Spring Semester 2010 Events

Wednesday, January 20th 11:00 AM GL 220	Women, Poetry and Migration: Afghan Refugees in Iran By Dr. Zuzanna Olszewska Dr. Zuzanna OlszewskaZuzanna Olszewska is a Junior Research Fellow in Oriental Studies at St. John's College, Oxford University. She recently completed her PhD in Social Anthropology on "Poetry and its Social Contexts among Afghan Refugees in Iran." Her research focuses on Afghan refugees in Iran and contemporary Persian poetry and intellectual discourses. She has a broad interest in Iranian and Afghan ethnography and history, as well as forced and labour migration in other parts of the world.
Friday, January 22nd 12:00 PM LC 110	Graduate Research Colloquium: The Poetry of Young Afghan Refugees in Iran By Dr. Zuzanna Olszewska Department of Global and Sociocultural Studies Women Studies
TBA TBA TBA	The Geopolitics of Central Asia (Tentative) by Dr. Houman Sadri Department of Political Science University of Central Florida
Thursday, February 4th 3:30 PM GL 220	Graduate Seminar: Post-Orientalism: Said and After by Dr. Hamid Dabashi Hamid Dabashi received a dual Ph.D. in Sociology of Culture and Islamic Studies from the University of Pennsylvania in 1984, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship at Harvard University. He wrote his dissertation on Max Weber's theory of charismatic authority with Philip Rieff (1922-2006), the most distinguished Freudian cultural critic of his time. Dabashi is the Hagop Kevorkian Professor of Iranian Studies and Comparative Literature at Columbia University in New York, the oldest and most prestigious Chair in Iranian Studies. He has also taught and delivered lectures in many North American, European, Arab and Iranian universities. He lives in New York with his wife and colleague, the Iranian-Swedish feminist, Golbarg Bashi. Professor Dabashi has written 16 books, edited 4, and contributed chapters to many more. He is also the author of over 100 essays, articles and book reviews in major scholarly and peer reviewed journals on subjects ranging from Iranian Studies, medieval and modern Islam, comparative literature, world cinema, and the philosophy of art (trans-aesthetics).Among his best-known books are his Authority in Islam; Theology of Discontent; Masters and Masterpieces of Iranian Cinema; Iran: A People Interrupted; and an edited volume, Dreams of a Nation: On Palestinian Cinema. His most recent work includes an Introduction to the Random House Modern Library edition of The Adventures of Amir Hamza as well as a book, Makhmalbaf at Large: The Making of a Rebel Filmmaker (I. B. Tauris, 2007). His forthcoming book is Islamic Liberation Theology: Resisting the Empire (Routledge, 2008).
Friday February 5th 2:00 PM GC 243	What is Middle Eastern Cinema? by Dr. Hamid Dabashi
Friday, February 12th 2:00 PM GC 243	Nomadic Mosque: Architecture as Identity by Azra Aksamija Azra Aksamija is a Bosnian-born Austrian artist, architect, and architectural historian. She studied architecture at the Technical University Graz (Dipl.Ing.), Princeton University (M.Arch), and is currently affiliated with the Massachusetts Institute of Technology as a Ph.D. candidate in the Department of Architecture. Her broader artistic and academic practice explores representation of Islamic identities in the West, spatial manifestation of identity politics, Orientalism, and cultural mediation through architecture. Azra dissertation entitled "Our Mosques Are Us: Rewriting National History of Bosnia-Herzegovina through Religious Architecture" explores construction of Bosnian Muslims' identities though history of mosques, with the focus on the post-socialist period. Besides her academic research, Azra has been working as a conceptual artist and a curator. Her interdisciplinary projects have been published and exhibited in various international venues.
Monday, February 22nd 11:00 AM GC 243	Elections in the Middle East: Iran, Palestine and Afghanistan by Reese Erlich Reese Erlich's history in journalism goes back 42 years. He first worked as a staff writer and research editor for Ramparts, an investigative reporting magazine published in San Francisco from 1963 to 1975. Today he works as a full-time print and broadcast, freelance reporter. He reports regularly for National Public Radio, CBC, ABC (Australia), Radio Deutche Welle and Market Place Radio. His articles appear in the SF Chronicle and Dallas Morning News. His television documentaries have aired on PBS stations nationwide. Erlich’s book, Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You co-authored with Norman Solomon, became a best seller in 2003. The Iran Agenda: The Real Story of US Policy and the Middle East Crisis was published in 2007. Dateline Havana: The Real Story of US Policy and the Future of Cuba was published in 2009. Erlich shared a Peabody Award in 2006 as a segment producer for Crossing East, a radio documentary on the history of Asians in the US. In 2004 Erlich’s radio special “Children of War: Fighting, Dying, Surviving,” won a Clarion Award presented by the Alliance for Women in Communication and second and third place from the National Headlines Awards. His article about the U.S. use of depleted uranium ammunition was voted the eighth most censored story in America for 2003 by Project Censored at Sonoma State University. In 2002 his radio documentary, “The Russia Project,” hosted by Walter Cronkite, won the depth reporting prize for broadcast journalism awarded by the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Thursday, March 4th 3:00 PM GL 220	Graduate Seminar: Thinking about the Muslim South by Dr. Richard Bulliet Middle East Institute Columbia University
Friday, March 5th 2:00 PM MARC Pavilion	The Big Bang Theory of Islamic History by Dr. Richard Bulliet
Friday, March 26th, 2010 MARC Pavilion	Islam, Latin America and the Middle East A Mini Conference

Fall Semester 2009 Events

Friday September 25th 9:45 AM Middle Ballroom (Graham Center)	Islam, Chechnya and the War by Dr. Khassan Baiev Khassan Baiev was born in Alkhan Kala, a suburb of the Chechen capital Grozny, in 1963. He attended Krasnoyarsk Medical Institute in Siberia. Graduating in 1985 and returning to Chechnya in 1988, Baiev became a successful reconstructive surgeon, particularly in the aftermath of the Soviet Union's collapse. But when Russia invaded Chechnya a few years later, Baiev gave up his lucrative practice to perform trauma surgery. As the wars raged on, he was persecuted as a criminal by both sides. When he treated Chechen fighters, the Russians accused him of being a traitor. When he treated Russian soldiers, factions of Chechen extremists accused him of the same. Determined to uphold the Hippocratic Oath, Baiev operated on all in need, from Russian soldiers to Chechen fighters. During both wars, Baiev treated thousands of civilians. Eventually, after being threatened by all sides of the conflict, the Russians issued orders for Baiev's arrest because he saved the life of Shamil Basayev, one of the Kremlin's most wanted field commanders. Realizing that Baiev was a man wanted by both sides, the humanitarian group, Physicians for Human Rights, helped him seek political asylum in the United States. In the past several years, Dr. Baiev has become an outspoken advocate for human rights and has been honored by Human Rights Watch, Physicians for Human Rights, Amnesty International and others. Last year, despite the ongoing simmering conflict, he returned to Chechnya to operate on the most vulnerable victims of the war -- children with severe injuries. After he spent several months in the region, he is coming to FIU to share his experience and talk about the humanitarian situation there.
Monday October 19th 4:30 PM Green Library RM 220	A Roundtable With Noted Iranian-American Author Firoozeh Dumas Firoozeh Dumas , author of the book "Funny in Farsi: A memoir of growing up Iranian in America", the FIU 2009-2010 Common Reading selection, was born in Abadan, Iran, and in the 1970s moved to Southern California with her family. She later attended UC Berkeley where she met and married a Frenchman. "Funny in Farsi" was distributed to all incoming freshmen, starting in Summer-B and continuing through Fall. The book will be used in Spring 2010 and Summer A, to complete the full year of this common reading. The book has been well received by students, who have enthusiastically embraced Ms. Dumas’s writings about her immigrant experience and commonalities across cultures. The text was selected by a committee comprising faculty and staff, with a review by a panel of students. Recent events in Iran have made this choice even more compelling.
Friday October 30th 10:00 AM GC 243	Populism and Foreign Policy in Iran and Venezuela by Dr. Manochehr Dorraj Dr. Manochehr Dorraj is a Professor of political science at Texas Christian University. He has published extensively on politics of the Middle East. Among his publications are: From Zarathustra to Khomeini: Populism and Dissent in Iran,( 1990), The Changing Political Economy of the Third World, (1995), Middle East at the Crossroads, (1999), Co- editor, Iran today: an Encyclopedia of Life in the Islamic Republic. 2 Volumes, (With Mehran Kamrava, 2008). Professor Dorraj is also the Co -author of “Populism and Foreign Policy in Venezuela and Iran” (with Michael Dodson, 2008), and “Neo-populism in Comparative Perspective: Iran and Venezuela” (With Michael Dodson, 2009).
Friday November 6th 3:00 PM MARC Pavilion	Hezbollah: Local, Regional and Global Dimensions by Dr. Augustus Richard Norton Dr. Augustus Richard Norton is a Professor in the Departments of International Relations and Anthropology at Boston University, and he is Visiting Professor of Politics at Oxford University. Formerly, he was a professor at West Point, the U.S. Military Academy, where he taught for a dozen years. His books include Hezbollah: A Short History (Princeton University Press, 2007), Civil Society in the Middle East (E. J. Brill, 2 vols., 1995, 1996, 2005), and Amal and the Shi’a (University of Texas Press, 1987. His “The Shiite ‘Threat’ Revisited” is in Current History, December 2007. He is a member of the Council on Foreign Relations, and he was an advisor to the Iraq Study Group ("Baker-Hamilton Commission") in 2006. Dr. Norton received his Ph.D. from the University of Chicago. He is writing a new book about the Sunni-Shi’i rift for publication by Princeton University Press in late 2009.
Friday November 13th 3:00 PM MARC Pavilion	Windows of the Soul: My Journey Through the Middle East by Alexandra Avakian Photographer, National Geographic Alexandra Avakian was born in New York City and brought up in New York and California. In 1983 Avakian graduated from Sarah Lawrence College with a B.A. in Liberal Arts. She also studied and worked at the International Center of Photography, and The New School from 1980-1982. She has been a professional photojournalist since 1984. Over the last 23-years Avakian has been published in Time, Life, Newsweek, National Geographic Magazine, The New York Times Magazine, The Washington Post Magazine, Audobon, Natural History, GEO, Stern, Paris Match, and most other mainstream magazines of the United States and Europe. She has been published in such National Geographic books as “Wide Angle”, “Women Photographers and Islam”, as well as “Day in the Life of the American Woman”, several TIME/LIFE books. She also created the photographs for two books on the Amish and one on the Rocky Mountains for Clarkson Potter publishers. Avakian has worked extensively worldwide, and lived in the Middle East (Gaza 1993-1995), Africa (Somalia 1992-1993), and the former Soviet Union from (1990 – 1992.) She covered the fall of the Berlin Wall and the Czechoslovakian Velvet Revolution for LIFE; the funeral of Ayatollah Khomeini; the Armenian earthquake; the Palestinian intifada over a period of 7 years; the civil wars, coups, uprisings and end of the former Soviet Union; the civil war and famine of Somalia and Sudan; Haiti’s uprisings; Reform in Iran; Muslims in America; Lebanon’s Hezbollah to name several. Avakian’s book “Windows of the Soul: My Journeys in the Muslim World” was published by National Geographic Books in 2008. Avakian and her book have been featured in O, The Oprah Magazine, Time.com, New York Times Lens, and more. Avakian has been a senior member of Contact Press Images since 1991 and has been a National Geographic photographer since 1995.

Summer Semester 2009 Events

May 15th 11:00 AM GL 220

The Role of Fiqh in Islam by Dr. Mohsen Kadivar Dr. Mohsen Kadivar, professor at the Iranian Institute of Philosophy in Tehran and visiting professor of Religious Studies at the University of Virginia, is a distinguished and internationally known theologian and intellectual in contemporary Iran. He obtained the certificate of Ijtihad (Islamic legal judgment) from grand Ayatollah H.A. Montazeri at Qom Seminary in 1997 and his Ph.D. in Islamic Philosophy and Theology from Tarbiat Modarres University in Tehran in 1999. He taught at Qom Seminary for 15 years and at Mufid University in Qom, Imam Sadiq, Beheshti and Tarbiat Modarres Universities in Tehran for 17 years. Kadivar has penned 13 books (in Persian and Arabic) and over 50 articles in Islamic Studies (philosophy, theology, jurisprudence and political thought). Among his best known books are Theories of Government in Shi'i Fiqh, Government by Guardianship (hokumat-e vela'i), The Political Works of M. K. Khurāsānī, and Haqq al-Nass (Islam and Human Rights). Among his articles in English are The Innovative Political Ideas of M. K. Khurāsānī (2005), Freedom of Religion and Thought in Islam (2006) and Intellectual Islam and Human Rights (2009).

Spring Semester 2009 Events

January 27th 5:00 PM MARC Pavilion	The Iranian Revolution: Thirty Years Later by Dr. Mohsen Milani Dr. Mohsen M. Milani is Professor of Politics and Chair of the Department of Government and International Affairs at the University of South Florida in Tampa, Florida. Born in Tehran, he completed his high school and higher education in the U.S., and received his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Southern California. His book, The Making of Iran’s Islamic Revolution, has been used as required reading in many universities in the U.S., Europe, Japan, and Canada. The Persian translation of his book is a recommended reading for a required exit course in Iran's universities.(/br> Professor Milani has written more than fifty articles, book chapters, and encyclopedia entries about the Persian Gulf, Iran’s revolution, and Iran’s foreign and security policies. His latest publications include "Iran's Persian Gulf Policy in the Past-Saddam Eras (in Contemporary Iran: Economy, Society and Politics, Oxford University Press, 2009), "Iran's policy toward Afghanistan" (Middle East Journal, 2006) and "Iran-Iraq Relations during the Pahlavi Era, 1921-79" (Encyclopedia Iranica, 2006). He is currently working on a book project about Iran's regional policies. He has served as a research fellow at Harvard University, Oxford University’s St. Antony’s College in England, and the Foscari University in Venice, Italy. He is a frequent speaker at international and national conferences on Iran and the Persian Gulf. Professor Milani is the Book Series Editor on "Governance and International Relations in the Middle East" for the University of Florida Press.
February 12th 5:00 PM GC East Ballroom	The Middle East, the Caspian, and U.S. Oil Dependency: The Fantasy and Reality of Thinking Green by Hossein Ebneyousef International Petroleum Enterprises Listen ... Since 1988, Mr. Ebneyousef has been the President of International Petroleum Enterprises where he manages the Company's worldwide consulting services and technical assistance on oil and natural gas development opportunities in the Middle East, North Africa and the Caspian Sea region. Previously he worked for Atlantic Richfield Company (ARCO) for 14 years -- 6 years with ARCO International, on projects in the Middle East; 6 years with ARCO Oil & Gas, on evaluating oil and gas producing properties for time rating of reserves and coordination of legal, geological, engineering, operation and business evaluation efforts towards acquisition or sales of oil and gas properties; and 2 years with ARCO's Corporate Planning, on identification and analyses of critical global oil-related issues and response strategies. Mr. Ebneyousef holds BS and MS degrees in petroleum engineering from Louisiana State University (LSU) and University of Southern California (USC), respectively.
March 3rd 5:00 PM GC 243	Secularism and Islam in Turkey: Between the French and American Models by Dr. Ahmet T. Kuru Listen ... Ahmet T. Kuru is Assistant Professor of Political Science at San Diego State University. He is currently Postdoctoral Research Scholar and Assistant Director of the Center for the Study of Democracy, Toleration, and Religion at SIPA of Columbia University. Kuru received his PhD from the University of Washington, Seattle. His book Secularism and State Policies toward Religion: The United States, France, and Turkey will be published by the Cambridge University Press in March 2009. This book is based on his dissertation that received the American Political Science Association, Religion and Politics Section's Aaron Wildavsky Award for the best dissertation in 2007. His publications include "Secularism, State Policies, and Muslims in Europe: Analyzing French Exceptionalism," Comparative Politics, 2008; "Passive and Assertive Secularism: Historical Conditions, Ideological Struggles, and State Policies towards Religion," World Politics, 2007; "Globalization and Diversification of Islamic Movements: Three Turkish Cases," Political Science Quarterly, 2005.
March 24th 5:00 PM GC 243	Beaches, Ruins, and Resorts: The Politics of Tourism in the Arab World by Dr. Waleed Hazbun Listen ... Dr. Waleed Hazbun is assistant professor of Political Science at the Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland where he teaches international relations, international political economy, US foreign policy, and Middle East politics. In 2007, he served as visiting professor in the Department of Political Studies at the American University of Beirut. He recently published his first book: Beaches, Ruins, Resorts: The Politics of Tourism in the Arab World (University of Minnesota Press, 2008), which shows how tourism development often promotes both economic globalization and political authoritarianism. Based on fieldwork in Tunisia and Jordan as well as travel across the region, the book explores the role of tourism development and tourist flows in the peace process between Israel and Jordan, the integration of Tunisia into the flows of the global economy, and the rise of Dubai as global travel and tourism hub. Hazbun has published articles in Arab Studies Journal, Geopolitics, Arab World Geographer; Arab Studies Quarterly; written reviews and commentary for Middle East Report, Political Theory, Urban Affairs Review, Baltimore Sun, and Jordan Times; and contributed chapters to the collections Jordan in Transition 1990-2000, The Business of Tourism: Place, Faith, and History, and Is There a Middle East? He is currently working on two projects. The first extends his work on the cultural political economy of tourism by investigating issues of history, identity, and travel in new forms tourism development based around history, religion, and the environment; experiences of travel across the Arab/Israel frontier; and what Ibn Battuta might teach us about the Arab-Islamic sources of cosmopolitism. The second project explores the influence of notions of modernity and modernization on US foreign policy in the Middle East and other aspects of US-Middle East relations, such as the development of American educational institutions in the region.
April 9th 5:00 PM MARC Pavilion	The Modern World and the Necessity of Dialogue Among Abrahamic Religions by Dr. Seyyed Hossein Nasr Watch ... Listen ... The Prophet and Erfan (In Farsi) Watch ... Listen ... Dr. Seyyed Hossein Nasr is University Professor of Islamic Studies at George Washington University, and is among the most important scholars of comparative mysticism and religion, and perennial philosophy in the world today. A graduate of MIT (BA-Physics and Mathematics) and Harvard (MA-Geology and Geophysics, Ph.D.-Philosophy and History of Science with specialization in Islamic cosmology and science), and trained in Islamic Philosophy and Mysticism in Iran, Nasr has authored over 25 books, including many classics such as Knowledge and the Sacred and Religion and the Order of Nature, and 500 articles in English, Persian, Arabic and French. Professor Nasr’s works have been translated into numerous other languages, including German, Spanish, Turkish, and Urdu. He is one of the most sought after speakers at academic conferences and seminars, university and public lectures and also radio and television programs in his area of expertise. Possessor of an impressive academic and intellectual record, his career as a teacher and scholar spans over four decades. The world’s leading authority in Perennial Philosophy, Dr. Nasr is a dedicated advocate of interfaith dialogue, and has worked extensively with Jewish and Christian leaders to foster communication among the three Abrahamic faiths and to work towards a common ground in belief through mutual respect, understanding of respective values, and commitment to world peace. In November 2008, in a historical meeting, he led a large delegation of Muslim scholars and personalities to meet with the Pope at the Vatican.
April 23rd 10:00 AM GC 316	Reporting on National Security and Civil Liberties: A Roundtable with Iraqi Journalists In cooperation with Miami Council for International Visitors, Inc Listen ... The Middle East Studies Center and the School of International and Public Affairs (SIPA) at FIU is pleased to host a delegation of journalists from Iraq. These visitors from the U.S. Department of State International Visitor Leadership Program will be participating in a roundtable that will discuss reporting on issues of national security and civil liberties in the United States and the Middle East.

Fall Semester 2008 Events

Thursday September 25 5:00 PM GC 243	The Middle East and Latin America: Historical Dialogues and Contemporary Relations by Dr. Maria Logrono Listen ... Dr. Maria Logrono (PhD University of California Santa Barbara, 2007) is a native of Spain who received her BA in History (Universidad de Alcalá de Henares), after which she studied modern Middle Eastern history at UC Santa Barbara. Her dissertation ("The Development of Nationalist Identities in French Syria and Lebanon: a Transnational Dialogue with Arab Immigrants to Argentina and Brazil, 1915-1929”) explores the transnational political movements among Syrian and Lebanese emigrants in Brazil and Argentina during the period of the French Mandate. Dr. Logroño Narbona has conducted field research at: Archives du ministère français des affaires étrangères (Paris and Nantes); National Library (Al Asad), Damascus; American University in Beirut, Archival Collection; The National Archives, London. She has authored two articles on this topic: “Information and Intelligence Collection Among Imperial Subjects Abroad: The Case of Syrians and Lebanese in Latin America, 1915-1930” in The French Colonial Mind, edited by Martin Thomas (University of Nebraska Press: forthcoming) and “The ‘Woman Question’ in the Aftermath of the Great Syria Revolt” in Al-Raida(May 2007). She is currently working on a monograph drawing from her dissertation research. Before joining FIU, Dr. Logroño Narbona held a one-year position at Appalachian State University. She has presented her work at major international conferences and has recently being invited as a presenter at the international conference “La contribución árabe a las identidades iberoamericanas” (Rio de Janeiro, November 2008)
Thursday October 9 5:00 PM GC 243	Human Rights in the Middle East by Dr. Mahmood Monshipouri Co-sponsored with Ruth K. & Shepard Broad Educational Series Listen... Dr. Mahmood Monshipouri is a faculty member of the Department of International Relations at San Francisco State University. He received his Ph.D. from University of Georgia in 1987. He has taught at the University of Georgia, Central Michigan University, Alma College, Quinnipiac University, Redlands University, and California State University at San Marcos. During 2003-2006, he served as a Visiting Fellow at the Yale Center for International and Area Studies—Yale University. He teaches several courses in international relations, including the Middle and North Africa in International Relations, the Persian Gulf in International Relations, Theory and Application in International Relations, and Introduction to World Affairs. He specializes in human rights, identity construction, and globalization in the Muslim world. His most recent work is entitled, Muslims in Global Politics: Identity, Interests, and Human Rights (forthcoming, Univ. of Pennsylvania Press). He is currently working on a book-length manuscript, tentatively entitled, Getting Counterterrorism Policy Right: Alternative Strategies (to be completed in 2010). He is co-editor of Constructing Human Rights in the Age of Globalization (Armonk, NY: M. E. Sharpe, 2003), Islam and Human Rights: Advocacy for Social Change in Local Contexts, (New Delhi, India: Global Media Publications, 2006); and he is the author of Islamism, Secularism, and Human Rights in the Middle East (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1998), and Democratization, Liberalization, and Human Rights in the Third World (Boulder, CO: Lynne Rienner Publishers, 1995). His most recent articles have appeared in Human Rights Quarterly, Insight Turkey, and International Studies Journal. He has served as the President of the International Studies Association—Northeast Political Science Association, the Executive Director of the Center for Iranian Research and Analysis. He currently serves as an editor of the Muslim World Journal of Human Rights, Berkeley Electronic Press.
Thursday October 23 5:00 PM GC 243	Obama vs. McCain: The Next President and the Middle East by Ambassador William Luers President, The United Nations Association of the USA co-sponsored by the Center for Islamic Studies Ambassador William Luers was elected in 1999 president of the United Nations Association of the USA (UNA-USA), a center for innovative programs to engage Americans in issues of global concern. UNA-USA's educational and humanitarian campaigns, along with its policy and advocacy programs, allow people to make a global impact at the local level and encourage strong United States leadership in the UN. Prior to joining UNA-USA in February 1999, Ambassador Luers served for 13 years as president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City. Prior to his move to New York in 1986, Luers had a 31-year career in the Foreign Service. He served as US Ambassador to Czechoslovakia (1983-1986) and Venezuela (1978-1982) and held numerous posts in Italy, Germany, the Soviet Union, and in the Department of State, where he was the Deputy Assistant Secretary of State for Europe (1977-1978) and for Inter-American Affairs (1975-1977). Luers has been a visiting lecturer at the Woodrow Wilson School at Princeton, at George Washington University in Washington, DC, and at the School of Advanced International Studies at Johns Hopkins University. He was also the director's visitor at Princeton's Institute for Advanced Study in 1982-1983. Luers received his B.A. from Hamilton College and his M.A. from Columbia University following four years in the United States Navy. He did graduate work in Philosophy at Northwestern University and holds honorary doctorate degrees from Hamilton College and Marlboro College. An active member of the Council on Foreign Relations and other public policy organizations, Luers serves on a number of corporate and nonprofit boards, including the Rockefeller Brothers Fund, The National Museum of Natural History, The Trust for Mutual Understanding, and the Rubin Art Museum. He is also chairman of the Advisory Board of The Center for Public Diplomacy at the Annenberg School of Communications at the University of Southern California and of The Harriman Institute at Columbia University. He speaks on foreign affairs, diplomacy, the UN, and the arts, and has been widely published on foreign policy issues. He speaks Russian, Spanish and Italian.
Tuesday October 28 6:30 PM GC 243	The Newly-Discovered Judeo-Persian Letter: Date, Provenance, and Historical Context by Bryan Averbuch Harvard University Listen ... co-sponsored by the Center for Islamic Studies A letter written around 800 C.E. by Jewish merchants trading in Inner Asia was recently discovered in Western China. This unpublished document provides us with valuable information about Jewish, Islamic, Iranian, and Inner Asian history, as well as the development of Iranian languages. Currently in the National Library in Beijing, the letter appears to be one of the earliest New Persian texts in existence. It is written in Judeo-Persian, a literary form of New Persian specific to Jewish texts. The presentation will begin with a look at the document itself--when and where it may have been written, how it was discovered--as well its relationship to another Judeo-Persian letter discovered in 1901 and now in the British Museum. The second part of the talk will discuss the social and historical information contained in the letter that tells us about the world of Jewish merchants on the Silk Road.
Thursday November 20 5:00 PM GC 243	China’s Growing Engagement in the Middle East: Changing the Horizons of Middle East Politics? by Dr. Timothy Niblock Co-sponsored with the Institute for Asian Studies Listen ... Dr. Timothy Niblock Professor Tim Niblock is Professor of Middle Eastern Politics at the University of Exeter. He began his academic career at the University of Khartoum in Sudan (1969-77), where he served as Associate Professor on secondment from the University of Reading. He first came to Exeter in 1978, as Research Fellow in Gulf Studies. He went on to establish the Middle East Politics Programme, of which he became Director. In 1993 he was appointed to the Chair in Middle Eastern Politics at the University of Durham, and was made Director of the Centre for Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies there. In 1999 he returned to the University of Exeter and served as Director of the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies from 1999 to 2005. He has written widely on the Politics, Political Economy and International Relations of the Arab world. Among his books are: Saudi Arabia: Power, Legitimacy and Survival (Routledge, 2006), ‘Pariah States’ and Sanctions in the Middle East: Iraq, Libya and Sudan (Lynne Rienner, 2001), Muslim Communities in the New Europe (edited, Gerd Nonneman and Bogdan Szajkowski, Ithaca Press 1997), Economic and Political Liberalisation in the Middle East (edited, with Emma Murphy, British Academic Press, 1993), Class and Power in Sudan (Macmillan, 1987), Iraq: the Contemporary State (edited, Croom Helm, 1982), State, Society and Economy in Saudi Arabia (edited, Croom Helm, 1981), and Social and Economic Development in the Arab Gulf (edited, Croom Helm, 1980). He was also editor, with Rodney Wilson, of the 6-volume Political Economy of the Middle East (Edward Elgar, 2000). He has a new book on Saudi Arabia, The Political Economy of Saudi Arabia (Routledge, 2007) which came out in November of last year.

Summer Semester 2008 Events

Thursday July 10 6:30 PM GL 220 (Library-FIU University Park Campus)

IR Discourse in Iran: Genealogy and Dynamics by Dr. Homeira Moshirzadeh Listen...

Thursday July 10 10:30 AM DM Building-Room 100 (DM-100) (FIU-University Park Campus)

Women in Iran by Dr. Homeira Moshirzadeh Dr. Homeira Moshirzadehreceived her PhD in Political Science from the University of Tehran, Iran in 1999. She was a Visiting Fellow at the Mershon Center for International and Security Studies, Ohio State University, in 2005-6. She is an Associate Professor at the Department of International Relations and an adjunct faculty at the Center for Women's Studies, University of Tehran. Her main scholarly interests are IR theory, theories of social movements, and Women's Studies. Dr. Moshirzadeh has published many books in Persian. She is the author of Social Movements: A Theoretical Introduction (2001), From a Social Movement to a Social Theory: A History of Feminism (2002, 2006), An Introduction to Women's Studies (2005), and Theories of International Relations (2005, 2006, 2007, and 2008). She has translated some of the major IR texts into Persian, including Hans Morgenthau's Politics among Nations and Alexander Wendt's Social Theory of International Politics. Her articles on International Relations, Feminism, Iran's foreign policy, dialogue of civilizations, cultural studies, and Women's Studies have appeared in edited volumes in Persian and English. Dr. Moshirzadeh's book “From a Social Movement to a Social Theory: A History of Feminism” won the Women's Library Prize in 2005.

Spring Semester 2008 Events

Wednesday January 16 2:00 PM GC East Ballroom Hosted by The Jack Gordon Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship	Iraq in the Future of Political Islam by Dr. James Piscatori Professor of Arab and Islamic Studies The Australian National University Hosted by The Jack Gordon Institute for Public Policy and Citizenship and co-sponsored by MESC Listen... Dr. James Piscatori holds the Chair in Arab & Islamic Studies at the Australian National University. Most recently he was a Fellow of Wadham College and of the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. and member of the Faculties of Social Studies and Oriental Studies, University of Oxford. He has taught at the University of Virginia, the University of Wales, the Australian National University and at the Nitze School of Advanced International Studies (SAIS) of the John Hopkins University. He was Research Fellow at the Royal Institute of International Affairs, Chatham House, in London, and a Senior Fellow of the Council of Foreign Relations. Professor Piscatori is the author of Islam in a World of Nation-States (Cambridge University Press, 1986) and co-author (with Dale F. Eickelman) of Muslim Politics (Princeton University Press, 1996). He is the editor of Islam in the Political Process (Cambridge University Press, 1983) and co-editor of Muslim Travellers: Pilgrimage, Migration, and the Religious Imagination (Routledge/University of California Press, 1992). As Islam team director of the Fundamentalism Project of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, he edited Islamic Fundamentalisms and the Gulf Crisis (University of Chicago Press, 1991). He is co-editor (with Susanne Hoeber Rudolph) of Transnational Religion and Fading States (Westview Press, 1997). His Islam, Islamists, and the Electoral Principle appeared as the first in a series of papers for the International Institute for the Study of the Modern Muslim World (ISIM) in Leiden in December 2000.
Monday January 28 10:30 AM GC 243	Thinking Security: A ComparativeAnalysis of Israeli and Arab Approaches by Dr. Ephraim Kam Listen... Dr. Ephraim Kam is Deputy Head, The Institute for National Security Studies (formerly The Jaffee Center for Strategic Studies). Dr. Kam served as a Colonel in the Research Division of IDF Military Intelligence. The positions he held in the IDF include Assistant Director of the Research Division for Evaluation and senior instructor at the IDF’s National Defense College. By 1993 he retired from the IDF and joined the Jaffee Center, where he serves since 1995 as the deputy head. He is also teaching at the Security Studies Program, Tel-Aviv University. Dr. Kam took his BA at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem in Middle Eastern Studies and Economics, and his MA and PhD degrees in International Relations at Harvard University. He specializes in security problems of the Middle East and the Arab states, Iran, Israel’s national security issues, as well as strategic intelligence. His book Surprise Attack: the Victim’s Perspective (Harvard University Press, 1988) was awarded the National Intelligence Study Center (Washington D.C.)1988 prize for the best book on intelligence issues. His recent book is From Terror to Nuclear Bombs: The Significance of the Iranian Threat (Hebrew, 2004). Among his other publications: The Implications of the Collapse of the Soviet Union on the Middle East (1991); The Political Framework of the Palestinian Entity (1994); and A Nuclear Iran: What Does It Mean and What Can Be Done (2007).
Thursday February 7 6:30 PM GC 243	Israel and Iran: Forever Enemies? by Dr. Trita Parsi Listen... Dr. Trita Parsi is the President of NIAC-National Iranian-American Council, and the author of the highly acclaimed and anticipated book, “Treacherous Triangle: The Secret Dealings of Israel, Iran and the United States”, (Yale University Press 2007). He earned a Master's degree in international relations at Uppsala University, a second Master's degree in economics at the Stockholm School of Economics and a Ph.D. in international relations at Johns Hopkins University's SAIS, where he worked with Francis Fukuyama, and Zbigniew Brzezinski. Trita Parsi has worked for the Swedish Permanent Mission to the UN in NY where he served in the UN Security Council, handling affairs for Afghanistan, Iraq, Tajikistan and Western Sahara, and the General Assembly's Third Committee addressing human rights in Iran, Afghanistan, Myanmar and Iraq. A leading expert on US-Iran-Israel relations, he has written numerous articles for major newspapers, including the Financial Times, the Jerusalem Post, the Herald Tribune, and the Los Angeles Times, and has been a frequent commentator in leading national and global news networks, including CNN, BBC, PBS, C-SPAN, MSNBC, Al Jazeera, and Voice of America.
Tuesday February 26 12:30 PM GC 243	Journalism in the Middle East: A Firsthand Perspective by Reese Erlich Best-Selling and Award Winning Journalist Listen... Reese Erlich reports regularly for CBC (Canada), ABC (Australia), Radio Deutche Welle (Germany) and for National Public Radio and major news publications. His articles have been published in The Nation, Mother Jones, The Progressive, San Francisco Magazine, California Monthly and California Lawyer, and he has worked as a consultant to National Geographic. Erlich’s book, Target Iraq: What the News Media Didn't Tell You (co-authored with Norman Solomon), was a 2003 best seller. His latest book The Iran Agenda: the Real Story of U.S. Policy and the Middle East Crisis, was published in October 2007. Erlich shared the prestigious 2006 Peabody award for the public radio series “Crossing East,” a history of Asians in the U.S. In 2004, Erlich’s radio special “Children of War: Fighting, Dying, Surviving” won a Clarion Award and two National Headliner Awards. In 2002 his radio documentary “The Russia Project,” hosted by Walter Cronkite, won the depth reporting prize for broadcast journalism awarded by the Northern California Chapter of the Society of Professional Journalists.
Thursday March 6 6:30 PM International Pavilion, MARC Building (Across the Blue Garage)	Modernism, Islamism, and Post Islamism by Dr. Farhang Rajaee Listen... Dr. Farhang Rajaee is currently Director of the College of Humanities at Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada. He is also a Professor of Political Science and Humanities specializing in political theory and international relations with emphasis in non-Western traditions, particularly Modern Political Thought in Islam. He obtained a BA degree in Political Science from the University of Tehran in 1975, an MA in Public Administration from the University of Oklahoma in 1977, and a PhD in Foreign Affairs in 1983 from the University of Virginia. From 1986 to 1996 he was a Professor at the University of Tehran and the Iranian Academy of Philosophy. He has also taught and conducted research at Oxford University and the Oriental Institute in Berlin. His major works include, The Development of Political Ideas in the Ancient East (1993), The Problematique of the Contemporary Iranian Identity (2004), Globalization on Trial (2000), Contemporary Political Thought in the Arab World (2002) and Islamism and Modernism (2007). He is currently working on a book on the interaction of Iran and modernity tentatively titled Authenticity and Modernity; Modern Moments of Convergence in the Persian Question.
Thursday March 20 6:00 PM GL 220	Prospects for Israeli-Palestinian Peace by two leading Israeli and Palestinian Peace Activists Gershon Baskin and Hanna Siniora Co-Directors of IPCRI (Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information) Listen... Dr. Gershon Baskin is the Israeli Co-Director and founder of the Israel/Palestine Center for Research and Information (IPCRI) - a joint Israeli-Palestinian public policy think-tank. Dr. Baskin has published books and hundreds of articles in the Hebrew, English and Arabic press about the Israeli- Palestinian conflict. Hanna Siniora is the Palestinian Co-Director of the Israeli-Palestinian Center for Research and Information (IPCRI). He has been a member of the Palestinian National Council since 1990. He is the editor and publisher of the Palestinian daily Al Fajr and The Jerusalem Times.
Thursday March 27 6:30 PM GC Middle Ballroom	Terrorism and Sacred Violence by Dr. Scott Atran Listen... Dr. Scott Atran is a joint Professor and senior researcher at several academic institutions, including the Department of Anthropology, Institute of Social Research, and the Ford School of Public Policy of the University of Michigan, and Directeur de Recherche, Centre National de la Recherche Scientifique, Paris. He received his BA in Anthropology at Columbia College (1972), his MA in Social Relations from Johns Hopkins University and his PhD in Anthropology at Columbia University, where he wrote his dissertation with Margaret Mead (1984). His Research and teaching interests are centered in the areas of cognitive and linguistic anthropology, evolutionary psychology, Middle East ethnography, political economy, terrorism and foreign affairs. A world leading authority on suicide terrorism he has made significant and path breaking contributions to the study of terrorism, its psycho-political and religious dynamics and evolution, and especially to the complex connection between poverty, sacred values, and honor. Dr. Atran’s publications comprise an extensive body of literature of over 30 scholarly articles, and several major books, including Cognitive Foundations of Natural History: Towards an Anthropology of Science (Cambridge University Press, 1990, 1993), Folkbiology (MIT Press, 1999), In Gods We Trust: The Evolutionary Landscape of Religion (Oxford University Press, 2002, 2004), and the forthcoming, The Native Mind and the Cultural Construction of Nature (MIT Press 2008).
Monday April 7 6:30 PM GC 243	Pakistan in Global Politics: A Critical Assessment by Ambassador Ahmad Kamal Diplomat- Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan Listen... Ambassador Ahmad Kamal served as a professional diplomat in the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Pakistan for close to forty years until his retirement in 1999. During this period he held diplomatic postings in India, Belgium, France, the Soviet Union, Saudi Arabia, the Republic of Korea, and with the United Nations both in Geneva and in New York. During his decade long assignment as the Ambassador and Permanent Representative of Pakistan to the United Nations, he held many of the highest elective posts including Vice President of the UN General Assembly, President of the UN Economic and Social Council, and Chairman of the Consultations on the Role of NGOs at the United Nations. Ambassador Kamal was also the chief negotiator in the Uruguay Round which led to the establishment of the World Trade Organization, as well as in the Conference on Disarmament which resulted in the Chemical Weapons Convention. He also has served as the Chairman of the “World Federation of Scientists” Permanent Panel on Planetary Crisis on Terrorism, at Erice, Italy. He is the author of several important publications, on disarmament, multilateralism, global economic issues, and technical aspects of informatics and information technology. Ambassador Kamal continues to be a Senior Fellow of the United Nations Institute of Training and Research, and is an Honorary Visiting Professor at several universities in the United States.

Fall Semester 2007 Events

Thursday October 11 6:00 PM FIU-Faculty Club	Popular/Media Cultures of Iran and the Middle East by Dr. Mehdi Semati
Thursday October 18 6:00 PM GC 243	Revitalizing Iraq’s Agriculture by Jonathan Gressel
Thursday November 08 6:30 PM MARC Pavilion	The United States and Iran—Is a Military Conflict Inevitable? by Dr. Gary Sick
Wednesday November 28 6:30 PM GC 243	Autocracy with Democrats in the Arab World by Dr. Daniel Brumberg