Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference on the Middle East, South Asia and Africa

Thursday, April 15 to Saturday, April 17, 2010

Interdisciplinary Graduate Conference on the Middle East, South Asia and Africa - Columbia University, April 15-17, 2010(conference logo)

Conference Schedule

Clicking one of the links below will take you to that paper's abstract. This schedule is also available as a printable PDF file.

Thursday, April 15

4:10 pm Opening remarks and faculty panel: Balancing the Humanities and Social Sciences in Area Studies (208 Knox Hall)

Prof. Sudipta Kaviraj, Chair of Dept. of MESAAS, Columbia University

Prof. Rashid Khalidi, Dept. of MESAAS, Columbia University

Prof. Anupama Rao, Dept. of History, Barnard College

6:10 pm Student panel: Literature Crossing Borders (963 Schermerhorn Hall)

“Individuation in Early Modern Travelogue” – Ishan Chakrabarti

“Why Did Shāh Ḥātim’s Collected Works Spawn a Child?” – Arthur Dudney

“The Autobiography of Muḥammad Shukrī: Modern Ṣuʿlūk – Levi Thompson

Friday, April 16

All events in 501 Schermerhorn Hall.

9:00 am Breakfast

9:30 am Student panel: The Politics of Religion I

“After The Sepoy Rebellion: South Asian Sufism and the Reassertion of Indo-Muslim Identity” – Daanish Faruqi

“Qur’anic Exegesis in East Africa: Circulation of Knowledge and Tradition” – Anja Pfeffermann

“Two Seas and Two Sides: Bahraini Women’s Religious Activism” – Nova Robinson

11:00 am Student panel: Conceptions of Law and Legality

“Sovereignty Beyond Boundaries”Yuval Kremnitzer

“Weapons Out of Control: Israel’s Use of Cluster Bombs and the 2006 War in Lebanon”– Vasiliki Touhouliotis

“Imperial Justice? Free Trade on Trial: Justification Narratives and Experiences of (In–)Justice in the British Colonies of the 19th Century”Verena Steller

12:20 pm Break for Lunch

1:30 pm Student panel: Area Studies?

“Not Death of a Discipline but Birth of a Refuge: A Post-Philological Image of the Department” – Ajay Singh Chaudhary

“Islamic Intellectual History and the Methodological Question: Toward an Analytical Avicennism?” – A David K Owen

“Situating Jewish Studies” – Suzanne Schneider Reich

3:00 pm Student Panel: South Asia(s)

“Local Food, Disparate Identities: Culinary Practices in Three ‘Enclave’ Communities in India” – Sayantan Biswas

“Obscene Geographies: The “Item Region” in Contemporary Hindi Film” – Rajiv Menon

“Bollymizwid and Bollyraï: Digital Mashups of Hindi, Tunisian, and Algerian Popular Music” – Portia Seddon

4:30 pm Student panel: Building Identities

“Anatomy, Androgyny and Performative Politics in Early Colonial South Asia, 1780–1830” – Mario D’Penha

“Colonial Legacy Faultlines as Mindset Frontiers” – Mohammed Lakhdar Ghettas

“Dynamics of Changing National and Ethnic Identity Concepts of Sahrawi Refugees” – Judit Smajdli

6:10 pm Keynote address by Professor Aamir Mufti of UCLA

Saturday, April 17

All events in 501 Schermerhorn Hall.

9:00 am Breakfast

9:30 am Student panel: The Politics of Religion II

“Stemming the Saffron Tide: Populism versus the Hindu Right in India”Soundarya Chidambaram

Untitled paper on Early Modern South Indian IntellectualsElaine Fisher

“The Role of Religious Belief in the Formation of Political Opinions: Proposal for a Study in Delhi, India” – Rachel Wahl

11:00 am Faculty panel: Cosmopolitanism and Identities

Prof. Emilienne Baneth-Nouailhetas, New York University

Dr. Ghazzal Dabiri, Dept. of MESAAS, Columbia University

Prof. Hlonipha Mokoena, Dept. of Anthropology, Columbia University

12:30 pm End of the conference


This site was lasted updated on 19 September 2010 by Arthur Dudney.