[Discussion] Hierarchy, Marginality, and Ethnicity in Muslim Societies

[Sule Tarakcioglu]

SIAS Summer Institute 2005-2006:
Hierarchy, Marginality, and Ethnicity in Muslim Societies
(7th Century to the Second World War)

Conveners:
Gudrun Kr=E4mer, Professor of Islamic Studies, Institute for Islamic
Studies, Free University, Berlin

Mark R. Cohen, Professor of Near Eastern Studies, Princeton University

When & Where:
August 8 - 19, 2005, Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin, Berlin, Germany
July 31 - August 11, 2006, National Humanities Center, Research Triangle
Park, North Carolina

For complete details and applications, please visit the web address
shown below.

Application Deadline: *FEBRUARY 18, 2005*

The SIAS Summer Institutes are designed to support the development of
scholarly networks and collaborative projects among young scholars from
Europe and the United States. The program seeks to explore theoretical,
methodological, and empirical issues, promote the integration of
approaches and interpretations from various disciplines into the
participants' research, review the state of research in that discipline,
and identify promising areas for further research.

Each institute will accommodate twenty participants and will meet twice,
once in Europe and once in the United States . Participants will present
their research and collaborate on new projects at the seminars and
between the two meetings. Participants will be expected to attend both
meetings. The program will provide stipends and cover travel and lodging
costs for both the European and the American meetings. The institutes
are open to Ph.D. candidates and scholars who have received a Ph.D.
since 1999.

This program is made possible by grants from the Alexander von Humboldt
Foundation and the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation.

Hierarchy, Marginality, and Ethnicity in Muslim Societies
(7th Century to the Second World War)

Moving beyond the approach of majority-minority relations, with its
focus on tolerance versus intolerance, this Institute will attempt, to
understand how Muslim societies, with all their complexity and
multiplicity of subgroups, worked, sometimes with conflict, often
without. Its premise is that interrelated concepts from anthropology and
sociology - hierarchy, marginality, and ethnicity - can be applied to
the history of Muslim societies with profitable results.

Within this theoretical framework, the Institute encourages applicants
in a variety of fields, including anthropology, history, sociology,
legal studies, literature, philosophy, and theology. Themes could
include, for example, notions of purity and impurity; intermarriage;
dietary laws; dress codes; physical as well as social and economic
mobility; spatial patterns of living; conviviality; conflict;
inter-communal ties; interaction of laws and courts; presence or absence
of corporate organization; cultural embeddedness of non-Muslims; shared
or parallel venues for learning; artistic borrowing; impact of
modernization; shared or entangled histories.

We would like to extend the geographical and cultural range of our
inquiry beyond the historical core region of the Islamic world by
including other Muslim societies, notably on the Indian subcontinent and
in Southeast Asia. We would also like to include themes dealing with
non-Muslims other than Jews and Christians.

Application Procedure:

To apply, send the following, in English, to the appropriate address belo=
w:

   1. A completed application
      (forms available on the Wissenschaftskolleg's website)
   2. A curriculum vitae
   3. A statement of up to 1,000 words (not counting cited references)
      detailing current research interests and past research and writing
      related to the institute topic
   4. A list of not more than five background readings potentially
      relevant to all participants of the summer institute
   5. One letter of recommendation

Applications should be received by *February 18, 2005.* Candidates
selected will be notified by the end of March, 2005.

Candidates should note that they are applying for two summer workshops:
one in Berlin, and another in Research Triangle Park, NC and that
successful applicants will be expected to attend both workshops. The
working language of the institute is English.

European candidates should address queries and applications to:

	SIAS Summer Institutes
Katharina Wiedemann
Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin
Wallotstrasse 19
D-14193 Berlin, Germany
Tel.: +49 30 / 89001 - 117
Fax: +49 30 / 89001 - 100

Email: wiedemann@wiko-berlin.de <mailto:wiedemann@wiko-berlin.de>
Visit the website at
http://www.wiko-berlin.de/kolleg/projekte/eayssi/ausschreibsecrel?hpl=3D2