Friday, May 29, 2020

The Damascus Psalm Fragment: Middle Arabic and the Legacy of Old Ḥigāzī

By Ahmad Al-Jallad, with a contribution by Ronny Vollandt
Chicago: The Oriental Institute, 2020
ISBN 978-1-61491-052-7
160 pages (xxiv + 136); 31 figures
Paperback, 10 x 7 in.
$39.95

This book investigates Arabic’s transformative historical phase, the passage from the pre-Islamic to the Islamic period, through a new approach. It asks, What would Arabic’s early history look like if we wrote it based on the documentary evidence? The book frames this question through the linguistic investigation of the Damascus Psalm Fragment (PF), the longest Arabic text composed in Greek letters from the early Islamic period. It is argued that its language is a witness to the Arabic vernacular of the early Islamic period, and then moves to understand its relationship with Arabic of the pre-Islamic period, the Quranic Consonantal Text, and the first Islamic century papyri, arguing that all of this material belongs to a dialectal complexed we call “Old Ḥigāzī.” The book concludes by presenting a scenario for the emergence of standard Classical Arabic as the literary language of the late eighth century and beyond.

Table of Contents

Preface 
Abbreviations 
List of Tables and Figures
Bibliography 
Contributions
1. The History of Arabic through Its Texts
2. The Psalm Fragment: Script, Phonology, and Morphology
3. Dating and Localizing the Document, Writing System, and Language
4. Old Arabic, Middle Arabic, and Old Ḥigāzī
5. Edition of the Arabic Columns of the Damascus Psalm Fragment
Appendix 1
Beyond Arabic in Greek Letters: The Scribal and Translational Context of the Violet Fragment
Appendix 2
Pre-Islamic Graeco-Arabic Texts
Index

Friday, May 22, 2020

Open Access Database: Arab American Newspapers Project


Arab American Newspapers Project
Published by: Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies, North Carolina State University

"The Khayrallah Center is delighted to announce the release of the beta version of its fully searchable database of Arab American newspapers. This online database provides full and open access to the general public and researchers to this rich source of the history of Arabs in the Americas, and beyond."

See also: Digitized Newspapers and Journals from the  Moise A. Khayrallah Center for Lebanese Diaspora Studies from North Carolina State University.

Discover Egypt's Monuments


Discover Egypt's Monuments

"Supported by Egypt's Ministry of Tourism and Antiquities, Discover Egypt's Monuments invites visitors on a virtual trip through Alexandria, Aswan, Cairo, Giza, Luxor, South Sinai, Wadi Natrun, Al-Minya, and the Red Sea. Clicking "Explore Egypt's Maps" leads visitors to an interactive map where they can scroll through locations (using the Places to Visit box on the right-hand side, under Sites and Monuments) and find pinpointed sites along the way. Each site includes a brief description (available in English or Arabic). If a site sounds particularly fascinating, click the "Read More" button to find additional highlights, history, and galleries. Visitors can also explore sites by time period (by switching the selection in the top-right from Sites and Monuments to Chronological). Want even more immersive content? The Ministry of Tourism's YouTube channel (accessible via the icon on the left-hand panel) offers video tours of many of the featured places. The Ministry of Tourism's website in its entirety is full of engaging resources. The button with three lines in the top-left corner links to these other parts of the website, including Children's World, where you will find a variety of activities and resources for the young ones in your life, and a Stories and Media hub with additional reading material." [EMB] [from Scout Report]

Wednesday, May 20, 2020

Open Access Journal : Ilāhīyāt-i taṭbīqī = الهيات تطبيقى = Comparative Theology


Ilāhīyāt-i taṭbīqī = Comparative Theology = Journal of Comparative Theology
Published : Isfahan, Iran : Dānishgāh-i Iṣfahān,
Date: 2010-
ISSN 2322-3421
In Persian and English

Subjects :
Christianity and other religions -- Islam -- Periodicals.
Islam -- Doctrines -- Periodicals.
Religions -- Periodicals.


See also: Alphabetical List of Open Access Journals in Middle Eastern Studies

Tuesday, May 19, 2020

New Open Access Journal: Manazir Journal


Manazir Journal 
Published by the University of Bern.
vol. 1; 2019-
ISSN:  2673-4354

"Manazir Journal is a peer-reviewed academic Platinum Open Access journal dedicated to visual arts, architecture and cultural heritage in the Middle East and North Africa (MENA). Every issue focuses on a specific theme defined and proposed by a guest editor responsible for the issue and its follow-up.  Manazir Journal accepts proposals for issues published in English, French, German and Italian and is also open to languages of the MENA region, such as Arabic, Persian and Turkish.
The journal is linked to Manazir – Swiss Platform for the Study of Visual Arts, Architecture and Heritage in the MENA, a platform of exchange that aims to connect researchers interested in these themes in Switzerland. The term “Manazir” refers to landscape, perspective and point of view in Arabic, Ottoman Turkish and Persian. Thus, Manazir Journal is oriented toward a diversity of transcultural and transdisciplinary “landscapes” and “points of views” and open to a multiplicity of themes, epochs and geographical areas."

See also: Alphabetical List of Open Access Journals in Middle Eastern Studies

Wednesday, May 13, 2020

Open Access Database: Qur’an Details Search



Qur’an Details search page allows scholars to search among 4,700 detailed entries for historically interesting Qur’an pages, spanning 110 collections from all over the world, and representing all eras and all places of production. Using this facility, scholars can make specialist searches for terms including
•            Qur’an page description (type of illumination, decoration or binding),
•            Qur’an type (fragment, Juz etc.),
•            Qur’an Sura reference,
•            Script (kufic, naskh, etc.),
•            Number of lines per page,
•            Page size (height and width),
•            Qur’an name (e.g. Oljaytu's Baghdad Qur’an), and
•            Calligrapher name.

This is in addition to all the standard search parameters such as date and place of production, holding collection, accession number and folio, and full publication details. The data covers items published online as well as in print and includes bindings. Search results include images for about 20% of the entries. "

Qur’an Details is a part of Islamic Painted Page - database of Persian, Ottoman, Arab and Mughal paintings, illuminations, decorated Qur'an pages, and book bindings from over 310 collections worldwide

Thursday, May 7, 2020

SHARIAsource


SHARIAsource

"SHARIAsource  is a project of the Program in Islamic Law at Harvard Law School, that aims to provide comprehensive content and context on Islamic law in a way that is accessible and useful. It is a Portal into the digital world of Islamic legal studies and related tools from data science and AI. Working with a global team of advisors, senior scholars, and editors, our mission is to organize the world’s information on Islamic law."

Tuesday, May 5, 2020

Open Access Journal: AlMuntaqa


AlMuntaqa
Published by: Markaz al-ʻArabī lil-Abḥāth wa-Dirāsat al-Siyāsāt: (Dawḥah, Qatar), 2018.
Hosted by JSTOR.

Summary: "An Open Access journal released by the Arab Center for Research and Policy Studies (ACRPS), devoted to providing English speakers with access to a selection of the best research in the social sciences and humanities coming out of the Arab academy. Articles in this journal were originally written in Arabic for the ACRPS' other peer-reviewed publications journals."

ISSN: 2616-8073


See also: Alphabetical List of Open Access Journals in Middle Eastern Studies

Monday, May 4, 2020

Kurdish Digital Library


Kurdish Digital Library - Kurdish Institute of Paris,
The Institute has digitized a thousand books related to Kurds and the Middle East general. Some books can be downloaded as pdf.

"This library contains over 10,000 monographs about the Kurds, in 25 languages, several tens of thousands of published documents, collections of reviews and newspapers, photographs, videos, post cards and posters, as well as audio archives and music recordings.

This rich documentation fills over a third of the Institute's premises as well as a substantial part of its warehouse, located in a Paris suburb. References to these monographs and the principal documents have been computerized"

Open Access Archive of Kurdish Periodicals: Arşîva Kurd




Open Access Archive of Kurdish Periodicals: Arşîva Kurd offers numerous Kurdish periodicals from 1898 to the present.