Samah Choudhury has been chosen as an American Examples scholar. Her dissertation delves into humor and Islam in America, specifically at how American Muslim comedians utilize humor as a mode of self-constructing and then articulating “Islam” for an American public. She is invited to attend a workshop that will culminate in a volume of papers to be submitted for publication in the NAASR Working Papers series published by Equinox.

“AE seeks scholars that see the Americas as an important site for analyzing and theorizing about religion. The study of religion in America, or American religious history, has most often sought to discover what is uniquely “American” about American religion.” -Read more about American Examples.

Congratulations, Samah!

UNC Religious Studies Ph.D. Candidate Katherine Merriman was recently featured in the New Yorker discussing the Muslim History Tour she leads in New York City.

From the New Yorker:

“For the past four years, Merriman has been giving Muslim-history tours of Trump’s home town, focussing on Harlem. ‘There are roughly three hundred mosques in New York City,’ she said the other day. ‘New York is one of the most, if not the most, diverse Muslim cities in the world. There is no such thing as a ‘Muslim world’ somewhere else.’

…This summer, Merriman will start a Wall Street-area tour, which will cover Little Syria and the site of the Ottoman mosque on Rector Street. She told the group, ‘Your job is to keep these stories alive.’”

Katherine’s Muslim History Tour of New York City was also recently featured in the New York Times.

Congratulations, Katherine!

The 15th Annual Duke-UNC Graduate Middle East and Islamic Studies Conference on “Map, Territory,​ and​ Boundary​” was held last week on Feb. 9-10 at Duke University, with participation from graduate students and faculty from both institutions. The conference explored geography and territoriality as not only the subjects of ongoing contestation, but also compelling paradigms to engage with broader interrelated questions pertaining to the modern makeup of the Middle East. Participants discussed the myriad of ways the themes of map, territory, and boundary open up new possibilities of insight in the contexts of the Middle East, Muslim communities, and their connected geographies. Congratulations to the conference organizers and participants on a successful conference!

    

On Wednesday, January 31, Dr. Shahla Talebi joined us for the first of our McLester Colloquia for the Spring semester. Dr. Talebi is Associate Professor of Historical, Philosophical and Religious Studies at Arizona State University.

In a lecture entitled “Traversing Religiopolitical Metaphors in Contemporary Iran,” Dr. Talebi discussed the significant metaphor of the event of Karbala in the history of Iranian Shi`i tradition. The lecture was thought-provoking and generated questions and responses from the faculty and graduate students present. As usual, the lecture was followed by casual conversation over refreshments.

Looking forward to the next McLester Colloquium!
 
 

Posted in Graduate Student News, News & Events on January 31, 2018. Bookmark the permalink.