallery. Cosponsored by ArteEast.

†Registration Deadline:  September 21, 2009

Seminar, Visual Culture Series

SURVIVING IMAGES: WAR, MEMORY AND TRAUMA IN LEBANESE AND IRANIAN CINEMAS
Monday, September 28, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Kamran Rastegar (Tufts University) will present his current research on visual representations of war and social trauma. By comparing post-war cultural productions in Iran and Lebanon, he will examine the differences between official government sponsored delimitations of memory practices in these two societies and how they have led to very different approaches to the question of remembering their wars.  Cosponsored with the Department of Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies and the Department of Comparative Literature.

Note: Unless otherwise noted, events will take place in the Kevorkian Center’s Richard Ettinghausen Library, 50 Washington Square South (at 255 Sullivan Street).  Expanded event details can be found at www.nyu.edu/gsas/program/neareast. With questions, please write to kevorkian.center@nyu.edu

The NYU Kevorkian Center, AMEJA & The Make Agency Presents:

Iran: What You Need to Know - A Teach-In
Tuesday, June 23, 2009 | 6:30pm - 9:30pm
Location: Cantor Center, 36 E. 8th street

The recent events in Iran have left many of us with questions.  Why are there demonstrations and violence in the streets of Iran?
How are the events there relevant to us here? What is our role here in the US and how can we support the people of Iran in this time of
turmoil?

A EVENING TEACH-IN IS TAKING PLACE for journalists, students, academics, and any one interested in gaining a better understanding of the incredible images and stories emerging from Iran over the past week. We will have eyewitness accounts from people who have just returned from Iran and reports from journalists who have been covering Iran for the past few years.

SPEAKERS:
Arang Keshavarzian is Associate Professor in the Department of Middle
Eastern and Islamic Studies at New York University. He has just
returned from Iran, where he spent the last three weeks following the
election campaign and its immediate aftermath and he will give an
eyewitness account of the events there.

Golnoush Niknejad is the editor and founder of Tehran Bureau
(www.tehranbureau.com), an online magazine launched this year. Tehran
Bureau carried out extensive coverage of the recent Presidential
elections and now continues to overcome the Iranian government filters
and has become one of the main news sources from within Iran

Kouross Esmaeli is an Iranian-American independent journalist and
filmmaker working with Big Noise Film collective. He has been
reporting from Iran for the past four years for Aljazeera English,
Press TV and Current TV. He is also a member of Arab and Middle
Eastern Journalists Association.

Sponsored by the Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at New York University & the Arab and Middle Eastern Journalist Association & The Make Agency

Email: IranTeachIn@hotmail.com

The Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies &
The Program in Ottoman Studies at New York University
with Light Millennium

present

SUMMER’S END
(YAZSONU)

---

A CONVERSATION WITH ACCLAIMED NOVELIST AND PLAYWRIGHT
ADALET AĞAOĞLU
Originally published in Turkish in 1980 and translated into English in 2008 by Figen Bingül, Summer’s End (Yazsonu) is one of acclaimed and prolific author Adalet Ağaoğlu’s most celebrated works. Since the early 1970s, she has published eight novels, several plays, three short story collections, two memoirs, including one which she describes as a memoir-novel, a book of dreams, and numerous essays.  Summer’s End is narrated by an author on vacation among the classical ruins of the ancient city of Side on the Mediterranean coast in Turkey, providing an intricate picture of a large cross-section of modern Turkish society. The novel offers a complex multi-dimensional and multi-leveled view of cultural values, politics, sexuality, and personal dilemmas.  Translation and discussion moderated by Sibel Erol (Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies, NYU)

Friday, May 1, 2009
12:30pm-1:45pm
Lunch will be provided

The Kevorkian Center, 50 Washington Square South at Sullivan Street

 

Program in Ottoman Studies

ELIAS KOLOVOS, “THE MONKS OF MOUNT ATHOS AND THE OTTOMAN SULTANS”
Thursday, April 2, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Elias Kolovos is currently a visiting fellow at the Program in Hellenic Studies at Princeton University.  His work sheds light on the history of monasteries under Ottoman administration, Ottoman peasant history, and island societies in the Ottoman Empire (fourteenth to eighteenth centuries).

Seminar Series

JÜRGEN TODENHÖFER, “WHY DO YOU KILL? THE UNTOLD STORY OF THE IRAQI RESISTANCE”
Wednesday, April 8, 2009 | 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Location: 19 University Place, Room 102

Dr. Todenhöfer was a member of the German parliament for 18 years and spokesman for the CDU/CSU on development aid and arms control. For 50 years he has traveled extensively in the Middle East.  His latest book describes in harrowing detail the full impact of the US invasions of Afghanistan and Iraq on daily life in the Muslim world. Cosponsored with the Department of Media, Culture and Communication.

Luncheon Seminar Series

MONA ELTAHAWY, “BLOGS, SOCIAL NETWORKING SITES AND THE NEW, NEW MEDIA IN THE ARAB WORLD: GIVING A VOICE TO THE VOICELESS"
Thursday, April 9, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Mona Eltahawy is an award-winning syndicated columnist whose essays appear regularly in both the western and Arab press.  Before she moved to the U.S. in 2000, Ms. Eltahawy was a news reporter in the Middle East for many years, including in Cairo and Jerusalem as a Reuters correspondent and she reported from the region for The Guardian and U.S. News and World Report. Cosponsored with ArteEast.

Panel Discussion

“OIL, ECONOMY AND POLITICS IN THE MODERN MIDDLE EAST”
Monday, April 13, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

TIMOTHY MITCHELL, Columbia University, studies the political economy of the Middle East, the political role of economics and other forms of expert knowledge, the politics of large-scale technical systems, and the place of colonialism in the making of modernity.  His most recent publication is Rule of Experts:  Egypt, Technopolitics, Modernity.

ROBERT MABRO is Visiting Scholar, NYU, Oxford Fellow, and former director of the Oxford Institute for Energy Studies.  His wide-ranging expertise in the field of oil is well-documented in his numerous publications, the most recent of which is Oil in the 21st Century.

Research Workshop

BESHARA DOUMANI, “BETWEEN KIN AND COURT: GENDER, PROPERTY AND THE PRAXIS OF ISLAMIC LAW"
Monday, April 20, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Professor of History at the University of California, Berkeley, Doumani specializes in the social and cultural history of peasants, merchants, artisans, and women who lived in the provincial regions of the Arab East during the late Ottoman period (18th and 19th centuries). His work paints a live portrait of everyday life through studying family history, the political economy of urban-rural relations, and connections between gender and property.  Discussants:  Christine Philliou (History, Columbia University) and Michael Gilsenan (Anthropology, New York University)

Note:  All workshop participants must read the paper beforehand.  Copies are available in the Ettinghausen Library or by emailing Sarah Coffey at sc145@nyu.edu

Luncheon Seminar Series

JOHN RYLE, “THE INTERNATIONAL CRIMINAL COURT AND THE PURSUIT OF PEACE AND JUSTICE IN SUDAN"
Thursday, April 23, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

John Ryle is Professor of Anthropology and Chair of the Rift Valley Institute at Bard College.  A writer, filmmaker, and anthropologist, his work broadly focuses on Africana Studies and Human Rights. He is a former member of the International Eminent Persons Group, whose report on slavery and abduction in Sudan was published in 2002; his editorial pieces on the Sudan, among other topics, have wide readership.

Luncheon Seminar Series

ROBERT MABRO,  “THE EGYPTIAN VERSUS THE COSMOPOLITAN ALEXANDRIA"
Thursday, April 30, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Robert Mabro of Oxford will discuss two contrasting stories of the city of his youth and early career.  While the Cosmopolitan Alexandria captured the imagination of the West, of those who read or heard of Cavafy, Durrell and Forster, the Egyptian Alexandria quietly supplied workers to industry, commerce, and civil service, later influencing nationalist struggles for independence.

Ottoman Studies Panel Discussion

“THUGS AND PASHAS: HOUSEHOLDS AND THE POLITICS OF OTTOMAN REFORM IN CAIRO AND ISTANBUL, 1800-1850”
Monday, March 2, 2009 | 4:00pm-6:00pm

• Virginia Aksan (McMaster University), "Husrev Pasha (d. 1855): The Man Behind Mahmud II's Reforms."
• Khaled Fahmy (NYU), "Mehmed Ali: From Thuggery to International Statemanship.”

Visual Culture Series

“WOMEN IN PRISON: CINEMATIC TESTIMONIES FROM TURKEY AND IRAN”
Thursday, March 5, 2009 | 8:00pm-10:30pm

“From Scream to Scream” (Documentary, Iran, 2004, 30 minutes)
“Don’t Let Them Shoot the Kite” (Feature, Turkey, 1989, 90 minutes)

Filmmakers PanteA Bahrami and Feride Çiçekoglu will introduce and discuss their groundbreaking films that analyze women’s experiences as political prisoners in the Middle East. Hosted in conjunction with Women’s Herstory Month at NYU.

Literary Conference

“PRISON, LITERATURE AND CULTURAL POLITICS”
Friday-Saturday, March 6-7, 2009

Friday Location: NYU, King Juan Carlos Building, 53 Washington Square South
Saturday Location: The New School, Wollman Hall, 66 West 12th Street
A literary conference featuring the following writers, critics and filmmakers

• Sinan Antoon
• Fadhil Al-Azzawi
• Livia Alexander
• Ammiel Alcalay
• Banu Bargu
• Fatna El Bouih
• PanteA Bahrami
• Monireh Baradaran 
• Feride Çiçekoglu
• Miriam cooke
• Alex Elinson
• Sabry Hafez
• Barbara Harlow
• Sonallah Ibrahim
• Mehdi Khorrami
• Elias Khoury
• Shahriar Mandanipour
• Esmail Nashif
• Susan Slyomovics
• Shareah Taleghani

Hosted by the Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies at NYU, the Eugene Lang College at the New School for Liberal Arts, and ArteEast (www.arteeast.org).  For more information and a complete schedule, contact Kevorkian.center@nyu.edu

CONCERT

NOUR MIDDLE EAST FOLK ENSEMBLE CONCERT: "FROM IRENE TO ISHTAR”
Sunday, March 8, 2009 | 4:30pm
Location: Kimmel Center, 60 Washington Square South, Eisner Lubin Hall

A benefit concert featuring the polyglot musical band NOUR (Divine Light in Arabic, Pomegranate in Armenian). The band covers folk and/or songs composed in the folk tradition from Balkans to the Gulf including (in alphabetic order) Arabic,  Armenian, Assyrian, Hebrew, Greek, Kurdish, Ladino, Persian and Turkish songs.

Purchase tickets at Kimmel Center’s Ticket Central, purchase online through NYU Home/NYU Life/Ticket Center, or email nourmusic@gmail.com. Cosponsored with the NYU Anatolian Culture Club.

Visual Culture Series

“FILM SCREENING: DISHING DEMOCRACY (2007, 50 minutes)”
Monday, March 9, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Dishing Democracy goes behind the scenes at Arab television channel MBC in Cairo for an inside look at the hit all-female talk show, Kalam Nawaem. The film provides a nuanced portrait of four Arab women harnessing the power of transnational satellite TV to boldly and effectively push social reform. With exclusive access to both the private and the professional lives of the hosts and producers, the cameras capture censorship discussions, tension and camaraderie in the dressing room, and viewer reactions on the Arab street. Hosted in conjunction with Women’s Herstory Month at NYU.

Special Panel Discussion

“HUMAN RIGHTS ACTIVISM IN IRAN: A CONVERSATION WITH WOMEN HUMAN RIGHTS DEFENDERS”
Monday, March 12, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

A group of prominent women activists from Iran will describe their work, their victories and their challenges in promoting human rights in Iran today. Moderated by Hadi Ghaemi, Director, International Campaign for Human Rights in Iran. Hosted in conjunction with Women’s Herstory Month at NYU.

Luncheon Seminar Series

NAJWA ADRA, "THE ANTHROPOLOGY OF DANCE IN THE ARABIAN PENINSULA: WOMEN, CULTURE AND PRIVATE/PUBLIC SPACE IN YEMEN”
Thursday, March 26, 2009 | 12:30pm - 1:45pm

Dr. Najwa Adra has conducted extensive ethnographic fieldwork in Yemen since the late 1970s.   In addition to the anthropology of dance, her research topics include tribal identity and customary law, the impacts of television on a rural community, women’s oral poetry, reproductive health, and women’s roles in agriculture. Hosted in conjunction with Women’s Herstory Month at NYU.

Research Workshop

HOMA HOODFAR, “RELIGIOUS IDIOMS AND RIGHTS-BASED DEMANDS: CAN IRANIAN WOMEN ACT AS AGENTS OF A REFORMATION OF SHIA ISLAM?”
Monday, March 30, 2009 | 5:00pm - 7:00pm

Homa Hoodfar is Professor of Sociology and Anthropology at Concordia University in Montreal. Author of Between Marriage and the Market: Intimate Politics and Survival in Cairo, Professor Hoodfar’s interests span the broad fields of development, human rights and gender issues in Egypt, Iran, Afghanistan and Pakistan.  Diane Singerman, Associate Professor in the Department of Government at the American University, author of Avenues of Participation: Family, Politics, and Networks in Urban Quarters of Cairo will serve as discussant.Hosted in conjunction with Women’s Herstory Month at NYU. 

 Participants in the Kevorkian Center Research Workshop must read the paper in advance.  Papers may be obtained by emailing Kevorkian.center@nyu.edu.

Womenomics: Women, Microfinance, and Cultural Development

Presented by WHM, The Hagop Kevorkian Center for Near Eastern Studies, Oxfam America @ NYU, Panhellenic Council and Asian American Women’s Alliance

Tuesday, March 31, 2009 | 7:00pm - 9:00pm
Location: Shorin Performance Studio, Kimmel 802

Join us as we discuss the importance of women in economic and cultural development, particularly in developing countries. Panelists include representatives from Women for Women International and the Financial Access Initiative. After the panel, we will be holding a shopping dinner party featuring foods and products that are created by New York based collectives and non-profit organizations.