Hi friends!
Another successful year is descending upon us–we close today at 6pm and reopen on the 2nd of January, 2013. Many thanks for your visits and feedback! We wish you a Happy Holiday season and best wishes for the new year! To our Christian friends, Merry Christmas and to our Jewish friends, a belated, Happy Hanukkah.
See you in 2013!
Hi friends! Dr. Medani of the IIS has just published a comparative piece on Egypt’s current changes and challenges and those of the Sudan in 1989.
Hot tip of the day: If you wish to continue reading more about the Sudan and not sure where to begin, go to McGill’s WorldCat Local catalogue and type in SU: Sudan. The SU stands for Subject and will return all titles with Sudan as a subject heading.
Enjoy!
Hi friends! Over the Christmas break don’t forget to begin studying Baluchi! McGill has recently digitized the 1969 publication by IIS members Muhammad Abd-al-Rahman Barker and Aquil Khan Mengal. Good luck!
http://www.library.mcgill.ca/hostedjournals/002201021.html.
Dirk Wintergruen, Robert Casties, Sally Ragep, Jamil Ragep (Max Planck Institute for the History of Science / McGill)
The Open Mind database of the Islamic Scientific Manuscript Initiative (ISMI)
Dec 13, 1pm, Arts 160
Traditional databases work well with structured data that can be organized into tables. But humanist scholars often deal with very unstructured information that is fluid and in need of flexible structures. The Open Mind database of the Islamic Scientific Manuscript Initiative (ISMI) was developed by humanist scholars and technical experts working jointly through a partnership between the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science (MPIWG) in Berlin and McGill’s Institute of Islamic Studies. The technical humanists and humanist technicians from both Institutes will discuss their experiences over almost a decade in developing the database and answer questions about how other projects can profit from the experiences made during the development of the project and how this open-source data structure might be re-used by other humanist scholars.
The Centre d’études ethniques des universités montréalaises (CEETUM) & The Chaire de recherche du Canada Islam, Pluralisme et Globalisation (CRC‐IPG) invite you to the following conference :
Contemporary Islamic dynamics in Indonesia
by Robert Hefner, Ph.D., Professor and Director of the Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs, Boston University
Monday Dec. 17 2012, 3-5 p.m.
Université de Montréal – Pavillon Lionel Groulx – Room C‐2059
Robert W. Hefner is professor of anthropology and director of the Institute on Culture, Religion, and World Affairs (CURA) at Boston University, where he served as associate director from 1986‐2009. At CURA, he has directed the program on Islam and society since 1991; coordinated interdisciplinary educational programs on religion and world affairs; and is currently involved in research projects comparing responses to modern social change (“modernity”) in Christianity, Islam, Hinduism, and Buddhism.
Hefner has conducted research on Muslim culture, politics, and education since the mid‐1980s, and on the comparative sociology/anthropology of world religions for the past thirty years. He has directed some 15 major research projects, and organized 11 international conferences. Recent projects have examined shari`a law and citizenship in eight Muslim majority countries (2008‐2010); the culture and politics of Muslim education (2005‐2007); the prospects for and the politics of civil democratic Muslim politics (2002‐2004); and social resources for civility and participation in the deeply plural societies of Malaysia, Singapore, and Indonesia (1999‐2001). Hefner has authored or edited fifteen books, as well as seven major policy reports for the U.S. government and private policy foundations. Five of his books have been translated into Indonesian.
During 2009‐2010, Hefner serves as the elected president of the Association for Asian Studies, the largest professional association for Asian studies in the world. During 2008‐2009, he was invited by Stanford University and the National University of Singapore to be the first Lee Kong Chian Fellow in Southeast Asian Studies. Hefner was also invited to be editor for the sixth volume of the forthcoming New Cambridge History of Islam, Muslims and Modernity: Society and Culture since 1800. He has also served as member of the advisory committee to two SSRC projects, the “Religious Lives of Migrant Minorities” and “Religion in International Relations”; as an advisor to a project on “religionification” in Southeast Asia at the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales in Paris (2009‐2010); and as an invited Senior Professor in the Summer Graduate Program on Religion, Culture, and Society at the University Centre‐St. Ignatius, University of Antwerp, Belgium (2007‐2009).
Arabic scripts developed over time and by the 13th century 6 scripts (الأقلام الستة) became the most prominent for a variety of reasons: thuluth, rayḥān, muḥaqaq, naskh, tawqīʿ and riqʿa. These scripts were formalised by a calligrapher known as Yāqūt al-Mustaʻṣimī in the early 13th century. This example is known as a kara-lamah which is Turkish for ‘black writing’. It is a practice sheet and in this instance it is written in the hand of Yāqūt by an unknown, probably 19th century calligrapher. The calligrapher would practice her/his penmanship to perfect it but also to try different nibs of his qalām, or reed pen. It is interesting to note that calligraphers were in want of ensuring secrecy of their trade, so almost all calligraphers would break their nibs after having completed a project.
This image comes from the Islamic Studies calligraphy collection. The calligraphy collection maintains some 200 specimens in Arabic, Persian and Ottoman Turkish. This example is a kara-lamah in the hand of the eminent calligrapher, and former librarian Yāqūt al-Mustaʻṣimī (ca. 618-98 Hijri/ca. 1221-98 A.D.). Yāqūt’s “nisba was derived from his master, the last ʿAbbāsid caliph in Bag̲h̲dād, al-Mustaʿṣim [q.v.], who brought him up and had him educated.” (Encyclopaedia of Islam, v. 2)
Yāqūt is one of the most influential calligraphers along with other prominent figures such as Ibn al-Bawwab and Ibn Muqla.
RBD AC24 located in Rare Books and Special Collections
Further information about Yāqūt al-Mustaʻṣimī:
Munajjid, Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn. 1985. Yāqūt al-Mustaʻṣimī. Bayrūt: Dār al-Kitāb al-Jadīd. (Call no. NK3633 Y3 M8 1985)
Canby, Sheila R.. “Yāḳūt al-Mustaʿṣimī.” Encyclopaedia of Islam, Second Edition. Brill Online, 2012. Reference. McGill University. 02 December 2012 <http://referenceworks.brillonline.com/entries/encyclopaedia-of-islam-2/yakut-al-mustasimi-SIM_7972>
Hi friends! Applications are now being accepted for this year’s MIISC symposium:
Tracing Encounters
The 3rd Annual McGill Institute of Islamic Studies Student Council Graduate Symposium McGill University’s Institute of Islamic Studies Student Council (MIISSC) invites abstracts for scholarly papers to be presented at its third annual graduate symposium to be held on the 3rd & 4th of May 2013 in Montreal, Quebec.
Go on, send in your paper proposals today and participate in this the 3rd annual symposium!
