CMES newsFall 12_3_web.pdf - Center for Middle Eastern Studies ...

u n i v e r s i t y o f c a l i f o r n i a a t b e r k e l e y 

c e n t e r f o r 

Middle Eastern Studies 

Fall 2012 Vol. 34, No. 1 

in this issue 

International Symposium on the 

Arab Spring — Istanbul, Turkey . . .1 

Notes from the Chair . . . . . . . . . .2 

Model Arab League . . . . . . . . . . .4 

Outreach . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . .4 

Sultan Postdoctoral Fellow: 

Dr. Heba Mostafa . . . . . . . . . . . . .5 

CMES Welcomes 

Prof. Asad Ahmed . . . . . . . . . . . .5 

News of Faculty . . . . . . . . . . . . . .6 

Recent Ph.D. Graduates . . . . . . . .8 

Visiting Scholars . . . . . . . . . . . . .9 

News of MES Alumni . . . . . . . . .10 

MES 2012 Graduation & 

Undergraduate Theses . . . . . . . .11 

Report on Spring 2012 

Lecture Series . . . . . . . . . . . . .12 

Grants and Fellowships . . . . . . .14 

Afaf Kanafani Prize . . . . . . . . . .15 

News of the Library . . . . . . . . . .16 

Upcoming Lectures and Events . .18 

N E W S l E T T E r 

International Symposium 

on the Arab Spring— 

Istanbul, Turkey 

The events that have swept across North Africa and the Middle East since 

January 2011 have transformed the political map of the region . Collectively 

termed the Arab Spring, these popular uprisings have brought down 

some of the most entrenched and repressive authoritarian regimes of our 

times . Yet the political future of the Middle East is far from set . While some 

countries in the region are setting up transitional governments and devising 

constitutional frameworks for their first democratic elections, others are in 

the midst of violent protests and fierce repression . The political origins, 

dynamics, and implications of these momentous events was the focus of 

an international symposium held on May 24, 2012 in Turkey, which was 

organized by the CMES and sponsored by Istanbul Aydin University . 

The symposium brought together experts from the United States, 

Europe, and the Middle East to discuss the prospect of democratic 

consolidation in the Arab world . Some of the questions they addressed 

included: 

n Will the uprisings and protests that have stretched throughout the 

region lead to the further re-entrenchment of market rule under 

Islamic and (relatively more) democratic leadership? 

n Are there counter-dynamics that could rein in market dynamics and 

build redistributive economies, or at least stronger welfare states and 

independent unions? 

These issues were discussed in relation to the “Turkish model” which 

many in the Western media and academia hold up as an exemplary 

democracy . The participants highlighted certain aspects of the Turkish 

case that remain under-analyzed in recent debates, ranging from its 

thoroughly inegalitarian neoliberalism and its frequent deployment 

of authoritarian techniques and discourses . They also discussed 

to what degree the ruling party and emergent regime in Turkey are 

symposium contInued on pAge 3

notes from the chair 

The Middle East is in turmoil! 

We have been hearing this for 

the past 18 months now and 

arguably for the past six or nine 

decades, depending on how we 

define “turmoil .” But, regardless 

of how far back we stretch our 

perspective on the region, there 

is no doubt that many countries 

in the Middle East are witnessing profound change . 

Dictators have been toppled in Tunisia, libya, Egypt, 

and Yemen with each encountering a very different 

fate . While Qaddafi was killed during the libyan 

uprising and Mubarak received a life sentence after his 

trial in Egypt, Ben Ali of Tunisia and Saleh of Yemen 

escaped punishment with the latter even continuing 

to pull strings behind the scenes in the affairs of his 

country . And the real bloody battle to topple Assad 

rages on in Syria with no immediate end in sight . 

But just as the fate of toppled dictators differed 

from one country to the next, so will the future of their 

countries differ during this difficult transition period . 

In Tunisia, long hailed as a haven for secularists 

and liberals, the Islamist Ennahda party has come 

to power and an Islamist parliament was elected . 

Similarly in Egypt, an Islamist was elected president 

and the undeclared alliance between the Muslim 

Brotherhood and the ultraconservative Salafists 

resulted in a parliament—now dissolved—fully 

dominated by their parties: the Freedom & Justice 

Party and the Al-Noor Party, respectively . Surprisingly 

in libya, the Islamists failed to win a majority, while 

in Yemen, they retained their same status under 

a government that is seen by many as a partial 

continuation of the past headed by a president who 

served as vice president for the old regime . 

One major sign of change, however, is the 

changing role of the military in most of these 

countries . In Tunisia, the military that went along with 

the removal of Ben Ali remains in check . In Yemen 

and libya, meanwhile the military still plays a part, but 

it’s role remains subordinate to the tribal groupings 

that have always existed in both of these counties . 

Egypt deserves a special focus here because the 

military had played a particularly dominant role in 

political and economic life there . Even in Egypt, 

however, it seems that the military’s powers are being 

significantly curtailed . At the writing of these notes, 

2 center for middle eastern studies 

Islamist President Mohamed Morsi had reasserted 

his authority by forcibly retiring the most important 

generals in the Egyptian army, those who have ruled 

the country since the fall of Hosni Mubarak . In their 

place, Morsi appointed a younger general as Minister 

of Defense and Chairman of the Supreme Council 

of the Armed Forces (SCAF) . He also appointed a 

civilian vice president for the first time in Egyptian 

republican history . These may appear to be positive 

developments but the reality is otherwise . Morsi’s 

new chair of SCAF and his vice president, while not 

affiliated with the Muslim Brotherhood or its party, are 

known to be very sympathetic to their Brotherhood’s 

Islamization agenda . In addition, to control the media 

and the judiciary, Morsi also appointed other Islamist 

sympathizers to serve as Ministers of Information and 

Justice and both acted quickly to shut down a cable 

television channel and to prosecute the editor of a 

major newspaper because of their critical remarks 

about Morsi . With all of these appointments, Morsi 

reversed a pledge to appoint women, Copts, and 

other liberals to important posts in his government, 

But just as the fate of the 

toppled dictators differed 

from one country to the 

next, so will the future of 

their countries during this 

difficult transition period. 

leaving many observers to conclude that the Muslim 

Brotherhood, from which Morsi hails, will stop at 

nothing to acquire total power in Egypt . To complicate 

the situation further, Morsi annulled the constitutional 

declaration issued by SCAF in the period after the 

parliament was dissolved before his election . As a 

result, he is the first president in Egyptian history 

who has managed to formally hold both legislative 

and executive powers with no checks and balances . 

Again, this all may have been acceptable if he was 

elected with a large margin and a mandate, but that 

was not the case; his election divides Egyptians 

to this day . Indeed, he may now be able to govern 

by decree, unchallenged except for a judiciary and 

notes contInued on pAge 17

symposium contInued froM pAge 1 

“Islamic,” despite some Arab 

Islamists’ investment in this 

belief . The discussion of the 

Turkish case in its relation to the 

Arab revolutionary processes 

also allowed the participants 

to problematize concepts and 

categories such as democracy, 

Islamic state, Islamism, Islamic 

democracy and to have a fresh 

debate about the articulations of 

Islam and neoliberalism . 

Dr . Mustafa Aydin, Chairman 

of the Board of Trustees for 

Istanbul Aydin Unversity opened 

the symposium with welcome 

remarks . Prof . nezar AlSayyad, 

Chair of the CMES, delivered 

introductory remarks on the 

theme of the symposium . A 

special address was given by Mr . 

Metin Kulunk, Vice-Chairman 

for Foreign Affairs and Member of 

Parliament for the AK Party . 

The first panel was chaired 

by Prof . Nezar AlSayyad and 

was titled “The Initial Uprisings .” 

Dr . Laryssa chomiak, Director 

of the American Institute 

for Maghrib Studies (AIMS) 

Professors alsayyad and caliskan 

Overseas research Center, 

Centre d’études Maghrébines 

à Tunis (CEMAT), presented 

the paper, “Post-revolutionary 

Tunisia in the Midst of the Arab 

Spring: Civic resistance to Civil 

Society .” Prof . Amr Shalakany, 

from the Department of law at 

the American University in Cairo 

followed with his paper “Egypt: 

law and revolution revisited .” Dr . 

Khaled fattah from the Center 

for Middle Eastern Studies at the 

University of lund, Sweden, then 

delivered his talk on “Non-state 

Actors in the Arab Spring: the 

Houthi rebels of Yemen,” and 

finally Prof . Koray caliskan, 

from the Department of Political 

Science at Bogazici University, 

closed the panel with his paper 

“Arab Spring, Turkish Fall .” 

The second panel was chaired 

by Prof . cihan tugal from the 

Department of Sociology at UC 

Berkeley . Prof . Bassam Haddad, 

from the Department of Public 

and International Affairs at George 

Mason University opened the 

panel with his paper on “The 

Structural Factors Behind the 

Uprisings: The Case of Syria .” Prof . 

firuz demir Yasamis from the 

Department of Political Science 

and International relations at Aydin 

University then followed with the 

paper “Turkey and the Arab 

Spring,” and finally, Dr . nuray Mert, 

a well known Turkish journalist 

and writer, closed the session with 

reflections and comments on the 

larger implications of the Arab 

Spring on Turkey . 

Professors chomiak and shalakany 

center for middle eastern studies 3

Model Arab League 

this year’s Model Arab League (MAL) conference was an exciting one for Berkeley students, who 

represented the states of Qatar and egypt, and walked away with several awards, including Best 

delegation for representing Qatar. 

Nine students participated in the simulation 

which was held at Mills College in Oakland, 

CA and where they competed with a 

number of schools from the West Coast . 

It was an eventful semester preparing for 

the simulation while closely following the 

changes taking place in the Middle East . 

The MAl class was led by graduate student 

Salma Mousallem . The class grappled with 

questions such as “Who really is in power in 

Egypt, and who do we represent?” The class 

was able to meet these challenges and did 

a formidable job negotiating with students 

in all five councils . During the conference, 

students took the lead in drafting resolutions 

and lobbying for their approval UC Berkeley 

MAl alumni Howaida Kamel and christian 

dolores held the positions of Chair for the 

Environmental Affairs Council and Joint Defense Council respectively . 

The class was also fortunate to have Mr . Ahmed Al-rumaihi, Charge D’Affaires of Qatar Embassy in 

Washington D .C as a class speaker for one session . This was a great opportunity for the students to personally 

interact with Mr . Al-rumaihi as well as learn from his valuable experience . The question and answer period was 

particularly dynamic as Mr . rumaihi relayed various anecdotes and stories about Qatar’s history, economic goals, 

and culture . The conference opened with a keynote speech by Hoda rashad, author of Rising from Tahrir, an 

Amazon Bestseller . 

outreach 

CMES works to share university expertise on the 

Middle East with pre-collegiate and community 

college educators through an outreach program 

coordinated with other International and Area Studies 

(IAS) National resource Centers through the Office of 

resources for International and Area Studies (OrIAS) . 

Funding is provided by Title VI grants from the United 

States Department of Education . 

On July 23-25, 2012 CMES celebrated its 

sixteenth year of participation in the joint Title 

VI summer teachers’ institute on campus . A 

collaboration of eight National resource Centers 


mal students with mr. al- rumaihi, charge d’affaires of Qatar embassy in 

Washington d.c 

Article contributed by salma mousallem 

in area studies, the popular institute features a 

program of scholarly lectures, classroom resource 

and curriculum review, and wide-ranging discussion 

about fundamental forces driving World History . Past 

summer topics have included such themes as Food, 

Imperialism, Cities, Absent Voices, Art, and Disease . 

This year’s institute focused on Technology and 

Human History, looking at contexts and processes of 

innovation over time and place . 

Case studies from the Middle East bookended 

the program, beginning with a presentation by Prof . 

John Hayes, Dept . of Near Eastern Studies at UC

cMeS Welcomes postdoctoral fellow 

dr. Heba Mostafa 

Dr . Heba Mostafa is our Sultan post doctoral teaching fellow/ Visiting Assistant professor 

in the areas of History of Islamic Art, Architecture, and Urbanism for the academic year 2012–13 . 

She comes to us from the Department of Architecture at the University of Cambridge where 

she finished her Ph .D . and taught courses on Islamic art and architecture . She previously held positions at the 

American University in Cairo and the Arab Academy for Science and Technology . 

While at Berkeley, Dr . Mostafa is being hosted by the Department of the History of Art . This fall she will be 

teaching Art History 121: Introduction to Islamic Art and Architecture which will be cross listed with Architecture 

179P: Special Topics in the History of Architecture and Near Eastern Studies C121A: Topics in Islamic Art . The 

course will treat, in depth, topics in Islamic architecture and topics in Islamic art . Subjects addressed may include 

painting, calligraphy, and book production . She is currently working on turning her dissertation into a book with the 

working title “religio-political Authority and the Formation of Islamic Architecture .” 

Berkeley Welcomes professor Asad Ahmed 

Professor Asad Q. Ahmed joins the department of near eastern Studies at Berkeley 

this fall . He specializes in early Islamic social and religious history and post-classical Muslim 

intellectual history . In the former field, he focuses on the sociopolitical networks of the elite 

of the Hijaz during the first two centuries of the hijra . By using prosopographical and social 

network analysis methods on genealogies, biographical dictionaries, and transmission chains, he investigates 

the significance of formal and informal groups for the development of early Muslim politics, society, and dogma . 

These same methods have also allowed him to speculate on the metahistorical thrust of his sources and on 

the nature of kinship ties in early Islam . Some of the conclusions of his work in this field are presented in The 

Religious Elite of the Early Islamic Hijaz (P&G, University of Oxford, 2011) . 

In the field of intellectual history, Prof . Asad’s long term goal is to write a responsible history of the rationalist 

sciences (ma’qulat) after the so-called Golden Age of Islam . Since such work first and foremost requires detailed 

and piecemeal studies of texts in logic, theology, philosophy, jurisprudence, etc ., much of his output in this area 

focuses either on case studies of salient technical issues or on the rationalist tradition in pre-modern and early 

modern Muslim India . In this area of scholarly interest, Prof . Asad has published Avicenna’s Deliverance: Logic 

(Oxford University Press, 2011), in addition to a number of articles . His more general training includes classical 

Arabic poetry and poetics, Graeco-Arabica, and Qur’anic and Hadith studies . 

Berkeley, on the invention of writing and record 

keeping in the ancient world, and ending with a panel 

on uses of new media to record the 2011 Egyptian 

revolution . Experiences with new media during the 

Tahrir Square uprising was presented by author Hoda 

rashad and filmmaker Khaled Sayed . rashad, a 

blogger during the square’s occupation, is the author 

of rising From Tahrir . Sayed is currently producing 

his film Stories from Tahrir, to follow up his already 

award winning documentary film The Story Behind 

the revolution . Their panel presentations illustrated 

ways in which new technologies activate, record, and 

disseminate voices of political change in a global 

context . Over forty-five teachers from private and 

public districts across the region registered for the 

institute and participated in discussions with area 

experts and colleagues over three days . 

For an archive of talk summaries and resources 

from this and previous summer institutes as well as 

updates on fall programs, visit the OrIAS website at 

http://orias .berkeley .edu . 

Article contributed by michele Delattre, oRiAs 


News of faculty and Associates 

Prof . Wali Ahmadi, 

Department of Near 

Eastern Studies, 

published the book 

Converging Zones: 

Persian Literary 

Tradition and the Writing of History 

(Costa Mesa, CA: Mazda Publishers, 

2012) . His articles “Endangered 

Nation: The literature of Soviet 

Occupied Afghanistan” appeared 

in Global Cold War Literature, ed . 

Andrew Hammond (New York and 

london: routledge, 2012), pp . 58–71 . 

He also presented a paper on “Irony, 

Ambiguity, and Ambivalence in the 

Poetry of Nasir Khusraw,” at The 

University of Strasbourg in July of 2012 . 

Prof . nezar AlSayyad, 

Departments of 

Architecture, City and 

regional Planning 

and Chair of the 

CMES, had a very 

busy spring semester . In February, 

he delivered a keynote address at 

the “Global Prayers” conference 

and exhibit organized by the House 

of World Culture Museum in Berlin, 

Germany . In early March, he gave 

the keynote address at the “Mayor’s 

Conference for Urban Development” 

held in Ankara, Turkey . While there, 

he also delivered several shorter talks 

in a number of research centers and 

think tanks in Ankara . In late March, 

he chaired the keynote session on 

“Globalization and Identity in Arab 

Cities” at the Qatar Urban Forum, 

coinciding with the opening of the 

Qatar Pavilion in Cannes, France . In 

early April, Prof . AlSayyad traveled 

to Jakarta, Indonesia to deliver the 

invited paper “Social Media and 

the Activation of Urban Space” at 

the Urban revolutions Conference 

organized by the journal Urban 


Studies . In late April, he traveled to 

Detroit where he participated in the 

annual conference of the Society of 

Architectural Historians, on whose 

Board of Directors he serves . In early 

May, Prof . AlSayyad delivered the 

keynote address at the City Debates 

Conference organized annually by 

the American University in Beirut . In 

late May, he also delivered the paper 

“On the Fundamentalist City” at the 

International Symposium on religion, 

Violence, and Cities held at Queens 

University in Belfast, Northern Ireland . 

And finally in May, Prof . AlSayyad 

presided over a one-day seminar on 

the “Arab Spring” hosted by Aydin 

University in Istanbul, Turkey . During 

this past spring, his paper entitled 

“religious Fundamentalisms in the 

City: reflections on the Arab Spring,” 

co-authored with Mejgan Massoumi, 

was published in the Columbia 

Journal of International Affairs . His 

paper “The Virtual Square: Urban 

Space and the Egyptian Uprising” 

was also published in the Harvard 

International Review . 

Prof . Samera esmeir, Department of 

rhetoric, published a book in June 

titled Juridical Humanity: A Colonial 

History with Stanford University 

Press . This fall, she will be teaching 

an undergraduate course titled 

“Great Themes in the rhetoric of 

Contemporary legal and Political 

Theory” which focuses on the theme 

of political violence . She will also 

teach a graduate seminar for the 

Critical Theory Program on “The 

Concept of the International .” In the 

Spring semester, Prof . Esmeir will be 

a fellow at the Berkeley Center for the 

Study of Value . 

Prof . emily gottreich, 

Department of History 

and International 

and Area Studies; 

Vice Chair of the 

CMES, gave the 

commencement address for the 

Department of Near Eastern Studies 

this spring, titled “Near to What, 

East of What?: revealing Questions, 

Evolving Answers .” She also gave 

a lecture on “The State of the Field 

in North African Studies” for the 

annual dissertation workshop of 

the American Institute for Maghrib 

Studies (AIMS), held at UClA . During 

the summer, Professor Gottreich 

traveled to rabat and Tangier to 

conduct site visits of the federallyfunded 

Critical language Studies 

Arabic programs in Morocco, and 

to attend the conference: “Berber 

Societies: New Approaches to 

Space, Time, and Social Process” at 

the American legation of Tangier . 

Afterward she headed to Jaffa 

to conduct research . Her review 

of Sheila Crane’s Mediterranean 

Crossroads: Marseille and Modern 

Architecture was published in the 

spring 2012 Traditional Dwellings 

and Settlements Review . In the fall, 

Professor Gottreich will be teaching a 

new course, MES 150: North Africa: 

History, Culture, Society . 

Prof . Mia fuller, 

Department of 

Italian Studies, was 

invited to give a talk 

in February at the 

first Interdisciplinary 

Conference of the Historical Justice 

and Memory research Network 

held in Melbourne, Australia entitled 

“Taking Back the Symbolic Currency 

of rebellion: ‘Umar al-Mukhtar, 

Qadhafi, and the libyan Uprising of

2011 .” In April, she delivered a lecture 

entitled “Ghadames: Architectural 

Muse and World Heritage Site,” at 

the Society of Architectural meetings 

held in Detroit, Michigan . 

Prof . charles 

Hirschkind, 

Department of 

Anthropology, 

published two articles 

during Spring 2012, 

one entitled “Experiments in Devotion 

Online: The YouTube Khutba” in the 

International Journal of Middle East 

Studies, and a second concerning 

the Egyptian revolution, “Beyond 

Secular and religious: An Intellectual 

Genealogy of Tahrir Square” in 

American Ethnologist . He also 

presented a keynote address at the 

conference “Digital Media, religion 

and Spectacular Activism,” held at 

New York University between June 

24th–26th . He received a residence 

fellowship from the American 

Academy in Berlin for Spring 2013 . 

In the fall of 2012, he will teach 

“Fundamentals of Anthropological 

Theory” and will continue as the 

Director of the religious Studies 

Program at Berkeley . 

Prof . Maria Mavroudi, 

Department of 

History, published 

a contribution on 

the transmission of 

science between 

the Byzantine and the Islamic world 

for the catalogue of the exhibition 

“Byzantium and Islam: Age of 

Transition, 7th–9th century”, held 

at The Metropolitan Museum in 

New York . In March, she conducted 

research in the Greek and Arabic 

manuscripts from the collection of 

the Greek Orthodox Patriarchate in 

Jerusalem . In the fall, she will offer the 

course History 3, an undergraduate 

lecture course comparing 

developments in the Byzantine and 

the Islamic world from the late 

Antiquity until the fifteenth century . 

Prof . Minoo Moallem, 

Department of 

Gender and Women’s 

Studies, gave a few 

public lectures in 

the spring of 2012 

including: “Carpets and Computers” 

at the Tech Museum of San 

Jose; “Contemporary research on 

Transnational Feminist Studies” at 

the Arizona State University; and 

“Women and revolution” at the 

Women’s Forum at the University 

of San Francisco . She served on 

two panels at the Cultural Studies 

Association in San Diego . She also 

participated in the UCHrI Cultures of 

Militarization Working Group . 

Prof . Benjamin porter, 

Department of Near 

Eastern Studies, 

gave a lecture on 

“Assembling resilience 

on the Margins of 

the Fertile Crescent” in March at 

Brown University’s Joukowsky 

Institute for Archaeology and the 

Ancient World . In May he presented 

the paper “locating Near Eastern 

Archaeology in Area Studies” at the 

8th International Congress on the 

Archaeology of the Ancient Near East 

in Warsaw, Poland . He also produced 

two publications in the spring of 

2012 including a co-edited article 

entitled “The Dilmun Bioarchaeology 

Project: A First look at the Peter B . 

Cornwall Collection at the Phoebe A . 

Hearst Museum of Anthropology,” in 

Arabian Archaeology and Epigraphy 

23: 35–49 . His second co-edited 

article entitled “Face-to-Face With 

the Past: reconstructing a Teenage 

Boy from Early Dilmun” appears 

in Near Eastern Archaeology 

75(2): 68–79 . In the summer of 

2012, 17 undergraduate students 

accompanied Prof . Porter to Jordan 

on his excavation project at Dhiban, 

an archaeological site possessing 

five millennia of Middle Eastern 

history . The students enrolled in the 

course Near Eastern Studies 193: 

Near Eastern Archaeological Field 

School, and earned credit through 

Berkeley’s summer sessions . His 

graduate students, Stephanie Brown 

and Martin Weber, both passed 

their Masters exams in the spring 

and are proceeding to the PhD next 

year . Another graduate student, Alan 

Farahani, received a National Science 

Foundation Doctoral Dissertation 

Improvement Grant for her project 

on agricultural intensification and 

sustainable practice under empire at 

Dhiban, Jordan . This fall Prof . Porter 

will be a Visiting Fellow at Johns 

Hopkins University’s Near Eastern 

Studies Department where he will 

be working on his next book project, 

“Disciplining Archaeology in the 

Contemporary Middle East .” 


ecent ph.d. graduates 

the cMeS extends its warmest congratulations to all of the recent graduates who specialized in Middle 

eastern topics in various programs and departments at Berkeley. 

reem Alissa, Department of 

Architecture 

Building for Oil: Corporate 

Colonialism, Nationalism, and 

Urban Modernity in Ahmadi, 

1946–1992 

Advisor: Prof . Nezar AlSayyad, 

Departments of Architecture and 

City and regional Planning 

Yael Allweil, Department of 

Architecture 

Building a Home-Land: Zionism as 

a Regime of Housing 1860–2005 

Advisor: Prof . Nezar AlSayyad, 



Hiba Bou Akar, Department of 


Contesting Beirut’s Frontiers: 

Urban Development, Militarization, 

and the Spatial Production of 

Religious-Political Difference 

Advisors: Prof . Nezar AlSayyad, 


City and regional Planning; Prof . 

Ananya roy, Department of City 

and regional Planning 

dana depietro, Department of 

Near Eastern Studies 

Piety, Practice, and Politics: Ritual 

and Agency in the Late Bronze 

Southern Levant 

Advisor: Prof . Marian Feldman, 

Departments of History of Art and 

Near Eastern Studies 


cristina rhiannon graybill, 

Department of Near Eastern 

Studies 

Men in Travail: Masculinity and the 

Problem of the Body in Hebrew 

Prophets 

Advisor: Prof . robert Alter, 

Department of Comparative 

literature 

Alison Lori Joseph, Department 

of Near Eastern Studies 

The Portrait of the Kings and the 

Historiographical Poetics of the 

Deuteronomistic Historian 

Advisor: Prof . ronald Hendel, 



Anaita Khudonazar, Department 


Generational Politics: Narratives 

of Power in Central Asia’s Visual 

Culture 

Advisor: Sanjyot Mehendale, 



Satyel Larson, Department of 

rhetoric 

Bearing Knowledge: Law, 

Reproduction and the Female 

Body in Modern Morocco, 1912– 

present 

Advisor: Prof . Marianne Constable, 

Department of rhetoric 

elizabeth Joanna Minor, 


The Use of Egyptian and 

Egyptianizing Material Culture in the 

Nubian Burials of the Classic Kerma 

Period 

Advisor: Prof . Carol redmount, 


Barbara Ann richter, Department 


The Theology of Hathor of Dendera: 

Aural and Visual Scribal Techniques 

in the Per-wer Sanctuary 

Advisors: Prof . Jacco Dieleman, 


languages and Cultures, UClA & 

Prof . Carol redmount, Department 


Samuel frank thrope, Jewish 

Studies Program 

Contradictions and Vile Utterances: 

The Zoroastrian Critique of Judaism 

in the Škand Gumānīg Wizār 

Advisor: Emeritus Prof . Martin 

Schwartz, Department of Near 

Eastern Studies 

Zohar Wieman-Kelman, 

Department of Comparative 

literature 

So the Kids Won’t Understand”: 

Inherited Futures of Jewish Women 

Writers 

Advisor: Prof . Chana Kronfeld, 

Departments of Comparative 

literature and Near Eastern Studies 

Congratulations on your achievement!

Fall 2012 Visiting Scholars 

peter Bartu 

Dr . peter Bartu is Senior Meditation Expert in the 

Department of Political Affairs for the United Nations . 

He has more than twenty years of diplomatic 

experience throughout the Middle East and the 

Asia-Pacific . Dr . Bartu previously taught courses in 

Peace and Conflict Studies and International Human 

rights through the International and Area Studies 

Teaching Program at UC Berkeley . He has also taught 

at the Australian Pacific School of Diplomacy and 

the Australian National University . He has contributed 

articles to various refereed journals including 

International Affairs and Autonomy and Peace Review, 

among others . 

While at the CMES, Dr . Bartu will develop curriculum 

for courses on regime change and revolution in the 

Middle East as well as political transitions related to 

the Arab Spring . 

Marie therese ellis-House 

Prof . Marie therese ellis-House is a Professor of 

French at the University of Texas in San Antonio . She 

previously served as a Visiting Assistant Professor at 

Mills College and Stanford University . Ellis-House’s 

research and teaching interests include French and 

Arabic languages and cultures, francophone and 

post-Enlightenment French literature, postcolonial 

studies, translation, and media studies . She has 

contributed articles to various refereed journals 

including the Journal of Mediterranean Studies; the 

International Journal of Francophone Studies, the 

Utah Foreign Language Review, and Romance Review . 

While at the CMES, Ellis-House will be working on 

her second monograph, which examines intellectual 

intervention through literary innovation in a collection 

of texts from the Maghreb . The working title for this 

project is “Intellectual and literary Innovation in 

Maghrebi Adab .” 

daniela Melfa 

Dr . daniela Melfa is a researcher in History and 

Institutions of Africa at the University of Catania, Italy 

where she also teaches courses on North African 

history . She previously served as a Visiting Fellow 

at the Institut sur le Maghreb Contemporain (The 

Institute for the Contemporary Maghreb) in Tunisia . 

She is the author of Migrating South. Italian Settlers 

in Tunisia 1881–1939 (2008) and co-editor of several 

books including most recently Private Space, Public 

Space and Civil Society in the Middle East and North 

Africa (2008) . 

While at the CMES, Dr . Melfa will collect research for 

her project focused on the cleavages that currently 

divide Tunisian society and that can be interpreted 

from a historical perspective . 

Sofia Shwayri 

Prof . Sofia Shwayri is Associate Professor of 

Environmental Studies at Seoul National University . 

She has also held positions at St . Anthony’s College 

at the University of Oxford and the Trauma and 

Violence Trans-disciplinary Studies Program at 

New York University . She has contributed chapters 

in edited volumes including Urban Theory Beyond 

the West (2011) and The Evolving Arab City (2008), 

among others . 

While at the CMES, Prof . Shwayri will be preparing a 

book manuscript entitled “The War Metropolis: Beirut 

from Destruction to reconstruction and back, 1975 

to 1990 .” 


News of MeS Alumni 

We proudly continue reporting on the achievements of the graduates of the undergraduate major in MeS. 

We are gratified to know that our alumni have maintained their commitment to the Middle east, whether 

in the academic or professional world or through government service. If you are an MeS alumna/us 

with news to share, we would love to hear from you! please write to us at: cmes@berkeley.edu 

Jordan Bethke (2012) is working 

for the Navy . 

Maria Bucon-Scales (2012) 

spent the summer of 2012 working 

as a white water river guide on the 

American river . This fall she plans to 

travel to Costa rica . 

Elise Burton (2010), a graduate 

student in the Middle Eastern 

Studies/History joint program at 

Harvard University presented papers 

at two conferences: in March, she 

presented the paper “Ethnic Humor, 

Stereotypes, and Cultural Power 

in Israeli Cinema,” at the annual 

conference of the Society for Cinema 

and Media Studies in Boston . In 

June, she delivered the paper “The 

Ideology of Israeli Marriage: Mizug 

Galuyot, Unorthodox Weddings, 

and National Identity” at the annual 

conference of the Association 

for Israel Studies in Haifa . Elise 

passed her general exams in May 

and is spending the summer in 

Istanbul studying Turkish and doing 

preliminary dissertation research, 

funded by a summer language grant 

from the Institute for Turkish Studies . 

Ismail Elhallak (2012) will begin 

a Ph .D . program in the fall in the 


at UC Berkeley . 

Nadia Ghanmeh (2012) is 

considering various employment 

opportunities . She also hopes to 

travel in the Middle East from Turkey 

and to Morocco . 


Maha Ibrahim (2006) will begin 

law school this fall at UClA . She was 

accepted as one of the 25 incoming 

students to participate in the Public 

Interest law Program . Prior to this, 

she served as a Congressional 

Aide for Congresswoman Barbara 

lee in her Oakland District Office . 

Along with field work in the Alameda 

County area, she primarily served as 

her District Speech Writer and lead 

district staffer for Middle East Affairs . 

She has also worked for assembly 

member Nancy Skinner as a Senior 

Field representative for the Alameda 

County area . Maha will be getting 

married in the spring of 2013 . 

Abe Kaplan (2012) hopes to enroll 

in an Arabic immersion program 

in Beirut . He will also continue his 

research on contemporary lebanese 

politics and women’s rights 

campaigns . 

Sarah Katz (2012) plans to 

carry out her graduate studies in 

international law, preparing for a 

career in international humanitarian 

law and diplomacy . 

Zari Matthews (2012) is applying 

to Ph .D . programs and researching 

the intersection of internet 

technology and Middle Eastern 

entertainment . Her current venture is 

a streaming video, social networking 

website . The website is producing 

dance classes and instructional 

choreography videos of artists who 

formerly belonged to national folk 

troupes of Egypt and Kuwait . It also 

offers instruction in raqs sharqi by 

performers based in Cairo, Dubai, 

Zanzibar, the US and Istanbul . 

Jennifer Mogannam (2008) was 

admitted to two Ph .D . programs in 

Ethnic Studies to begin in the fall 

of 2012 . She is currently deciding 

between UC San Diego and UC 

riverside . 

Victor Ray (2012) is commissioning 

as a Second lieutenant in the United 

States Marine Corps . 

Zoe Rudrow (2012) moved to New 

York City where she is working with 

the New York City legal Assistance 

Group’s Immigrant Protection Unit . 

Ariana Sarfarazi (2010) is 

currently working for the Iran Human 

Documentation Center on a project 

about the politics of motherhood 

in Iran . In the summer of 2012, she 

will be studying international human 

rights law and international criminal 

law at Oxford University in the UK . 

In the fall of 2012, Ariana will begin 

her second year of law school at 

George Washington University and 

will be pursuing a related internship in 

Washington, DC . 

Christy Stanker (2012) is the 

Campaign Manager for Joan 

Buchanan, the incumbent Democrat 

running for State Assembly in Contra 

Costa County and east Alameda 

County . She spent the summer of 

2012 backpacking across Europe for 

five weeks . 

Maia Wolins (2012) currently 

works in Sacramento at the California 

Senate Office of International 

relations and at Kaufman Campaign 

Consultants . In the summer of 2012, 

she had the opportunity to welcome 

delegates from Saudi Arabia, Oman, 

Tunisia and Yemen .

*# 

MeS 2012 graduation & undergraduate theses 

one of the highlights of the spring semester is 

the annual commencement ceremony honoring 

graduates of the International and Area Studies 

Academic program (IASAp), including those in 

Middle eastern Studies (MeS). the director of 

IASAp, prof. Maximilian Auffhammer, opened 

the ceremony on May 16, 2012, in the greek 

theater. Andrew Bell, political editor for 

channel 5 news in the united Kingdom was 

the commencement speaker. this year’s MeS 

MES class of 2012. 

graduating class was a particularly large and 

exceptional group of students. the cMeS extends its congratulations to this year’s departmental 

citation recipient, Maia Wolins for excellence in MeS. We wish all our graduates the best of luck in their 

future endeavors. 

undergraduate theses in Middle eastern Studies, Spring 2012: 

“The Middle East in Standardized 

Education: A Case Study of 

California Classrooms” by 

Maria Bucon-Scales 

Advisor: Mona Damluji, 

Department of Architecture 

“Persian Pride among Iranian- 

American College Students” by 

Sarah Katz 

Advisor: Prof. Cihan Tugal, 

Department of Sociology 

“life in the Aftermath: Iraqi 

refugees and American Veterans 

in Contemporary California” by 

Maia Wolins 

Advisor: Timoteo Rodriguez, 

Department of Anthropology with 

additional support from Prof. Emily 

Gottreich, Department of History 

and International and Area Studies 

Teaching Program 

* denotes honors thesis 

# denotes departmental citation 

* 

“Camp is life, the rest is Just 

Details’: Jewish Nationalism and 

Israeli Militarism in an American 

Jewish Summer Camp” by 

Zoe Rudow 

Advisor: Sarah Anne Minkin, 

Department of Sociology 

“Ahsan Nas: Creating Egyptian 

Dance, 1959–2012” by 

Zari Matthews 

Advisor: Prof. Nezar AlSayyad, 


City & Regional Planning 

“Higher Education and rising 

Expectations among Qatari 

Women” by Christy Stanker 

Advisor: Hedaya Al Hammadi, 

Department of City & Regional 

Planning 

“Broken laws: Migrant Domestic 

Servants in Jordan” by 

Nadia Ghanmeh 

Advisor: Satyel Larson, 

Department of Rhetoric 

* 

“Missionary Education and the rise 

of the Muslim Brotherhood in Egypt” 

by Jordan Bethke 

Advisor: Momen El-Husseiny, 

Department of Architecture 

“Framing Terrorism: The role of the 

Arab Media after 9/11” by 

Ismael Elhallak 

Advisor: Dr. Hatem Bazian, 



“Frames of Violence: lebanese 

Media Portrayals of the Anti- 

Domestic Violence against Women 

Campaign” by Abe Kaplan 

Advisor: Prof. Emily Gottreich, 

Department of History & 

International and Area Studies 

“The Blue Frontier: The 

Development of Maritime law 

and Practice in the Early Medieval 

Mediterranean” by Victor Ray 

Advisor: David Moshfegh, 

Department of History 


Spring 2012 Lecture Series 

to view these and previous lectures online, please visit our website at http://cmes.berkeley.edu/video 

FEBRUARy 23 

“tears in tahrir from tamer: 

Arabic Language pop Stars and 

the Arab Spring” 

Dr . Laith ulaby, 

The U .S .-Muslim 

Engagement 

Initiative, 

Washington, D .C . 

Dr . Ulaby examined 

how Egyptian pop stars have 

fared in the aftermath of the 

January 25th protests, including 

the “King of Egyptian Pop,” Tamer 

Hosny . While many Egyptian song 

traditions have a strong political 

sentiment, the pop industry in 

Egypt has been mostly apolitical 

for some time, which makes 

Hosny’s and others’ statements 

in support of Mubarak all the 

more mystifying . Dr . Ulaby 

discussed how Egypt’s popular 

singers became so tone deaf 

to the aspirations of the very 

youth demographic that had 

previously been their biggest 

supporters? His analysis of these 

questions brought together data 

from social media, fan sites 

and interviews that examine 

the discourse around Hosny 

and others as a window into 

contemporary Egyptian views on 

celebrity, popular music, and the 

intersection of art and politics . 

12 center for middle eastern studies 

MARCH 1 

“Sites of War: State power and 

Media in post-revolutionary 

Iran” 

Prof . niki Akhavan, 

Department of 

Media Studies, The 

Catholic University 

of America 

While opponents 

and critics have long turned 

to the media to challenge the 

Iranian state, the state itself has 

been consistent in deploying 

these same forms of media to 

expand its political power . In this 

lecture, Dr . Akhavan examined 

the Iranian state’s use of media 

to control, manufacture, and 

memorialize moments of national 

crisis . She highlighted how digital 

technologies have impacted the 

state’s strategies for asserting 

its dominance and confronting 

its perceived cultural and 

political enemies . Specifically, 

she focused on how this media, 

instead of becoming a weapon 

for liberalization (as with Iran’s 

Arab neighbors), had been 

used against potential reformers, 

and how it has guaranteed the 

continuance of the status quo . 

MARCH 8 

“egypt’s new political Map: Key 

Issues and players” 

Prof . Mohamed Kamal, 

Department of 

Political Science, 

Cairo University, 

Egypt 

As of March of 2012, 

a new Parliament 

in Egypt was in session . In this 

lecture, Prof . Kamal discussed 

the composition of this parliament 

which includes Islamists, liberals 

and remnants of the National 

Democratic Party . He analyzed 

the views and future role of these 

different political forces . Prof . 

Kamal discussed the drafting of 

a new Egyptian constitution and 

the key players involved including 

the military council, activists 

who sparked the uprising, and 

Islamist groups . While the new 

constitution supports the creation 

of a president and prime minister, 

he argued that it may result in 

a deadlock situation . While the 

country is eager to change, the 

road ahead is long and Egypt 

should be prepared for a difficult 

transition .

APRIL 19 

“retrieved Atlantis: 

photographic Memories of a 

disappeared Algerian Village” 

Mr . Slimane 

Zeghidour, Author 

& Journalist, TV5 

Monde, France 

Slimane Zeghidour 

recalled the 

history, lives, and memories of 

those who lived in an Algerian 

village that has disappeared . 

He used photographs to bring 

the village back to life ., He 

discussed the heavy impact 

of French colonization on the 

village, essentially displacing the 

local peoples to camps . He drew 

comparisons between France/ 

Algeria and Israel/Palestine to 

illustrate the different plights of 

people who have been displaced . . 

APRIL 26 

“the Arab uprisings: Youth, 

technology, and Human rights” 

Prof . Mahmood Monshipouri, 

Department of 

International 

relations, San 

Francisco State 

University 

The unfolding, openended 

uprisings in the Middle East 

and North Africa (MENA) have so 

far caused the collapse of regimes 

in Egypt and Tunisia, libya, and 

could possibly do so in other 

countries of the region in the nottoo-distant 

future . In this lecture, 

Prof . Monshipouri discussed 

the combination of youth and 

technology that facilitated an 

unprecedented revolutionary 

change in the region’s history . 

Specifically, he stressed that 

social media alone did not bring 

about revolution . The people on 

the ground should be credited for 

their efforts, he argued, pointing 

out that social media was one of 

their most important mobilizing 

tools . 

MAy 3 

“Islamic publishing Houses in 

the course of transformation – 

the role of translation” 

Prof . elif daldeniz, 

Department of 

Translation Studies, 

Okan University, 

Istanbul, Turkey 

Prof. Daldeniz 

discussed the changing 

strategies of translation 

of Western Classics by an 

important (now mainstream) 

Islamic publishing house in 

Turkey. Prof. Daldeniz explained 

that translation has been a 

major means for the transfer of 

ideas in fields such as literature 

and culture as well as law and 

technology since the Tanzimat 

period and continued to be since 

the foundation of the Turkish 

Republic. Typically a translator 

has to choose between three 

discourse options to translate 

a text: pure, reactionary, or 

liberal. In the Turkish context, 

the metaphor of the mirror is 

used to describe translation 

between the source and target 

texts. Moreover, it illustrates 

how translation is a socially 

embedded phenomenon. 

Daldeniz concluded her lecture 

by discussing how translation 

has been used to expand the 

cultural hegemony of particular 

subjects in Turkey. 


grants and fellowships 

foreIgn LAnguAge And AreA StudIeS 

(fLAS) progrAM 

The U .S . Department of Education has again provided 

generous funding for FlAS fellowships, which enable 

graduate students to study Middle Eastern languages 

at UC Berkeley during the academic year and at 

other universities in the U .S . and abroad over the 

summer . Six students received 2012–13 academic 

year awards and eight received 2012 summer awards . 

Congratulations to the following students: 

Academic Year 2012–2013 fLAS fellowships: 

rachel colwell, Arabic, Music 

Ismail elhallak, Persian, Near Eastern Studies 

rachel friedman, Hebrew, Near Eastern Studies 

Ayda Melika, Arabic, Architecture 

rosa norton, Arabic, Anthropology 

Kamala russell, Arabic, Anthropology 

Summer 2011 fLAS fellowships: 

eliana Abu-Hamdi, Arabic, Architecture 

robia charles, Turkish, Political Science 

tadashi dozono, Arabic, Education 

Ayelet even-nur, Arabic, Near Eastern Studies 

Ali Hassan, Persian, South & Southeast Asian 


Sarah Ludin, Arabic, law 

Ayda Melika, Arabic, Architecture 

Joseph Mudikuneil, romance languages and 

literature 

Special thanks to Ms . Gina Farales of the Graduate 

Fellowships Office, who administers the FlAS 

program . 

The 2012–2013 FLAS committee was comprised 

of Emily Gottreich, Department of History & 

International and Area Studies Academic Program, 

Minoo Moallem, Department of Women’s and 

Gender Studies; Saba Mahmood, Department of 

Anthropology and CMES Chair Nezar AlSayyad. 


SuLtAn progrAM In ArAB StudIeS 

The Sultan Interdisciplinary Program in Arab 

Studies is made possible through a generous 

endowment from the Sultan Abdul Aziz Al-Saud 

Charity Foundation . The program supports teaching, 

research, and public outreach on all aspects of Arab 

and Islamic studies at UC Berkeley . The program 

cuts across disciplinary boundaries, appealing to 

scholars from the social sciences and the humanities 

as well as those in the professional fields . 

2012–2013 Sultan grants 

A Graduate Student Fellowship was awarded to 

support research on the dissertation titled, “Toward 

a revolutionary Culture: The Poetry and Criticism 

of Adonis” by Kareem Abu-Zeid, Department of 

Comparative literature . 


support research on the dissertation titled “Cairo: 

The Insurgent Modern and the City Yet to Come” 

by Momen el-Husseiny, Department of City and 

regional Planning . 

A Graduate Student Fellowship was awarded 

to support research on the dissertation titled, 

“Educators in Iraq, Jordan and Palestine: the 

Formation of State and Subject 1917–1958” by Hilary 

falb, Department of History . 

An Undergraduate Scholarship was awarded to 

Jordan Bach-Lombardo of the Department of Near 

Eastern Studies to support travel to Amman, Jordan 

for his research project titled “The Influence of Social 

Media in Amman, Jordan .” 

An Undergraduate Scholarship was awarded to 

Andrew elkhoury of the Department of Philosophy 

to support the publication of the undergraduate 

journal, Affirm, which seeks to empower the voices of 

Middle Eastern, Muslim, and South Asian students on 

the UC Berkeley campus . 

An Undergraduate Scholarship was awarded 

to Jessica Saba of Peace and Conflict Studies, 

International and Area Studies Teaching Program to 

support her service project using conflict resolution 

‘dialogues’ between Israelis and Palestinians in the 

West Bank .

The Sultan Program Committee for 2012–2013 

included Professors Mia Fuller, Department of Italian 

Studies; Margaret Larkin, Department of Near Eastern 

Studies and Maria Mavroudi, Department of History. 

A call for proposals for the 2013–14 Sultan Program 

is currently available at the CMES office and on the 

CMES website. 

AL-fALAH progrAM 

The Al-Falah Program was initiated in 1998 through 

a generous endowment from Xenel Industries ltd . 

and the family of Sheikh Salahuddin Yusuf Hamza 

Abduljawad, alumni and friends of Berkeley . The 

program supports the better understanding of Islam 

and Muslim peoples and cultures in the United States 

of America, mainly through the transfer of knowledge 

and technology . The program also supports the 

development of economic self-reliance in countries of 

the Islamic world, in particular Saudi Arabia . 

In the 2012–2013 academic year, the Al-Falah 

Program will support a research and scholarship 

program as well as an outreach program . 

2012–2013 Al-falah program grants 


support research for a dissertation titled, “Teaching 

Muslims to be German Citizens: Holocaust Education 

as an Integration Strategy” by Sultan doughan, 

Department of Anthropology . 


support research for a dissertation titled, “Historicity 

and Monumentality: the Futures of the Past in 

the Sultanate of Oman” by Amal Sachedina, 

Department of Anthropology . 


support research for a dissertation titled, “The life 

and Works of ‘Afifa Karam: The First Arab-American 

Woman Novelist” by elizabeth Saylor, Department of 

Near Eastern Studies . 

A Teaching and research Grant was awarded to 

support additions to the Middle East Collection of the 

University library including major primary sources 

from the British Archives such as King Abdul Aziz: 

Diplomacy and Statecraft 1902–1953; King Abdul 

Aziz: Political Correspondence 1904–1953; and 

The Slave Trade into Arabia 1820–1973, by Shayee 

Khanaka, librarian for the Middle East Collection . 

The Al-Falah reviewers for the 2012–2013 cycle 

included Professors Munis Faruqui, Department of 

South and Southeast Asian Studies and Charles 

Hirschkind, Department of Anthropology. 

A call for proposals for the 2013–14 Al-Falah Program 

is currently available at the CMES office and on the 

CMES website. 

Afaf Kanafani prize 

The Center for Middle Eastern Studies is pleased to announce the completion of the 

competition for the annual Afaf Kanafani Prize for best paper on the topic of women 

in the Arab world . The competition is intended to foster scholarship contributing to a 

better understanding of gender issues in the Middle East and beyond . It is open to 

all undergraduate and graduate students currently registered in any department or 

professional school at UC Berkeley . 

This year, one paper was selected to receive the prize: 

“Higher Education and rising Expectations among Qatari Women” 

by christy Stanker, fourth-year undergraduate, Middle Eastern Studies . 


News of the Library 

Middle east/north Africa Collection 

The spring of 2012 included many activities for the Middle East/ North 

Africa Collection . As a member of the Free Speech Movement Education 

Program (FMSEP), Shayee Khanaka, librarian of the collection, helped 

organize an event titled “A Portrait of Afghan Women’s lives: Challenges and 

Opportunities” held on April 10, 2012 . Featured panelists included Dr . Ashraf 

Zahedi, author of Land of the Unconquerable: the Lives of Contemporary 

Afghan Women, and Amina Kator-Mubarez, research Associate for the 

Program for Culture and Conflict Studies (CCS) at the Naval Postgraduate 

School in Monterey, CA . They shared their knowledge and concerns over the 

situation of women in Afghanistan in light of U .S . policies and the imminent 

withdrawal of the international forces . This event was co-sponsored by the 

Afghan Student Association at UC Berkeley . Members of the audience, 

numbering well over fifty, engaged the panel in lively discussion . 

The FSMEP also sponsored four posters depicting the events in the Middle 

East and North Africa entitled “The Arab Spring .” The first poster highlights the 

events in Tunisia which resulted in toppling the government; the second poster 

focuses on Egypt and the change of regime in that country; the third poster 

highlights the events in libya and Yemen, where despite the brutal crackdown 

on demonstrators, both governments lost their grip on power; and, the final 

poster depicts revolutions in progress in Syria and Bahrain . These posters 

were installed in exhibit cases in the Free Speech Movement (FSM) Cafe in 

May and will remain on display at least through December 2012 . For more 

information about the FSM educational program and event schedule, please 

visit http://www .lib .berkeley .edu/news_events/fsmprograms/upcoming .html 

other collection development news: 

The library received a $5,000 grant from the Al-Falah Foundation to partially fund three sets of primary sources 

based on documents from the British Archives, published by Cambridge University Press: King Abdul Aziz, 

Diplomacy and Statecraft 1902–1953, King Abdul Aziz: Political Correspondence 1904–1953, and The Slave 

Trade into Arabia 1820–1973 . These acquisitions will enhance the collection and its user’s research in the fields 

of history, politics, and other sociology of the MENA region . The library is grateful to the Al-Falah Foundation and 

the CMES for their continued support for the collection . Enhancing the Middle Eastern primary sources benefits 

scholars on campus and the community at large and helps sustain the library’s commitment to excellence . 

The general agreement for the Berkeley-Stanford Cooperative Collection Development Program has been 

finalized . The combined Islamic & Middle East-North African collections of the library systems at the University 

of California, Berkeley and Stanford University offer an extraordinary intellectual resource of major research 

value not only to their students and faculty but to the scholarly community in general . Berkeley is known for its 

long-standing commitment to Middle Eastern studies and to the important research contributions of its faculty . 

This agreement aims to extend and deepen the collecting strengths of the libraries by focusing acquisitions and 

development efforts in complementary areas as much as possible . This cooperative undertaking is intended to 

allow the libraries to build more extensive collections, more systematically . 


Article contributed by shayee Khanaka, Librarian for the middle east & north Africa Collection.

Judaica Collection 

The Judaica Collection continues to collaborate with 

the University library and The Bancroft library in 

the integration of the Magnes Collection for Jewish 

life and Art at the Bancroft library . The Museum’s 

collection of over 10,000 items including rare books, 

art, artifacts, music and historical archives has now 

been moved from storage facilities into the renovated 

25,000 square foot space at 2121 Allston Way . The 

events space has already become a popular venue 

for lectures, films and concerts . 

Also in the work flow are over one hundred rare 

books which will become available in the Bancroft 

library following cataloging and preservation . Other 

materials from the Magnes will find their place in the 

Main Stacks and other collections on campus . 

notes contInued froM pAge 2 

a media that are increasingly being threatened 

by forced retirements or shutdowns . These 

developments in Egypt have indeed caused major 

concerns both internally and internationally as many 

worry about the return of one party rule, the trampling 

on the rights of the Coptic minority, and the drafting 

of an unrepresentative constitution . 

Meanwhile, President Assad of Syria, having 

seen the fate of Qaddafi and Mubarak and seemingly 

possessing a certain pride not to become another 

Ben Ali, has decided to hang on to his position even 

if this means massacring his own people . His best 

hope to avoid the same fate as his counterparts is to 

negotiate an exit similar to that of Saleh’s in Yemen, 

who managed to hold on to his possessions and 

some of those of his family as he handed over power 

without personal repercussions except for the wounds 

he suffered during the attack on his compound . It may 

be too late for a bloodless exit, however . 

What will become of the new systems of 

government that are being devised in the Arab World? 

other collection development news: 

Of special interest to the CMES, the Judaica Collection 

continues to seek funds to help acquire the 

second half of Moroccan imprints in Judeo-Arabic 

from the collection of Meir Benayahu, an important 

scholar of North African Jewry . These materials will 

further research in the history and cultural life of North 

African Jewry through access to primary resources 

never before found in the UC Berkeley library . 

Together, with other sectors of the library, the Judaica 

Collection continues to struggle with severe budget 

cuts . As a result, the collection has written several 

grant proposals seeking additional funding to maintain 

the high standards of the UC Berkeley libraries as 

a leader of research and teaching in Jewish Studies . 

Article contributed by paul Hamburg, Librarian for the 

Judaica Collection. 

Clearly, democracy is about the rule of the majority, 

but does that majority have the right to create 

structures that deliberately sideline minorities or deny 

them rights? Is the Arab World developing a new form 

of illiberal democracy? For the past few decades, 

scholars of Middle Eastern Studies have debated 

the notions of an “Arab Democracy” or an “Islamic 

Democracy” articulating many different scenarios . 

Some have argued that Islam is not compatible 

with democracy, while some attributed the current 

malaise in the Arab World to the long and oppressive 

history of colonialism and imperialism in the region, 

and yet others raised the issue of secularism and its 

expectations as the main obstacle to democratically 

elected regimes that want to adhere to religious forms 

of rule . The current political turmoil in the Arab World 

promises to out these theories to the test . The time 

has come to see if the projections of the optimists or 

the pessimists, on both sides of the political spectrum, 

regarding the fate of the Arab World will come true . 

—nezar Alsayyad 


inteRDisCiPLinARY LeCtuRe seRies 

ALL LectureS tAKe pLAce on tHurSdAYS At 5:00 p.M. In tHe SuLtAn rooM of tHe center for 

MIddLe eAStern StudIeS, 340 StepHenS HALL 

September 20 

“Qatar’s Hidden History: Power, 

Image and lineage in the Gulf” 

Prof . allen fromherz 

Department of History, Georgia State 

University 

october 11 

“Communities of literacy and 

Collecting Selves in Early 

Modern Isfahan” 

Prof . Kathryn Babayan 

Departments of History and Near 

Eastern Studies, University of Michigan 

18 CENTEr FOr MIDDlE EASTErN STUDIES 

LECTURES and 

EvEnTS fALL 2012 

november 1 

“The Tunisian Elite after ‘the 

People’s revolution’: New 

Challenges for the Modernist 

legacy?” 

Dr . daniela melfa 

Department of Political and Social 

Sciences, 

University of Catania, Italy 

november 15 

“Measuring the Destruction of 

Heritage and Spikes of Violence 

in Iraq” 

Dr . Benjamin isakhan 

Australian research Council Discovery 

research Fellow 

Center for Citizenship and Globalization, 

Deakin University, Australia 

A COnFeRenCe: 

DEMOCrACY rISING? GlOBAl PrOSPECTS, PErIlS, AND POlICY CHAllENGES 

September 13–14 

HeYnS rooM, fAcuLtY cLuB 

The challenges of the transition to 

democracy and the development of 

countries emerging from authoritarian 

regimes will be the focus of this 

conference . Participants will 

include a combination of scholars 

and practitioners from a variety of 

disciplines, as well as civil society 

activists . The conference will be the 

inaugural event for UC Berkeley’s 

Program for the Study of Democratic 

Political Development in Emerging 

and Fledgling Democracies . This is 

a partnership involving the Institute 

of Governmental Studies (IGS) the 

Institute of International Studies (IIS), 

and the Center for Middle Eastern 

Studies (CMES) at U .C . Berkeley 

sessions include: 

* Global Trends in Democratic Transitions 

* Democracy Engagement and Civic 

Participation 

* Post-electoral Challenges — Managing 

Pluralism Within the Rule of Law 

* Russia in Transition and the Look 

Forward: The Russian Democratic 

Revolution 1989–96 

november 29 

“A New World Order: Authority, 

Sacrality and Early Islamic 

Architecture” 

Prof . Heba mostafa 

Sultan Post Doctoral Teaching Fellow/ 

Visiting Assistant Professor 

History of Art Department, University of 

California, Berkeley 

I Activities in the Sultan Room are wheelchair 

accessible during operating hours. For all 

other times please call 510-642-8208 

Mon–Fri to request disability related 

accommodations. 

The MiDDLe eAst session is titled 

“The ‘Arab Spring’: Emblematic Tunisia 

& Egypt and the Wider Middle East” 

and will be held on september 14th . 

Speakers include: 

eva Bellin, Brandeis University 

Mahmoud el-gamal, rice University 

Mohsen Marzouk, Arab Democracy 

Foundation, Tunisia 

robert Springborg, School of 

International Graduate Studies, Monterey 

Shibley telhami, University of Maryland

FiLM seRies 

CrUDE FIlMS: 

A CINEMATIC EXPlOrATION OF MIDDlE EASTErN OIl 

ALL fILMS WILL Be Screened In tHe SuLtAn conference rooM 

of tHe cMeS, 340 StepHenS HALL. 

Oil profoundly shaped political geographies and popular American imaginations of 

the Middle East during the twentieth century . Global dependence on oil has become 

one of the most defining and critical problems of our time, and as a result there has 

been an explosion of recent films competing to tell the story of petroleum . This film 

symposium will juxtapose oil company propaganda films, critical documentaries, 

and critically acclaimed Hollywood portrayals of the role of Middle Eastern oil in our 

modern world . The symposium will open and conclude with discussions that frame 

and historicize the dynamic relationship between oil and film . 

thursday, october 25: 4–6 Pm 

4 Pm 

Mona Damluji (Department of Architecture, UC Berkeley) will open the symposium 

with brief remarks about the history of oil companies operating in the modern Middle 

East. She will lead an audience-driven discussion of the ways in which the story of oil’s 

discovery and its impact on the region has been portrayed in documentary films. 

4:15 Pm 

Blood and Oil: The Middle East in World War I | 2010, 112 min, 

documentary 

An independent documentary that exposes the greed and political intrigue that laid 

the foundation for wars, coups, revolts, oppressive dictators and military interventions 

in today’s Middle East . 

friday, october 26: 10 am–6 Pm 

10 am 

Ageless Iraq | 1955, 20 min, documentary 

The Iraq Petroleum Company’s more than fifty-year old film about oil and modernity 

during the mid-twentieth century tells a story of how oil radically transformed the Iraqi 

state and society . 

10:30 am 

First Oil | 2008, 24 min, documentary 

British Petroleum’s most recent film combines interviews, stock footage and 

dramatizations to tell a story about their first oil discovery in the Middle East at Masjidi-Suleiman 

in Iran on May 26th 1908 . 

1 Pm 

Hannah Appel (Department of Geography, UC Berkeley) will deliver brief remarks on 

the context of the contemporary politics of oil. She will conclude the second day of the 

symposium with an audience-driven discussion of the films. 

1:15 Pm 

The Oil Factor | 2004, 93 min, documentary 

Assessing today’s dwindling oil reserves and skyrocketing use of oil for fuels, plastics 

and chemicals, The Oil Factor questions the motives for the U .S . wars in the Middle 

East where 75% of the world’s oil and natural gas is located . 

4 Pm 

Syriana | 2005, 128 min, feature film 

This politically-charged and celebrity-studded epic explores the greed and corruption 

surrounding the global oil industry, from the backrooms of Washington DC to the 

petroleum-rich fields of the Middle East . 

contInued on BAcK coVer 

CENTEr FOr MIDDlE EASTErN STUDIES 19

C printed on recycled paper 

events contInued 

the center for middle eastern studies 

international and area studies 

340 stephens Hall 

university of california 

Berkeley, ca 94720-2314 

address serVice reQuested 

ARCe LeCtuRe seRies 

tHe center for MIddLe eAStern StudIeS co-SponSorS tHe 

fALL Lecture SerIeS of tHe AMerIcAn reSeArcH center 

In egYpt, nortHern cALIfornIA cHApter. ALL LectureS 

tAKe pLAce on SundAYS At 2:30 p.M. In 110 BArroWS HALL, 

unLeSS IndIcAted otHerWISe. 

August 26 

“Update on El Hibeh 

and the looting 

of Archaeological 

Sites in Egypt” 

Prof . carol 

redmount 

University of California, 

Berkeley 

September 13 

“recent Excavation 

Work at Senosret’s 

Tomb” 

Dr . Josef Wegner 

University of 

Pennsylvania 

*BegInS At 2:00 pM 

october 14 

“Out of Africa: 

Ancient Egypt, 

the Chad Basin 

and the Egyptian 

Underworld” 

and “German 

Egyptology in the 

Third reich” 

Dr . thomas 

schneider 

University of British 

Colombia, Vancouver 

november 4 

“The Scribal Games: 

Iconography & 

Epithet Plays in the 

Temple of Dendera” 

Dr . Barbara 

richter 

University of California, 

Berkeley 

december 2 

“Temple Musicians 

in Ancient Egypt” 

Dr . emily teeter 

University of Chicago 

The Oriental Institute 

non Profit org. 

u.s. Postage 

Paid 

Berkeley, ca 

Permit no. 1 

The center for Middle eastern Studies (cMeS) is an Organized 

research Unit of International and Area Studies at the University of 

California, Berkeley . It was founded in 1963 with a mandate to 

promote excellence in Middle Eastern Studies at the University and 

beyond . With an affiliated faculty and academic staff of 75 

(supplemented by an annual contingent of 12 visiting faculty and 21 

graduate student instructors), the CMES coordinates Middle Eastrelated 

language and area studies courses in 26 different departments 

and seven professional schools, while also providing academic 

advising for an undergraduate major and minor . Our newsletter is 

published twice yearly, during the fall and spring semesters . 

To be added to our weekly e-mail announcement list of Middle 

East-related lectures and activities in the Bay Area and beyond, 

please send your name, e-mail address, and affiliation to 

cmes@berkeley.edu. 

Center Chair: Prof. nezar alsayyad 

Vice Chair: Prof. emily Gottreich 

Center Manager: ms. mejgan massoumi 

Administrative Coordinator: mr. Jeff sturm 

Publications Director: ms. tara Graham 

the center for Middle eastern Studies 

340 Stephens Hall 

University of California 

Berkeley, CA 94720-2314 

tel: 510-642-8208 

fax: 510-643-3001 

e-mail: cmes@berkeley .edu 

www .cmes .berkeley .edu 

ISON DESIGN

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