Weekend Scholarship Roundup

SCHOLARSHIP ROUNDUP

On Islamic Law

• In Disenchanting the Caliphate: The Secular Discipline of Power in Abbasid Political Thought (Columbia University Press, 2023), Hayrettin Yücesoy (Saint Louis University) argues that “the ulema’s discourse of religious governance and the political thought of lay intellectuals diverged during this foundational period, with enduring consequences.”
• In “The Contribution of the Islamic and Social Banks to the Concept of Sustainable Development” (European Journal of Islamic Finance 10, no. 2 (2023)), Karim Aboul-Dahab (Graduate School of Business) “investigate[s] the similarities between Islamic and social banks.”
• In “Aqilahh in Islam: Meaning, Necessity and Rules” (SSRN, September 6, 2023), Liaqat Ali Khoso argues that “[t]he Islamic concept of security to the human being is far lasting and is secured in each and every manner.”

On Islam and Data Science

• A recent Pew Research Center survey found that “[a] whopping 86 per cent of Malaysian Muslims polled recently are in support of making the Shariah code the ‘official law'” in Malaysia or wherever Muslims are a majority. The survey further found that “in comparison, just 64 per cent of Muslims polled in Indonesia felt the same way.”
• In “Comparing the Performance of Google Translate and SYSTRAN on Arabic Lexical Ambiguity” (AWEJ for Translation & Literary Studies 7, no. 3 (2023)), Hamad Abdullah H. Aldawsari (College of Arts and Sciences, Prince Sattam Bin AbdulAziz University) “investigates how two popular MT systems, Google Translate and SYSTRAN, handle three problematic linguistic features of the Arabic language: homonyms, heteronyms, and polysemes.”

FIELD GUIDE TO ISLAMIC LAW ONLINE: RECENT SOURCES

The Field Guide to Islamic Law Online is an ever-growing collection of links to hundreds of links to primary sources and archival collections around the world, online.We recently added new resources to this list:

• One Look Thesaurus: Islamic or Arabic Contexts provides a list of approximately 100 terms that relate to Islam and Islamic law, with a brief explanatory description accompanying each term.

UPCOMING EVENTS AND OPPORTUNITIES

PIL & Harvard Calendar:

• Student work opportunity: Research assistant, Widener Library, Harvard University.

Global Calendar:

• Conference: Celebrating the scholarship and teaching of Prof. Christopher Melchert, Pembroke College, Oxford, September 25, 2023.
• Position opening: 3-year Postdoctoral Research Fellowships in History, Magdalene College, Cambridge, 2024, September 29, 2023.
• Call for Abstracts: Thematic Dossier on the Indian Ocean, September 30, 2023.
• Call for Abstracts: The 3rd Malikussaleh International Conference on Law, Legal Studies, and Social Sciences, September 30, 2023.
• Position opening: Tenure-track assistant professor in 19th century Middle East history, Yale University, October 1, 2023.
• Position opening: Assistant Professor in Southeast Asian history, Brown University, October 2, 2023.
• Position opening: Associate or Full Indigenous and/or Black Professor, Osgoode Hall Law School, York University, October 10, 2023.
• Call for Papers: Symposium on Copyright in Islamic Legal Tradition, ISAR Research Center, Istanbul, October 15, 2023.
• Call for Papers: American Oriental Society’s 234th Meeting, October 15, 2023.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Cyrenaica on the eve of the Islamic conquest through epigraphy and numismatics, October 18, 2023.
• Fall 2023 Works-in-Progress Workshop: Comparative Constitutional Law in the Global South, Columbia Law School, October 20-21, 2023.
• Call for Papers: Law and Society Association Annual Meeting Unsettling Territories: Tradition and Revolution in Law and Society, October 24, 2023.
• Fellowship: The American Research Institute in Turkey (ARIT), 2024-25, November 1, 2023.
• Conference: MESA’s 57th Annual Meeting, Montréal, Québec, Canada, November 2-5, 2023.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): The emirate of the Banū Tellīs in the 15th c. CE, November 22, 2023.
• Call for Papers: Annual Conference of the British Association for Islamic Studies, December 14, 2023.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Shedding light on some Islamic sites and buildings in Cyrenaica, December 20, 2023.
• Position opening: Adjunct Lecturer in Modern Middle East, Babson College.
• Call for Applications: Interdisciplinary Scholars of Places, Movement and Cultural Practices Professor, New York University Abu Dhabi. Deadline: until the position is filled.
• Research Project: Historian/Researcher – Tudor Period/Elizabethan Era, and the Ottoman Empire during the Suleiman the Magnificent Period. Deadline: until the position is filled.
• Call for Submissions: The UCLA School of Law’s Journal of Islamic and Near Eastern Law (JINEL).
• Call for Manuscripts: Advances in the Study of Islam, Edinburgh University Press.
• Request for Open Submissions: AALS 2023 Annual Meeting, January 4-7, 2023. Submission deadlines vary.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): The jurisprudential corpus and the history of Ibadism in medieval Libya: additions and difficulties, January 24, 2024.
• Position opening: Postdoctoral opportunity in History of Islam/Arabic Studies, Leiden University, February 1, 2024.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Looking for Libya in Coptic-Arabic historiographical sources, February 21, 2024.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Partnership for Heritage. Documentation and heritage management for the protection of the Nafousa Mountains, April 17, 2024.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Between Ṭarābulus and Aṭrābulus. The journey of the toponym and difficulties in determining its form, May 22, 2024.
• Webinar: Revisiting the History of Medieval Libya (7th-16th centuries): Surveying and documentation of the archaeological city of Barca (Al-Marj), June 26, 2024.
• Symposium on Copyright in Islamic Legal Tradition, Istanbul, June 28-29, 2024.
• Search for Editor: International Journal of Middle East Studies, until an appointment is made.
• MEM Fellowship for Graduate Students of Color.
• Scholarship: Islamic Scholarship Fund CAMBA Law Scholarship 2023.
• Internship opportunity: The Executive Office of the President, White House, various deadlines.
• Position opening: Academic mentor and field researcher in Iraq, Cordoba Peace Institute-Geneva (CPI) & ETH Zurich, rolling basis.
• Position opening: Academic mentor for researcher in Mogadishu, Cordoba Peace Institute-Geneva (CPI) & ETH Zurich.
• Position opening: Assistant Professor of Modern Middle Eastern History, University of Tennessee, Fall 2022. Deadline: until an appointment is made.
• Position opening: Postdoc at the Center for Social Concerns and the Ansari Institute for Global Engagement with Religion at the University of Notre Dame, July – September 2023. Deadline: until an appointment is made.
• Position opening: Columbia University, The Department of Art History and Archaeology Barbara Stoler Miller Assistant Professor, Indian and South Asian Art History. Deadline: until an appointment is made.
• Position opening: Associate Director, Center for Religious and Spiritual Life and Muslim Chaplain, Macalester College.