CFP - Digital Humanities in Islamic & Middle East Studies (Brown University, Oct 24-25 2013)

The Digital Humanities in Islamic & Middle East Studies October 24-25 2013
Brown University

Call for Papers

Over the past few decades, humanistic inquiry has been problematized and invigorated by technological advances and the concomitant emergence of what is referred to as the digital humanities. Across multiple disciplines, from history to literature, religious studies to philosophy, archaeology to music, scholars are tapping the extraordinary power of digital technologies to preserve, curate, analyze, visualize, and reconstruct their research objects.

The humanistic study of the Middle East and the broader Islamic world has been no less impacted by this new paradigm. Scholars are making daily use of digital tools and repositories including private and state-sponsored archives of textual sources, digitized manuscript collections, densitometrical imaging, visualization and modeling software, and various forms of data mining and analysis. However, there have been few calls to bring researchers together to showcase their experiments in digital humanistic scholarship within their respective fields, or to discuss the opportunities and challenges engendered by this changing scholarly ecosystem.

With this in mind, *Middle East Studies at Brown University* – with the support of the Brown Humanities Initiative – is pleased to announce a pioneering conference on October 24-25 2013 that will explore the state of the art in digital scholarship pertaining to Islamic & Middle East Studies. Some of the guiding questions we are interested in include:

(1)  Where are the most important digitization projects of historical sources in Arabic, Persian, Turkish, and other languages taking place around the world?

(2)  What kinds of digital technologies and methodologies have proven most fruitful for scholars in different disciplines (e.g. data mining, pattern recognition, social network analysis, etc.)?

(3)  How are existing technologies challenged by the manipulation of data in non-Western languages, and what are the most significant technological desiderata for researchers?

(4)  What specific examples of digital-based research (macroscopic or microscopic) in Islamic and Middle East Studies are promising, problematic, or otherwise provocative?

(5)  As digital tools and media become more widespread, what ethical issues relating to privacy and human consent must be carefully considered, particularly in projects involving contemporary political and social issues?

We are happy to welcome as our keynote speaker *Dr. Dwight Reynolds* (Professor of Religious Studies, UCSB), who is among many other things the architect of the Sirat Bani Hilal Digital Archive, “an open access resource for the preservation and dissemination of audio recordings, written texts, photographic images and other materials related to the Epic of the Bani Hilal Tribe,” a thousand-year-old epic poem. The conference will be webcast and several papers may be selected for publication in an edited volume.

*Submissions*: We welcome submissions from scholars and graduate students in diverse disciplines. Interested candidates are kindly requested to submit a title and abstract of 300 words to the conference organizers at
digitalhumanitiesconference@gmail.com. The deadline for submissions is March 15, 2013, and successful applicants will be notified by mid-April. Papers should be no longer than 20 minutes and should be read in English.

Depending on the number of participants, *there will be limited funds available for travel and accommodation*. Brown University is located in Providence, Rhode Island, about one hour south of Boston. For any questions, please contact Dr. Elias Muhanna at the email address above. Additional information will soon be available on the conference website.

Open Access Book: Greetings from the Teklimakan: a handbook of Modern Uyghur

	Greetings from the Teklimakan: a handbook of Modern Uyghur
Authors:	Engesæth, Tarjei Yakup, Mahire Dwyer, Arienne M.
Keywords:	Uyghur language -- study and teaching -- English speakers Uyghur grammar Uyghur language -- study and teaching Uyghur language, textbook
Issue Date:	2009
Type:	Book
Abstract:	An introductory textbook of the modern standard Uyghur language with exercises and extensive grammatical analysis. With the accompanying audio, the textbook is designed for self-study or a one-year classroom course.
Description:	xiv, 310 p.
URI:	http://hdl.handle.net/1808/5624
ISBN:	978-1-936153-03-9 (text)
ISSN:	978-1-936153-04-6 (audio)

Orientalist Photography

Orientalist Photography

The collection includes late nineteenth century and early twentieth century architecture in
Arab cityscapes and natural landscapes. The photos bear witness to the scars left by the
Ottoman empire , French and English. The collection includes postcards and albumen
photographs. The majority of the albumen photos where taken by professional
photographers, including the Zangaki brothers, Pascal Sabah and Lehnert & Landrock.

Orientalist photography (and painting) was born out of the westerners' desire for
entertainment and amusement. It capitalizes on portraying Arabs as savages in staged
settings. One section of the collection, the Colonial Harem postcards, is a testimony to this
notion. The Colonial Harem postcards were created primarily by French photographers.
The models for these postcards were very young girls from north Africa, primarily Morocco
, Alger, Tunis, and Egypt .. The photographs were staged to duplicate the compositions
of the western orientalist painters, embedding the false conception of the uncivilized Arab
even deeper in the western psyche.

The stereo-topical photographs of the Palestinian people and their lifestyle were created
to target western Christians, many of whom never traveled from their homes but were
curious about the birth place of Jesus.

Sirat Bani Hilal Digital Archive

 Sirat Bani Hilal Digital Archive

"The Sirat Bani Hilal Digital Archive is designed as an open access resource for the preservation and dissemination of audio recordings, written texts, photographic images and other materials related to the “Epic of the Bani Hilal tribe” (Arabic: Sīrat Banī Hilāl سيرة بني هلال ). The site is dedicated to the epic singers of al-Bakātūsh (Egypt) for their willingness to share their knowledge and performances of this thousand-year-old epic poem."

The Archive was created and is maintained with support of the American Council of Learned Societies and the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Open Access Journal: Journal of Islamic Architecture

Journal of Islamic Architecture
ISSN: 2086-2636

Journal of Islamic Architecture (JIA) is a scientific publication for widespread research and criticism topics in Islamic architecture studies. JIA is published twice a year in June and December since June 2010 by International Center for Islamic Architecture from the Sunnah (CIAS), Department of Architecture UIN Maulana Malik Ibrahim Malang.

2012

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 2, No 2; 2012)

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 2, No 1; 2012)

2011

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 1, No 4; 2011)

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 1, No 3; 2011 )

2010

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 1 No 2; 2010)

Journal of Islamic Architecture (Vol 1 No 1; 2010)

See the Alphabetical List of Open Access Journals in Middle Eastern Studies

GLORIA Center's Free Books Project

"The GLORIA Center’s Free Books project features 13 books on our site, free and full-text to be read online or easily downloaded. The books are available in HTML and PDF and will soon be available for download in all other formats. GLORIA invites you to take advantage of this free service, designed to promote education on Middle East, U.S. foreign policy, and other issues. We hope you find this material useful in your work, research, study, and analysis."
The collection includes nine books by Barry Rubin.
Barry Rubin is Director of Global Research in International Affairs  (GLORIA) Center and Editor of Middle East Review of International Affairs (MERIA) 

1. Assimilation and Its Discontents
2. Cauldron of Turmoil,
   
3. The Arab States and the Palestine Conflict
   
4. Istanbul Intrigues
   
5. Paved with Good Intentions
   
6. Modern Dictators: Third World Coupmakers, Strongmen, and Populist Tyrants
   
7. Islamic Fundamentalists in Egyptian Politics
   
8. The Long War for Freedom-The Arab Struggle for Democracy in the Middle East
   
9. The Tragedy of the Middle East
   
10. The Truth About Syria
11. Secrets of State  
12. Hating America: A History 
13. Children of Dolhinov

Open Access Iraqi Academic Scientific Journals

Iraqi Academic Scientific Journals (IASJ).

"IASJ is one platform where all scholarly journals published by the Iraqi universities and research institutions are indexed and discovered. All journals in IASJ are peer-reviewed and open access.
The main aim of IASJ is to improve the online discoverability and visibility of and access to the published scholarly research of iraqi academics. IASJ will help Iraqi authors to disseminate their research globally.
At the moment IASJ is launched in a Beta version with only 71 journals published by 18 institutions. The service will be further developed and will cover all journals, more than 200 journals publisher by 40 academic institutions in Iraq."

Agriculture
Archaeology
Asian studies
Business, economics and management
Education
Environmental studies
Gender studies
General reference
History
Language and literature
Law
Library and information science
Medicine
Others
Performing arts
Philosophy
Political science
Psychology
Religion
Science
Social sciences
Technology and engineering

Open Access Journal: Ādāb al-Baṣrah - اداب البصرة

Ādāb al-Baṣrah
اداب البصرة

ISSN: 1814-8212
Publisher: [Baṣrah, Iraq] : Wizārat al-Taʻlīm al-ʻĀlī wa-al-Baḥth al-ʻIlmī : Jāmiʻat al-Baṣrah
Faculty: Arts
Language: Chiefly in Arabic, English.

2012	Volume:0 Issue:62	Pages (1-391)
2012	Volume:0 Issue:61	Pages (1-356)
2012	Volume:0 Issue:60	Pages (1-360)
2011	Volume:0 Issue:59	Pages (1-425)
2011	Volume:0 Issue:58	Pages (1-415)
2011	Volume:0 Issue:57	Pages (1-427)
2011	Volume:0 Issue:56	Pages (1-356)
2011	Volume:0 Issue:55	Pages (1-428)
2010	Volume:2 Issue:54	Pages (1-348)
2010	Volume:1 Issue:54	Pages (1-377)
2010	Volume:0 Issue:53	Pages (1-347)
2010	Volume:0 Issue:52	Pages (1-316)
2010	Volume:0 Issue:51	Pages (1-352)
2009	Volume:0 Issue:50	Pages (1-283)
2009	Volume:0 Issue:49	Pages (1-350)
2009	Volume:0 Issue:48	Pages (1-342)
2008	Volume:0 Issue:47	Pages (1-362)
2008	Volume:0 Issue:46	Pages (1-346)
2008	Volume:0 Issue:45	Pages (1-340)
2007	Volume:0 Issue:44	Pages (1-308)
2007	Volume:0 Issue:43	Pages (1-361)
2007	Volume:0 Issue:42	Pages (1-320)
2006	Volume:0 Issue:41	Pages (1-261)
2006	Volume:0 Issue:40	Pages (1-248)
2005	Volume:0 Issue:39	Pages (1-234)
2005	Volume:0 Issue:38	Pages (1-237)

See the Alphabetical List of Open Access Journals in Middle Eastern Studies

Open Access Manuscripts: University of Edinburgh image collections

University of Edinburgh: Image Collections 


"These collections display highlights of the resources of the University of Edinburgh Library, principally from within Special Collections. At present we have almost 12,000 images in the system with more being added on a regular basis.
The images that have been created by the University's Digital Imaging Unit are freely accessible to all. We also offer images through commercial services such as Archivision and the Amica Library. Access to these is restricted to students and staff of the University of Edinburgh. This restriction also applies to Edinburgh College of Art collections. All images are displayed using LUNA software."

 See Alphabetical List of Open Access Islamic Manuscripts Collections