Calls for Participation

Using Games in the MES Classroom

This roundtable will explore how presenters use games, like Reacting To The Past (RTTP) or other types of simulations in the Middle East Studies classroom, broadly defined. It aims to be interdisciplinary and to facilitate a conversation on the practical and pedagogical level about the use of games. Can they teach empathy? Can they help with intercultural understanding? What are their limits? What should instructors keep in mind when utilizing them?

Organized by: Victoria Hightower
Submit your abstract and a short bio to Victoria Hightower ([email protected]) by February 3, 2025. 

Arabic Speculative Literature amidst Destruction, Repression & Trauma

The challenges to Arabic culture today range from the fear of extinction to the loss of one´s home and collective memories, and from war to censorship. How does Arabic literature deal with such severe existential and political threats? How can it preserve cultural heritage, restore hope, and contribute to visions for the future?

The envisaged panel seeks to explore Arabic speculative literature from Palestine and beyond. It welcomes analytical engagements with primary texts as well as conceptual investigations of literary forms which may range from magical realisms to appearances of the fantastic, science fiction, utopias/dystopias, and futurisms.

The panel is inspired by the project “Magical Realisms and Speculative Literature” hosted by Beatrice Gründler at the Cluster of Excellence “Temporal Communities: Doing Literature in a Global Perspective” (Freie Universität Berlin): https://www.temporal-communities.de/research/future-perfect/projects/magical-realisms-speculative-literature/index.htmlhttps://www.temporal-communities.de/research/future-perfect/projects/magical-realisms-speculative-literature/index.html. The project hosts a regular colloquium accessible both in-person and online. If interested in joining these events, please just get in touch.

Organized by: Hanan Natour (Freie Universität Berlin)
Please submit a 300-word abstract and a short bio (150 words) to Hanan Natour ([email protected]) by February 10th.

Capital and Social History in the Middle East

This panel explores the synchronicity and relevance between capital flows and social history in the Middle East, broadly defined. Economic scholarship has construed various abstract frameworks around capital, from theoretical foundations to laws of commodity exchange and metamorphoses of value. These macroeconomic frameworks often rely on dehumanized metrics like currency, profit, productivity, and financial institutions. Yet, capital doesn’t operate in isolation with society; economic systems are embedded in social relations, cultural practices, and power structures. By centering human agencies and their lived experiences in examining global flow of capital, this panel illuminates nuanced historical contingencies and structural changes in social history, offering insights into patterns of crisis, dependency, and inequality.

This panel welcomes scholars from interdisciplinary approaches, with particular focus on the 18th to 20th centuries. Topics include but are not limited to the following:
- Capital and Islamic institutions
- Cultural changes and consumption patterns
- Colonialism, empire, and global capital
- Gender, labor, and capital
- Urbanization and social structures
- Resistance and social movements
- Technology, capital, and society

Organized by: Xiaoyue Yasin Li
Please submit your 300-word abstract and a short bio to Xiaoyue Yasin Li ([email protected]) by February 6, 2025 for full consideration

Internal Migration: Ruralization of Urban Areas

As most of the literature focuses on the process of urbanization, we seek to shed light on the process of the ruralization of urban areas. The session aims to focus on how rural practices, social settings, and values persist and adapt within urban spaces. The process of the ruralization of cities could allow us to better understand certain phenomena, including informal settlements, informal governance structures, resistance to the values of urbanization, and informal economies.

We aim to focus on how internal migration dynamics from rural to urban areas could result in socio-spatial transformation in urban spaces.
This could include (but is not limited to) how ruralization impacts:
1-The cultural landscape of urban areas
2-Housing and spatial organization
3-Economic structures
4-Governance and political participation

Organized by: Sama Alsheikh
Submit your abstract and a short bio to Sama Alsheikh ([email protected]) by February 3, 2025. 

Ottoman and post-Ottoman archaeologies

We invite scholars interested in encounters with and perceptions of the past in the Ottoman Empire and post-Ottoman lands to submit abstracts for a proposed MESA panel. We are especially interested in encounters with and perceptions of the past by diverse communities of the empire/successor states both in the center and provinces. Our focus is on 'indigenous' archaeologies, expanding the cast of characters -both state and non-state actors- that engaged with the topic and understand the reasons and goals of these engagements and perceptions, though we are open to other, similar topics as well. 

Organized by: Artemis Papatheodorou and Ceren Abi
Submit your abstract (no more than 300 words) and a short bio to Ceren ([email protected]) by January 31, 2025. 

Science and Technology Studies in the Middle East

Universities Confronting Genocide: Resistance, Repression, and Transnational Mobilizations

History, Gender, and Genre in Arabic Literature

This session organized by Nada Ayad (Cooper Union) and Brady Ryan (University of Connecticut) explores the intersection of gender, genre, and history in Arabic literature. We invite proposals that address:
- Gendered literary histories
- Gendered literary interventions in history
- Gendered theories of specific genres, gendered innovations and interventions in specific genres, and/or critiques of specific genres
- Connections between women’s movements and literary forms, genres, histories
- Specific authors or works that pose gendered questions of history and/or genre

Organized by: Nada Ayad and Brady Ryan
Submit a 300-word abstract and short bio (under 100 words) to Brady Ryan ([email protected]) by February 6 for full consideration.

Literary Representations of Prostitution

This session organized by Nada Ayad (Cooper Union) and Brady Ryan (University of Connecticut) explores representations of prostitution in literature. We invite proposals that address:
- Specific case studies or comparisons of prostitution in modern or pre-modern literature
- Representations of prostitution in specific genres
- Connections between literary representations of prostitution and the nation and nationalism, modernism and modernity, colonialism and anticolonial critique, women’s movements, and/or the postcolonial state
- Connections between literary representations of prostitution and economies, transactions and exchange between classes, languages, and/or cultures
- Prostitution and literary history
- Prostitution and affect, aesthetics, and/or politics

Organized by: Nada Ayad and Brady Ryan
Submit a 300-word abstract and short bio (under 100 words) to Brady Ryan ([email protected]) by February 6 for full consideration.

Entangled Power: Clinical and Cultural Readings of Sadomasochism

Muslim Women under the Discourse of Indigenous Feminism​​​​​​

In this round table, I would like to touch indigenous feminism as an emancipatory movement regardless of political purposes, which tend to reduce the context of colonization to settler states mostly in North America. It is an effort to find a place for indigenous women who experience “internal colonized Other” under the ethno-theocratic state in Iran. Islamic regime constitutionally suppressing non-Persian and non-Shia Muslim women by the idea of a centralized nation-state and imposing the narrative of political Shia Islam.

Organized by: Naima Mohammadi 
Submit a 300-400 words abstract and a short bio (100-300 words) to Naima Mohammadi ([email protected]) by January 31. 

Feminist Criticism of the Quran

This session will explore the emerging field of feminist criticism of the Quran, examining how gender perspectives can reshape our understanding of the text and its interpretations. As scholars increasingly engage with religious texts through a feminist lens, this discourse invites critical inquiries into the feminist Interpretations, the Quran’s portrayal of women, gender roles, and the implications for contemporary Muslim societies.

Participants will discuss various methodologies employed in feminist critiques, evaluating How feminist interpretations have reproduced patriarchal values ​​under the guise of erasing them. The session will highlight key themes such as the roles women play in Quranic narratives, the implications of language and imagery, and the historical context that shapes these interpretations. By contrasting feminist criticism with feminist readings, we aim to uncover new insights and foster a more inclusive understanding of the Quran.
Additionally, the session will feature case studies that illustrate feminist criticisms of specific verses and narratives in the Quran, showcasing the diversity of thought within this critical framework. We will also consider the challenges faced by scholars in this field, including potential pushback from traditionalist circles and the need for ongoing dialogue.

Join us for a dynamic discussion that celebrates the contributions of feminist and secular scholars to Quranic studies and promotes a re-examination of religious texts that encourages inclusivity and empowerment. Participants will leave with a deeper understanding of feminist criticism and its potential to enrich contemporary conversations around gender and Islam.

Organized by: Zahra Mohagheghian
Submit a 300-word abstract and a short bio (150 words) to Zahra Mohagheghian ([email protected]) by February 10. 

Franklin Books and the Cultural Cold War in Comparative Contexts

This session will bring together scholars working with materials (whether archival or the translated books themselves) related to the Franklin Book Publications program that operated from 1953-1979. There has been a recent surge in interest in Franklin's activities in the Middle East following the rise of scholarship addressing the cultural Cold War, dating back to Frances Stoner Saunders's The Cultural Cold War but more recently represented by studies including but not limited to Greg Barnhisel's Cold War Modernists: Art Literature, & American Cultural Diplomacy; Peter Kalliney's The Aesthetic Cold War: Decolonization and Global Literature; Jini Kim Watson's Cold War Reckonings: Authoritarianism and the Genres of Decolonization; and Pamela Lee's Think Tank Aesthetics: Midcentury Modernism, the Cold War, and the Neoliberal Present, among others. Research directly related to Franklin's activities, however, remains limited to some scattered articles, Amanda Laugesen's 2017 Taking Books to the World: American Publishers and the Cultural Cold War, and Mahdi Ganjavi's 2023 Education and the Cultural Cold War in the Middle East: The Franklin Book Programs in Iran.

Because of the outsize influence Franklin had on book publishing throughout the Middle East, Southwest Asia, and beyond, operating out of offices in Cairo, Beirut, Baghdad, Tabriz, Tehran, Kabul, Lahore, Islamabad, and Dacca, to name only a few, there remain significant opportunities for comparative analysis of Franklin's operations across linguistic and national contexts. I am therefore seeking papers on Franklin's publishing efforts in Arabic, Persian, and Urdu so that we might begin this work together. Papers that situate Franklin within the context of the cultural Cold War are especially welcome, though I am also interested in reading abstracts taking up the United States Information Services/United States Information Agency role in the cultural Cold War as well. The final panel description will reflect the interests of the accepted papers.

Organized by: Levi Thompson
Submit an abstract with a short bio to Levi Thompson ([email protected]) by February 5.

Rethinking Occidentalism: The East Explores the West

Since its tangential emergence in Said’s Orientalism in 1978, the term Occidentalism accrued multiple significations. Most notably, the term is argued to stage a counter- or reverse-discourse of Orientalism, operating on similar dichotomic and oppositional paradigms. Occidentalism, in this light, defines the East’s response to the West and its construction of a “Western other by reversing, so to speak, the Orientalist coin” (El-Enany vii). Numerous studies on the concept of Occidentalism have taken a similar approach, most notably Ian Buruma and Avishai Margalit’s Occidentalism: The West in the Eyes of Its Enemies, which labels Occidentalism as “dehumanizing picture of the West painted by its enemies” (5).

This session queries if we can conceive East-West relations differently, apart from the Orientalist logic that inheres in studies of Occidentalism. It explores novel dynamics in the encounters of “Eastern” travelers, poets, novelists, and among others, with the so-called West—dynamics that do not quite align with, or perhaps even challenge, oppositional, antagonist, and differentialist discourses. In what ways do these texts complicate narratives of alterity? What perspectives do they offer for a more nuanced understanding of East-West relations to move beyond monolithic assumptions? Is it possible that these encounters—rather than painting dehumanizing pictures of the West and provoking resentment and hard feelings—might address “our common human concerns” (Al-Azm 7) that involve both East and West (e.g., violence of modernity, war, gender inequality, environmental concerns, among others)? Can they enact new lines of solidarity between East and West, perhaps even empathetic identifications, that prevalent analytical frameworks are not able to discern? Is Occidentalism a useful term of analysis in this regard? How can we reformulate this concept for a more progressive politics in action?

Organized by: Varol Kahveci
Submit a 300-word abstract with a short bio to Varol Kahveci ([email protected]) by February 5 for full consideration.

Islam in Southeast Asia: Intellectual Sufism, Colonialism, and Cultural Transformations

This session explores the intersection of intellectual Sufism, colonial encounters, and cultural transformations in Southeast Asia, focusing on the pivotal role of Islamic mysticism in shaping regional identities, literature, and resistance movements. Scholars are invited to examine how figures like Hamzah Fansuri bridged Persian Sufi traditions and local cultural contexts, creating a unique synthesis of Islamic thought and Malay literary expression.

The session seeks to investigate the influence of Sufi philosophy on the sociopolitical landscape, particularly its role in anti-colonial discourses and the development of a distinct Southeast Asian Islamic identity. Contributions addressing themes of self-awareness, Unity of Being, poverty, and annihilation, as well as the impact of Persian and Arabic intellectual heritage on the Malay world, are encouraged. By engaging with these intersections, this session aims to illuminate the enduring legacy of Sufism in Southeast Asia's spiritual and cultural transformations.

Reimagining Middle Eastern Studies Classroom: Gaming and Digital Platforms for Pedagogy, Research, and Representation