Pre-CME Conferences 1978
I first joined the IUAES in 1978 upon invitation from late Professor Leela Dube, to the ICAES which was held in New Delhi. I presented a paper in the Women’s session, and late Professor Eleanor Leacock was present, I was totally overwhelmed at this Conference and the personalities I was meeting.
So I first joined this Commission, later I participated in the Pastoral Nomadic Commission as well, and edited a volume of Nomadic Peoples (Guest Editor: Volume 7, No. 2). Later I joined the Urban Commission, upon invitation from late Professor Ghaus Ansari. I became the Executive Secretary of this Commission and edited 4 issues of the Newsletter from 2004-2007.
During the Congress in Florence (2003) I was elected Vice-President of the IUAES , and later in Holland I was appointed Senior-Vice President.
HISTORY OF OUR COMMISSION
Letter to the Secretary General of the IUAES in view of the formation of an area Commission, entitled: Commission of Anthropology of the Middle East, June 27th 2009
Ever since the 1970s, when I attended a conference of the American Anthropological Association for the first time, a question had been with me: Why do anthropologists of the Middle East not have a common forum in the form of a journal or an anthropology association? These turbulent years have posed more burning questions for me, above all the following one: Has the anthropology of the Middle East played its due role as a social science dedicated to writing, describing, explaining and analyzing the everyday life of people in the Middle East? As recent political events have shown, there remains an alarming lack of awareness in most countries of life in the Middle East. Anthropologists, now more than ever, could play an important role in making social and cultural developments in the Middle East more comprehensible to a wider world.
Understanding local discourses and social actions and interpreting them in the light of specific socio-political and historical contexts are crucial processes in anthropological research and are especially urgent in times of war and social unrest. This holds particularly true if, in the long run, we aim for peace and justice. In doing so, we cannot focus exclusively on institutional power and infrastructure and ignore the actual lived experiences and voices of the people who have been suffering from oppression, marginalization and poverty. Due to our academic training and personal experiences as anthropologists working on or originating from the Middle Eastern countries ourselves, we are able and willing to take up this challenge of proposing a Commission at the heart of the International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences.
In 2004 I proposed a journal with the title Anthropology of the Middle East to Berghahn Publishers and ever since we have been publishing this biannual journal regularly. Through this journal the editorial advisory board and the contributors have shown the necessity of this endeavor, and the success of the journal shows the great demand for scholars to analyze/examine through the eyes of anthropologists the reality experienced in the Middle East.
I would like to propose a number of our scientific board members as the forming members of the Commission, and the managing editor as the Executive Secretary of the Commission The latter is familiar with our scientific board and often is in touch with our list of three hundred members. This way we could have a strong beginning, and then we shall definitely form a forum of scholars from various regions of the Middle East. As our work is mainly within cultural anthropology, we would easily cross boundaries to include the cultures of Central Asia which have commonalities with Turkey and Persia. North Africa with its relations to the Arab Middle East will be the western boundaries of our region.
So my proposal at this point for the main positions of the Commission is the following:
Members of our Scientific Council
Soheila Shahshahan Chair Person
Birgit Reinel Executive Secretary
Jean-Pierre Digard, CNRS, Paris, France
Christian Bromberger, Aix-en-Provence, France
Soraya Tremayne, Oxford, UK
Azim Malikov, Uzbekistan
Hassan Chaabi, Tunisia
Aygen Erdentug, Turkey
Participation in Inter-Congresses
IUAES Inter-Congress, Antalya, Turkey, 2010
Convenors: Soraya Tremayne, Marcia Inhorn, Hassan Chaabi & Soheila Shahshahani
Sessions:
1) Encounters between the Local and the Global in the Middle East
2) Material Cultures in the Middle East – Integration or Dispersion?
3) Ritual ad Change in the Middle East
4) Recent Studies in Genetic: Anthropology in the Middle East
IUAES Inter-Congress, Perth, Australia, 2011
SHIFTING VALUES IN MIDDLE EASTERN AND DIASPORIC CONTEXTS: MIGRATION, IDENTITY AND GENERATIONAL
PANEL I, TITLE: Ethnographic innovations in the Middle East: New approaches to knowledge construction, migrant employment and environmental management,
PANEL II TITLE: Shifting values in Middle Eastern and diasporic contexts: Migration, identity and generational change.
IUAES Inter-Congress,Bhabuneswar, India, 2012
Children and Youth in a Changing World, Bhubaneswar, Orissa, India
Paper presented by S.Shahshahani:
“Coming of Age in Tehran 2012: Short Stories by Young Iranian Writers”
Congress 2013, Manchester, England
COMMISSION OF ANTHROPOLOGY OF THE MIDDLE EAST
The Middle East: Is it facing its spring or fall?
I-Changes in Death Rituals in the Middle East
Convenor: Dr. Soraya Tremayne
II-The Middle East: Is it facing its spring or fall?
Convenor: Soheila Shahshahani (Shahid Beheshti University)
III-Ethnicity, language and Religion in the New Middle East
Convenor: Babak Rezvani
IV– Iranian family, kinship and community evolving and emerging in a changing world
Convenor: Professor Mary Elaine Hegland (Santa Claroomra University)
During this meeting, through a vote, Marzieh Kaivanara was elected as the next Executive Secretary.
2014 Report of Commission on the Middle East
Date of establishment: July 2009
Chairperson: Soheila Shahshahani
Executive Secretary: Marzieh Kaivanara
Scientific Committee: Soraya Tremayne, Christian Bromberger, Jean-Pierre Digard and others…
Associated Journal: Anthropology of the Middle East, Berghahn Publishers, first issue: 2006
Keeping the aims of the IUAES Constitution, this area commission attempts to attract and focus on anthropology of the Middle East. This area, passing very critical moments in its life, needs the expertise of anthropologists who study everyday life of people to supplement all the political and economic considerations of the area. We try to have space for all four subfields of anthropology, as reflected in the journal (AME), and as we consider culture of the area, we easily include Central Asia, and Afghanistan and Pakistan in our sessions and journal articles.
The members of the scientific Committee of the Commission have been collaborating through the journal for many years, and we are all persistent to include younger anthropologists from various continents working on the area.
The Middle Eastern diaspora is slowly recognizing our presence and we hope to see them join the scientific committee and Commission panels and sessions through their active participation. We have already had many panels and sessions in the Inter-Congress in Turkey, in Perth, Australia, and Tokyo, in Congress in Manchester, alongside with a photo exhibition, and our Commission meeting as well.
Also, we held a joint panel with Commission on Women in the Inter-Congress in Japan which was concerned with primary to higher education, and its impact on women’s status within or outside the family in rural or urban areas of the Middle East and East Asia.
The journal Anthropology of the Middle East (since 2006-), which is a peer-reviewed journal, will publish commission papers in special topic issues or individually in open issues, according to merit. I must say that I still hold strongly to what I wrote in the first issue of AME:
Recent political events have shown an alarming lack of awareness in Western countries about life in the Middle East. Anthropologists, trained in analyzing local discourses and social actions and their socio-political and historical contexts, can play an important role in making social and cultural developments in the Middle East more comprehensible to a wider world.
This important new journal provides a forum for scholarly exchange between anthropologists and other social scientists working in and on the Middle East. The journal’s aim is to disseminate, on the basis of informed analysis and insight, a better understanding of Middle Eastern cultures and thereby to achieve a greater appreciation of Middle Eastern contribution to our culturally diverse world.
This year (2014) we shall be giving a Zubaydah Ashkanani prize of $2000 to the best article of Anthropology of the Middle East.
In November our Chair accompanied by a colleague (Danila Mayer) acquired the acceptance of two colleagues in Krakow Poland to hold yearly Commission Conferences there. This will bring more cohesion and collaboration amongst our members.
Conference of Commission on the Middle East of the IUAES
International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences
Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology: Gołębia 9, 31-007 Kraków, Poland
9-11 September, 2015
Organized by Soheila Shahshahani & Soraya Tremayne
Program
September 9th
Plenary Session
Chair – Professor. Homa Hoodfar,University of Concordia, Canada
Dr. Hab. Marcin Brocki, Head of the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Uniwersytet, Jagierllonski W Krakowie, “Welcome Speech”
Professor Anna Krasnowolska, University of Krakow
“Middle Eastern Studies and Iranology at Our University”
Dr. Allesandra Peruzzetto, Program Specialist for Archaeology and the Middle East, World Monument Fund
“An Overview of Endangered Cultural Heritage in the Middle East”
Dr. Soraya Tremayne, Oxford University, UK
“Anthropology of the Middle East?”
Dr. Soheila Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University, Iran
“Anthropology of the Middle East or Anthropology of Disaster”
Professor Mohammad Shahbazi, Jacksonville University, FL, USA
“Social Determinants of Health and Engaged Anthropology”
Panel I: Research Methodology in Practice: Women and Politics, Legal Empowerment, and Disability Rights
Part 1-Chair –Dr. Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University, NJ, USA
Dr. Mona Tajali, Oxford University, UK
“Researching Election Campaigns from the Inside Out: Women and Major Elections in Turkey”
Dr. Sachiko Hosoya, Oxford University, UK
“Ethical Discussions on Premarital / Prenatal Diagnosis: Case Studies of the Thalassemia Prevention Programme in Iran”
Dr. Sahar Maranlou, Oxford University, UK
“How to Measure Legal Empowerment?”
Part 2- Chair – Professor. Homa Hoodfar, University of Concordia, Canada
Dr. Gulnora Ganieva, Institute of History at the Academy of Sciences, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Gender Sociology: Condition, Problems and Prospects in Society, Transformation of Women’s Roles?”
September 10th
Panel II: Everyday Life in the Middle East: Political, Legal and Economic
Chair -Dr Shoheila Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University, Iran
Dr. Leonardo Schiocchet, Austrian Academy of Sciences Institute for Social Anthropology (ISA), Austria
“Critique, Comparison, Suffering and the Middle East”
Ms. Monireh Mohammadi, Oxford University, UK
“State Violence and Cultural Trauma”
Dr. Babak Rezvani, University of Amsterdam, Netherlands
“Central Asia and the Caucasus”
Dr. Avazbek Ganiyev, Tashkent State Institute of Oriental Studies, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Impact of Religious Obligation ‘Zakat’ to the Welfare of the Society in Contemporary Muslim States”
Dr. Krzysztof Lalik, Jagiellonian, University of Krakow & Institute of Middle and Far Eastern Studies and Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Poland
“Relations Between Christians and Muslims in Iraqi Kurdistan- The Case of Ankawa and Koya”
Panel III: Music in the Middle East and Central Asia
Convenor: Dr. Gay Breyley, University of Monash, Australia
“‘Intensive Collectivity’: Collaborative Art and Music Practices in Urban Iran”
Dr. Latofat Tolibjonova, State Institute of Arts and Culture of Uzbekistan, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Music and Society:To’y,Social Transformation and Musical Construction of New Uzbek”
Dr. Iroda Dadadjanova, State Institute of Arts and Culture of Uzbekistan, Uzbekistan
“A Woman Who Sings: Representation of Uzbek Divas in a New Socio-Cultural Space”
Panel IV: Family and Ritual Studies
Convenor –Dr Soraya Tremayne, Oxford University, UK
Professor Aftandil Erkinov, Tashkent State Institute of Oriental Studies, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Urbanisation and Modernization as a Stimulus of Deconstruction of Patriarchal Family”
Dr. Zyoda Rasulov, National University of Uzbekistan, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Ethno-Psycholinguistic Experimental Survey of Marriage and Family Relations Concepts”
Dr. Maxim Yosefi, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel
“Collective Ritual in Tribal Arabic Poetry”
Ibrahim Alkoraan, Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, Israel
“The Bedouin community in the Negev- traditional Bedouin law vs. the Israeli legal system: Has the Israeli legal system superseded traditional Bedouin law in the Negev?”
September 11th
Panel V: Philosophical Bases of Anthropology
Chair –Dr Leonardo Schiocchet,Austrian Academy of Sciences Institute for Social Anthropology (ISA), Austria
Dr. Ravshan Nazarov, Academy of Science, Republic of Uzbekistan
“Daily Occurrence Anthropology: Basic Principles”
Dr. Viloyat Aliyeva, Academy of Sciences, Uzbekistan
“Modern Youth: Cultural and Anthropological Approaches”
Panel VI: Practical Future Considerations
Next year: Should we go to the IUAES Inter-Congress?
Regional Distribution of Responsibilities
Election of the Committee Members
The International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences (I U A E S)
Conference of Commission of Anthropology of the Middle East
“Migration, Change and Continuity:
Kinship, Religion, Politics, Visual, in Retrospect and Beyond”
Krakow, Poland (7-9 August, 2016)
Chair of the Commission: Dr. Soheila Shahshahani
Executive Secretary of the Commission: Dr. Marzieh Kavianara
Scientific Committee:
Dr Soraya Tremayne, University of Oxford
Professor Mary Hegland, Santa Clara University
Professor Yamagishi, Meiji University
Dr Danila Mayer, University of Applied Sciences
Dr Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University
Dr Mona Tajali, Agnes Scott College
Dr Sahar Maranlou, University of Oxford
Programme
August 7th
Dr S. Shahshahani: Welcome Note to Participants
Dr Hab. Marcin Brocki, Head of the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology: Welcome to Jagierllonski Uniwersytet
Professor Anna Krasnowolska: “The Magic of Fruit Trees in Iran and Poland”
Panel I: The Emerging Kinship in Changing Middle East
Organiser and Chair: Dr. Soraya Tremayne
Dr Zuzanna Olszewska, University of Oxford
“The Heart’s Secret No More? The Shifting Meanings of Love and Companionate Marriage Among Young Afghans”
Dr Azim Malikov, Institute of History of Academiy of Sciences, Tashkent
“Kinship System Among Khoja Groups in Southern Kazakhstan”
Krzysztof Lalik, Jagiellonian University of Krakow
“Tribal Mechanisms In Contemporary Social Live Among Kurds in Iraq”
Dr Mitra Asfari, Universite de Paris (Descartes)
“Kinship Among the Qorbat of Babol in Tehran”
Sachiko Hosoya, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies “Choosing A Unique Life As A Thalassemia Patient: Biological Citizenship and Marriage Partner Preferences Of People With a Genetic Illness in Turkey and Iran”
Panel II: Migration, Change and Continuity
Organiser: Dr. Danila Mayer
Chair: Professor Yamagishi
Dr Danila Mayer, University of Applied Sciences, Austria. “Puppets Play War: Wael Shawky’s Cabaret Crusades”
Ibrahim Algoraan, Ben-Gurion University of Negev
“Bedouin Society: Immigration, Continuity and Change”
Panel III: Anthropologists of the Middle East in Retrospect
Organiser: Dr S. Shahshahani
Chair: Dr Fakhri Haghani
Dr Matthias Battis, University of Oxford
“A Window in the History of Ethnography in Soviet Tajikistan:
The Archive of Antonina Pisarchik (1907-1995) in Cracow’s Institute of Iranian Studies”
Dr Soheila Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University
“Nasser Khosrow Qobadiyani’s Travel Account or Daily Notebook of an Anthropologist in Retrospect”
August 8th
Panel IV: Popular Religious Practices and Perceptions
Organiser and Chair: Prof. Mary Hegland
Amina Tawasil, University of New Mexico
“The Art of the Chador: Practice and Play among Iranian Howzevi (Seminarians)”
Professor Edith Szanto, The American University of Iraq
“The Final Tear: Pious Bodies, Affective Economies, and Sacred Space in Contemporary Iraqi Arbaeen Practices”
Professor Erika Loeffler Friedl, Western Michigan University
“God and People in Folkloric Texts from Boir Ahmad, Iran”
Professor Kim Shively, Kutztown University
“Answering Debt: Charity and Eschatological Anxiety in the Age of Turkish Prosperity”
Zep Kalb, University of Oxford
“The Neither Dulati nor Khosusi: Civil Society, Creativity and Islam in Qom’s Religious Academia”
Panel V: Negotiating Political Inclusion: Women and Party Politics in the Middle East and North Africa
Organisers: Professor Homa Hoodfar & Mona Tajali
Chair: Professor Kim Shively
Sabah Ikhmayes, Vrije Universiteit
“The Implications of Gender Quota in Palestine as a Conflict-torn, Divided Society”
Mona Tajali, Agnes Scott College
“Women and Party Politics in Turkey and Iran”
Katarina Skrabakova, Comenius University in Bratislava
“Islamic Women as Candidates in Elections: Comparison of PJD in Morocco and Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt”
Sarah Fischer, Marymount University
“Women in Islamic Political Parties: Increasing Visibility, Utility and Power?”
Sawsan Samara, King Hossein Foundation
“Are Educated Jordanian Women Really Interested in Seeking Leadership Positions in Jordanian Public and Political Sector?”
Business Meeting of the Commission on the Middle East
Agenda: Location of our meeting in 2017
IUAES Membership
AME News
August 9th
Panel VI: Beyond Theories; Doing Research in the Middle East
Organisers: Professor Yamagishi Tomoko & Dr. Sahar Maranlou
Chair: Soheila Shahshahani
Mary Hegland, Santa Clara University
“Anthropological Field Research in the Iranian Revolution and in the Islamic Republic”
Yamagishi Tomoko, Meiji University, Tokyo
“Beyond the Dialectic of Globalisation Theories; Far East visual Culture Entering Middle East”
Sahar Maranlou, University of Oxford
“Understanding Pubic Perceptions about Law & Society”
Panel VII: Visual Culture, Law and Gender in the Middle East and North Africa
Organiser: Dr Fakhri Haghani
Chair: Professor Erika Loeffler
Zuzanne Blajet, Jagiellonian University
“How Powerful Slogans Are? Language Policy and Social Change On the Example of the Shughni language in the Republic of Tajikistan
Farniyaz Zaker, University of Oxford
“Urban Space as a White Canvas: The Politics of Space in Twentieth Century Iran”
Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University
“What is ‘Visual’ about the Refugee Crisis?”
Panel VIII: Research in Progress
Chair: Prof. Mary Hegland, Santa Clara University
Marzieh Kaivanara, University of Bristol
“Medicalisation of Beauty and Consumption of Health: The Case of Tehran”
Sara Lenehan, London School of Economics “Fake luxury fashion brands and their uses in Tehran”
Students participating in the Conference would be welcomed to present their research and benefit from the presence of scholars to enhance their work. Discussion follows.
Round Table Discussion: Anthropology and the Middle East
The International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences
(I U A E S)
Commission on Anthropology of the Middle East
Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology
Jagiellonian University, Krakow, Poland
August 10-12, 2017
“Continuity and Change:
Diaspora, Religion, Kinship, Food, Art and Architecture”
Organized by:
Chair of the Commission: Dr. Soheila Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University
Executive Secretary of the Commission: Dr. Marzieh Kaivanara, University of Bristol, UK,
Scientific Committee:
Dr. Soraya Tremayne, University of Oxford, UK.
Professor Mary Hegland, Santa Clara University, USA.
Professor Kim Shively, Kutztown University, Pennsylvania, USA.
Professor Tomoko Yamagishi, Meiji University, Tokyo.
Dr. Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University, N.J., USA.
Dr. Danila Mayer, University of Applied Sciences, St. Poelten, Austria
PROGRAMME
Welcome Note to Participants
Dr. S. Shahshahani: Welcome to Participants
Dr. Hab. Marcin Brocki, Head of the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Jagiellonian University.
“Creating and Professing the Myth of the Middle East and Refugees in Contemporary Poland: Introductory Remarks”
Panel I: The Cultural Expression of the Relationship Between Human/God Through Oral or Written Culture
Organiser and Chair: Prof. Kim Shively, Kutztown University, Pennsylvania
Anna Łukjanowicz, Hamad bin Khalifa University, Qatar
“Muhajirun, the Muslim Expats. Experiences of Western Converts to Islam in Qatar”
Prof. Kim Shively, Kutztown University
“Good Deeds and Sincere Hearts: Hopes of Salvation among Members of the Turkish Gülen Movement”
Dr. Marie Sato, JSPS
“Islamic NGOs and their Provision of Urban Refugee Protection in Jordan”
Dr. Sachiko Hosoyo, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
“Supporting Negotiation with God: Examples of Spiritual Care for End-Stage Cancer Patients and Their Families in Isfahan”
Dr. Liyakat Takim, McMaster University
“Rituals and Pilgrimages in Kerbala”
Stefan Williamson Fa, University College London
“Voices of Regret: Sound, Performance and Listening in Contemporary Turkish Shi’ism”
Dr. Mateusz M. Kłagisz, Jagiellonian University
“The Omar-košân Festival and some Polish Parallel Observances”
Prof. Hiroshi Nawata, Akita University
“Methods for Selecting and Processing Red Sea Black Coral into Muslim Prayer Beads in Cairo, Egypt”
Panel II: Middle Eastern Diaspora in Europe and in Latin America
Organised by Dr. Leonardo Schiocchet (ISA, Austria) & Prof. Cecília Baeza (PUC-SP) & Prof. Paulo Pinto (UFF)
Chair: Dr. Leondardo Socchio
Dr. Schiocchet Leonardo, Institute for Social Anthropology, Austria
“Home, (im)mobility, and belonging among Palestinian
Prof. Paulo G. Pinto, Universidade Federal Fluminense, Brazil
“Ambiguous Differences: Constructions of Arab/Syrian-Lebanese Identities in Brazil”
Prof. Cecília Baeza, University of Brasilia
“The Palestinian Diaspora in Brazil in Perspective”
Liza Dumovich, Fluminense Federal University
“Following the Prophet’s Path: Narrating Migration in the Hizmet Community in Brazil”
Yutaka Takaoka, The Middle East Research Institute of Japan & Aiko Nishikida, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
“Syrian and Palestinian Diaspora: Their Experience and Consciousness of Migration”
Yuko Suzuki-Monatte, Azad University, Tehran
“Iranian Migrants in French Society– A Comparative Study of Immigration Politics and Cultural Elements to Integration”
Dr. Sophie Roche, University of Heidelberg
“The Religious Infrastructure of the Cathedral Mosque in Moscow between Political Loyalty and Sociality of Migrants”
Panel III: Middle East in Distress, Roundtable Presentation and Discussion
Organiser and Chair: Dr. S. Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran
All participants are invited to give their views, and summary will be made to make a Statement from our Commission to the IUAES
Panel IV: Food, Family, and Fellowship: The Ethnography of Culinary Work in The Middle East
Organisers: Prof. Mary Hegland & Prof. Nefissa Naguib, University of OsloChair: Prof. Nefissa Naguib
Dr. Saideh Saidi, Bremen University
“Food and Identity: Changes in Afghan Culinary Culture”
Anna Zadrożna, University of Oslo
“Circulation of Foods within a Diaspora: Foods, Belongings, and Sensory Experience”
Dr. Ayisha Khansaheb, New York University Abu Dhabi
“Life Histories and Shared Platters: Food, Religion, and the Values of Senior Emirati Women”
Dr. Reik Otsubo, The University of Tokyo
“Changing Meanings of Qat Consumption in Sana’a, Yemen”
Panel V: 4. Gender and Religion
Organiser and Chair: Dr. Soraya Tremayne, University of Oxford & Prof. Nefissa Naguib, University of Oslo
Dr. Paulina Niechciał, Jagiellonian University “Women in Zoroastrianism in the Contexts of Gender Relations in Iran”
Dr. Jabbar Rahmani, Institute for Social and Cultural Studies, Tehran & Dr Mehri Tayebinia
“Women’s Reflexive Identity in Redefinition of Spirituality: Case Study: Women Who Are Employed And Have Higher Education In Iran”
Dr. Sahar Maranlou, University of Essex
“Sharia, Gender and Personal Status: Understanding Public Legal Culture”
Dr. Magdalena Rodziewicz, University of Warsaw
“The Phenomenon of ‘White Marriages’ in Iran – Legal Perspective”
Anna Zadrożna, University of Oslo
“The Lions’ Milk: Women and Consumption of Alcohol in Turkey”
Dr. Erol Saglam, University of London
“Islamic Practices in a Gendered Prism: Normativity, Masculinity, and Public in the Turkish Context”
Dr. Saideh Saidi, Bremen University
“Exacerbation in Tensions between Change and Loyalty, case study: Afghan Migrant Women’s Religious Identity in Germany”
Corinne Fortier, CNRS
“The Right to Divorce for Women (khul‘) in Islam: Gender and Practices in Mauritania”
Panel VI: Anthropology of Art and Architecture in the Middle East
Organiser & Chair: Dr. Farniyaz Zaker, University of Oxford
Prof. Anna Krasnawolska, Uniwersytet Jagiellonski
“Tracking the Vanishing Old Tehran in Zoyā Pirzād’s Novel Adat mikonim”
Dr. Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University
“Egyptian Women, Revolution, and the Making of a Visual Public Sphere”
Shokoufeh Arvin, Alzahra University, Tehran & Golsadat Seyed Mahdavi
“The “Others” in Iranian Movies on the Subject of Iran-Iraq War (Based on Ideas of Bakhtin)”
Nasim Yazdani, Deakin University, Australia
“Linking Ideology, Habitus and Landscape, Traditional and Contemporary Uses of Gardens and Parks in Iran”
Kenichi Tani, Hitotsubashi University, Japan
“A Study On the Bodily Aspect of Hussein’s Mourning Ritual in Iran”
Sara Bamdad, University of Warwick
“Physical Boundaries and Beyond: The Spatial, The Social And The Embodied in an Infertility Treatment Clinic in Iran”
Discussion and Announcement of Zubaydeh Ashkanani Prize
Panel VII: Documentary Film Screening
Chair: Dr. Danila Mayer
Rona Sela: “Looted and Hidden – Palestinian Archives in Israel”
Panel VII: Ethno-history of the Middle East
Organiser and Chair: Dr. Fakhri Haghani, Rutgers University
Dr. S. Shahshahani, Shahid Beheshti University
“Culture and Governance in Pre-Islamic Persian Literature”
Dr. Kaseim Sh. Al Sultani, Al Nahrain State University, Iraq
“The Sectarian Conflict in Iraq in the Seventeenth Century and after: A study of its Causes and Extensions”
Prof. Tomoko Yamagishi, Meiji University
“Preparatory Study for the Ethnography of Mobile-phone Usage in the Middle East”
Dr. Matthias Battis, Higher School of Economics’ Centre for Historical Research, St. Petersburg
“Russian Oriental Studies and the 1934 Ferdowsi Milenary Celebration”
Khalil A. Arab, Jagiellonian University
“Matrimonial Traditions in Pre-Islamic (Zoroastrian) Afghanistan: Focusing on Epic Poetry Mainly Shāhnāmeh of Ferdawsi”
Dr. Kenichiro Takao, Tokyo University of Foreign Studies
“Development of Hisba in Today’s Muslim Society: “Religious Police” and its Scope of Operation”
Panel VIII: Anthropological Perspectives of Documentary Films About Women in the Middle East
Organised by Prof. Esther Hertzog, Levinsky Academic College, Tel Aviv. & Prof. Yael Katzir, Beit Berl Academic College, Kfar Saba, Israel.
Chair: Prof. Esther Hertzog
Prof. Yael Katzir, Berl Academic College.
“Coping With the Military And The Religious Male Clubs”
Dr. Abeer Zeibak Haddad, Beit Berl Academic College.
“Our Silence is a License to Murder”
Prof. Esther Hertzog, Levinsky Academic College.
“Anthropological Perspectives of Documentary Films about Women in the Middle East”
Business Meeting of the Commission of Anthropology of the Middle East and Closure of the Conference
Agenda
ISSC Meeting in Japan this Fall, should our Commission Participate?
Next year we shall meet in Florianopolis, Brazil, it will be the 18th Congress of IUAES, entitled The Past, Present and Future of Anthropological Knowledge, the date will be July 16-20th, 2018.
Should we Hold Joint Commission Sessions?
Titles for our Sessions in Brazil
Structure of our Commission: Adding Regional Representatives?
Publication of Conference Papers
From the IUAES Document on Commissions 2019:
Anthropology of The Middle East
Chair: Dr. Soheila Shahshahani: Soheilairan@gmail.com,
Associate Professor of Anthropology, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran, Iran.
Executive Secretary: Farniyaz Zaker: Farniyaz.zaker@googlemail.com
During 2019 we had our Commission Meeting in Krakow, Poland at the Jagiellonian University, with the support of Dr. Marcin Brocki, Head of the Institute of Ethnology and Cultural Anthropology, Jagiellonian University. We held our meeting in a lovely place at Archaeology department. I am including our three days program so that you familiarize yourself with our Conferences (Addendum I).
Every year we hold a Business Meeting where besides discussing changes in executive positions, as we had last year; we also propose sessions for the year after. I am also including that so that you see how we work from one year till the other (Addendum II). During the Business Meeting we parted the news to all that Dr. Marzieh Kaivanara who was the executive secretary of the Commission had decided due to personal reasons and scholarly considerations, to leave the Commission. We opened up the floor for proposals and finally Dr. Farniyaz Zaker (Oxford) became new executive secretary. I must add that we have regional representatives for our Commission, and this way we try to activate members to participate and introduce their colleagues of their geographical area to come to Commission meetings.
I U A E S
International Union of Anthropological and Ethnological Sciences
Commission on the Middle East
in cooperation with Orient-Institut Istanbul
The Re-invention of Traditions in the Middle East
PANELS, ABSTRACTS, BIOGRAPHIES
Online via Zoom, August 7-9, 2021
Chair of the Commission: Dr Soheila Shahshahani
Executive Secretary of the Commission: Dr Farniyaz Zaker
Technical Hosting: Dr Katja Rieck
Day 1: August 7th, 2021
9:30–9:40 Registration
9:40 -9:50 Dr Soheila Shahshahani: Welcome Note to Participants
9:50-10:00 Dr Richard Wittmann: Welcome Note to Participants (Orient-Institut Istanbul)
Panel I: Research in Progress
Convenor: Dr Soheila Shahshahani
- Professor Christian Bromberger: “Eyes and Eyebrows among other ways of Communication and Beautification”
- Dr Azim Malikov: “Transformation of the Veneration of the Islamic Saints of Samarkand in the Context of Religious Policy in Uzbekistan”
- Dr Sara Bamdad: “Perceptions of Trans Bodies in Iran: A Review of the Literature”
- Wesam Hassan: “Lotteries in Istanbul: Entangled Realities of Luck and Fate”
- Ana Clara Alves de Oliveira: “Veiled Faces, Exotic bodies: An Ethnographic Study About the Female Photographic Images in the Pierre de Gigord’s Ottoman Photographic Collections”
Panel II: NGOs or another face of nations in the Middle East
Convenors: Dr Anna Romanowicz and Dr Daniel Tower
Dr Nahal Nafici: “Re-articulations of Doing Good and Doing Well at the turn of the Iranian Century”
- Massumeh Hosseini Toosi: “New Face of Iranian Charities: Policy and Practice”
- Dr Anna Romanowicz: “Class Dimension and NGOs’ Politics of ‘Doing Good’”
Panel III: Religion and Everyday Life: Shaping Religious Identities, Performing Social Practices
Convenors: Dr Liza Dumovich and Dr Paulo Pinto
- Dr Paulo Pinto: “Secrecy and Reconfigurations of Druze Identity in Brazil”
- Dr Liza Dumovich: “A Conditioned Agency: Women, Discipline and Space in the Gülen Community in Brazil”
- Dr Bruno Ferraz Bartel: “The power of Musical Aesthetics: Ritual and Emotion in contemporary Moroccan Sufism”
- Burcu Kalpaklioglu: “Dower and Materiality in Religiously Committed Women’s Life Narratives in Istanbul”
- Amir Najafi: “Induced liminality; The Case of Shia Mourning in Iran”
- 16:20-16:40 Anna Maria Raietparvat: “Iranians and the Elamites: Iranian Christian Transnational Networks”
Panel IV: Is Patriarchy in Crisis in the Middle East?
Convenor: Dr Soraya Tremayne
- Professor Janet Afary & Professor Roger Friedland: “Non-Standard Marriages or Unions in the Contemporary Middle East, North Africa, and South Asia: A Facebook Survey”
- Professor Mary Hegland: “Social, Cultural, Economic, and Political Changes Allow Closer Wife-Husband Relationships: Five Stories of Marital Devotion from Shiraz”
- Professor Esther Hertzog, Dr Assaf Lev, and Dr Moshe Levy: “Patriarchy in Disguise: Regaining Male dominance through the Ninja Competition”
- Thomas McGee: “Born of ISIS Genocide: Challenging Nationality Acquisition and Religious Identity Construction for Children of Yezidi Survivors”
Day 2: August 8th, 2021
Panel V: Is there a Middle Eastern Body?
Convenors: Dr Claudia Liebelt and Dr Melike Sahinol, “Introductory Remarks”
Discussant: Dr Sertaç Sehlikoglu
Session I: Regulating the “Middle Eastern” Body
- Dr Cimen Gunay-Erkol and Dr Gunes Sezen: “Iskat-I Cenin”: Ahmed Rasim’s Critical Approach to Ottoman Bodies”
- Dr Dani Kranz: Unwanted Bodies in Israel: Non-Jewish, Female, Partners and Spouses of Israeli Citizens
- Dr Mellike Sahinol and Dr Burak Taxdizen: “Colonizing Men’s Bodies: Nature Culture Metaphors Around Hair Transplantation”
Session II: (Re)Imagining the “Middle Eastern” Body
- Dr Mathew Gagne: “Queer Male Desire in Beirut and the Production of Abstract Distinctions between Middle Eastern and Non-Regional Bodies”
- Dr Hande Guzel: “(Re)producing the Gendered Middle Eastern Body in Academic Discourse”
- Kamran Behrouz and Setarreh Fatehi: “a Diasporic Parallax”
Panel VI: Making of Cultural Hero and Heroine
Convenor: Dr Bozena Gierek
- Dr Pedro Bogossian-Porto: “The making of a Hero: Nokol Pashinyan’s Journey in the Armenian Velvet Revolution”
- Dr Joanna Bocheńska: “From Namûs to Dignity: Challenging the Image of Faithful Woman in the Modern Kurdish Literary and Cinema Narratives”
- Dr Bozena Gierek: “Power of Media in Making Hero: An Example of Turkish Ertuğrul”
Panel VII: Re-articulation of Tradition: Discourse Shift, Cultural Change and Politics
Convenor: Dr Mehrdad Arabestani
- Professor Mary E. Hegland & Maryam Karimi: “Considering Cultural Change in the Tradition and Religiously-Advised Practice of Child/Early Marriage in Iran”
- Mehrdad Arabestani: White Hājī Fīrūz: Avant-garde or Conservative?
- Dr Jabbar Rahmani: “Nowruz as a Context of Negotiation Between Society and Political System”
- Maral Sahebjame: “Transforming the Marriage Discourse in Iran”
Panel VIII: Commission Meeting (All participants are invited to be present at this meeting)
- Announcement of the winner of the Zubeydah Ashkanani Prize for the best article of the year 2019
- Discussion on Title for the Commission Meeting of Next year
- Proposal of specific Panels
- Other Views and Perspectives
Day 3: August 9th, 2021
Panel IX: Educational Perspective on Immigration in the Middle East
Convenor: Dr Esther Hertzog:
- Dr Esther Hertzog: “Discourse of Integration and Practices of Separation: The Absorption of Ethiopian Immigrants’ Children in the Israeli Educational System”
- Dr Adi Binhas: ‘Immigration Policy vis-à-vis Teachers’ Views Regarding Immigrant Students: The Israeli Case”
- Janet Cohen: “Ideologically-Motivated Migration to Development Towns and its Influence on the Potential for Educational Mobility of the Local Community”
- Professor Anna Krasnowolska: “School Memories of the Iranians – A Preliminary Report”
11:30 Panel X: Visual Anthropology (film screening)
Convenor: Mina Rad
Dr Narges Bajoghli: Skin That Burns (25 min)
Abtin Sarabi: The people of the wind (Ahle Hava) (57 min)
Mina Rad: Persian Tales, Jean-Rouche in Iran (59 min)