PAST LECTURES

 

2007
2006
2005
2004
2003
2002
2001
2000 and before

 

Fall 2007

October 22
Two presentations in the Stella Room
“Orientalism, Self-Orientalism and Identity Politics:
The Mosque in Western Europe and North America”
Nebahat Avcioglu
Visiting Associate Professor, AKPIA@MIT
Columbia University Institute for ScholarsParis, France
“Mosques-to-go”
Azra Aksamija
PhD Student, AKPIA@MIT
Artist Affiliate, Center for Advanced Visual Studies at MIT

November 19
"Nebukadnezar and Saladin - The Iconography of History in Contemporary Political Representation in the Middle East"
Stefan Heidemann
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow
Friederich Schiller Universität
Department of Semitic Philology and Islamic Studies
Jena, Germany

November 26
“Antiquarianism and Connoisseurship in 19th century Cairo: Some Reconsiderations”
Mercedes Volait
Centre National de Recherche Scientifique
Paris, France

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Spring 2007

Available Bios & Abstracts

February 12
“Mysterious” Dubai
Nadia Al-Hasani
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow
Department of Architecture
American University of Sharjah, UAE

February 26
Public Works and the Public Good:
Modernizing Urban Space in Ottoman Izmir

Sibel Zandi-Sayek
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow
Department of Art & Art History,
College of William & Mary, Williamsburg

March 5
Open Terrains
Anuradha Mathur
Landscape Architecture & Regional Planning Department
University of Pennsylvania

Monday, March 12, 5:30 pm
Presentations by MIT graduate students recipients of the 2006-07 AKPIA@MIT Travel Grants
Razan Francis
AKPIA PhD
"Spain: Cultural exchanges and migration of styles"
Spain
Sadia Shirazi
MArch
"Ritual + Space: the Sufi Shrine of Shah Jamaal"
Pakistan

March 15
New Town-New Life:
Garden City in Translation

Esra Akcan
Graduate School of Architecture
Columbia University

March 22
Searching for Water and Wisdom in the Indo-Islamic Garden
James L. Wescoat Jr.
Landscape Architecture Department
University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign

April 10
Two special presentations part of the seminar
4.617: The Islamic City:
From an Orientalist Concept to a Contemporary Aspiration
Deeba Haider
Auctioning Identity to the Highest Bidder
From Bedouin to Babylon in 35 years: The Degeneration of Cultural Identity in the Urban Environment of Dubai
Ahmed Kanna
Anomalous Spaces in 'the Orientalist Dream City': An Unconventional Look at Dubai

May 7
Status, Gender, Privacy. The Transformation of Domestic Culture in the Beirut House, 1860-1930
Ralph Bodenstein
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow
Post-Doctoral Fellow, German Archaeological Institute (DAI) in Cairo

May 11
Working in Paradise,
Restoring Baghe Babur and Humayun's Tomb Gardens

Ratish Nanda
AKTC Conservation Architect, New Delhi

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Fall 2006 (back to top)



Available
Bios & Abstracts

September 25
Documentary Film Presentation:
Celebrating Popular Islam in India:
Short Films on Devotional Images and Rituals of Indian Muslims
Yousuf Saeed
Documentary Film Maker
New Delhi, India

October 23
Between Scholarship and Experience;
The German and French Discourse on Islamic Architecture

Lorraine Declety
Ecole pratique des hautes études, Paris
Technische Universität, Dresden

November 13
Patterning Knowledge: Geometry and Islamic Art
Carol Bier
Research Associate
The Textile Museum, Washington, DC

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Spring 2006

February 13
The Architecture of the 'Eastern Question': Diplomacy and Space in Late Ottoman Istanbul
Paolo Girardelli
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow, Bogaziçi University

March 13
The Citadel of Jerusalem Revisited: An Architectural and Archaeological Investigation
Mahmoud Hawari
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow, Oxford University

April 10
'Dis-Orientalism' - Palestinian Artists between East and West
Gannit Ankori
Harvard Divinity School

April 21 & 22
Symposium:
The Mosque in the West

April 24
AKPIA Travel Grant Presentations

MIT Graduate Students recipients of the 2005-06 Aga Khan Travel Grants

May 15
Authenticity in Architecture: A Postcolonial Critique
Can Bilsel
University of San Diego

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Fall 2005 (back to top)

October 3
The Politics of Pleasure: The Strategic Use of Umayyad Bath Complexes
Lara Tohme
Knafel Assistant Professor in the Humanities, Wellesley College

October 29
Workshop:
The Mamluk Domes of Cairo


November 14
Rethinking the Pleasure Garden in the Munyas of Cordoba
Glaire Anderson
College Art Association Professional Development Fellow

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Spring 2005

Available Abstracts & Bios

February 28
AKPIA@MIT Travel Grant Presentations
Students recipients of the 2004 AKPIA@MIT Travel Grant Awards

March 7
Muslims and the Language of the Other in the Umayyad Visual and Verbal Vocabulary of the Dome of the Rock
Dr. Abier Ziadeh Shamma
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow

March 14
Architecture in Lebanon: From Modernism to Contemporary Trends

Elie Haddad
Department of Architecture Lebanese American University, Beirut, Lebanon

April 4
New Urbanism and the Heritage of the Islamic City: The Case of Jerusalem
Yosef Jabareen
AKPIA@MIT Post-Doctoral Fellow 

April 11
Nation, Myth and Memory: The Reception of Ghurid Architecture East of the Indus
Alka Patel
Senior Fellow, American Institute of Indian Studies, Gujarat, India

May 6 & 7
Symposium:
Islamic Cities in the Classical Age


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Fall 2004 (back to top)

Available Abstracts & Bios

October 4
"Images of Sufi Leaders in Ottoman and Safavid Manuscripts"
Ethel Sara Wolper
University of New Hampshire

October 25
The Afghan Girl' in Transnational Visual Culture
Holly Edwards
Williams College

November 1



Aestheticizing Politics and Politicizing Aesthetics: Visual Artists and the Cultural Production of Muslim Identities in NYC
Munir Jiwa
Columbia University
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

November 15
Rural-imperial Relations in Medieval Jordan: An Architectural Perspective from Tall Hisban
Bethany Walker
Grand Valley State University

November 22
Mediterranean Cities: Aleppo, Forms of the City Intra Moenia
Giulia Annalinda Neglia
Politecnico di Bari
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

December 6
Deliberating Ira
Film screening and discussion with one of the directors of "About Baghdad"

Sinan Antoon
Dartmouth College

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Spring 2004

Available Abstracts & Bios

February 9
Public History and the Production of the "Culture of Shiraz"

Setrag Manoukian
Università di Milano-Bicocca, Milan
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

April 5
Strangers, Lovers and Kin: Gender Roles and their Interplay with the Architectural Delights of Awadh, India
Hussein Keshani
University of Victoria, Canada
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

April 12
Italian Architects in Modern Egypt
Cristina Pallini
Politecnico di Milano, Milan
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

March 1
DIALOGUE in Concert
Kinan Azmeh, Dima Orsho, Kinan Abou-Afach, Omar Al-Musfi
and Issam Rafee

May 7, 8 & 9
Symposium:
Harem in History & Imagination


May 10
Handwriting of the Dead: Advances in script identification and synthesis
Vlad Atanasiu
École Pratique des Études Superiors, Paris
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

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Fall 2003 (back to top)

Available Abstracts & Bios

September 29
Tell Tale - The Alphabet, Outcome of Millennia of Mayhem
Thomas Milo
President of DecoType, inc. The Netherlands

October 3
Consuming Heritage or the End of Tradition
Nezar AlSayyad
School of Architecture and Planning, University of California, Berkeley

October 6
MTV, The Middle East & Mainstream Media: Using Music and the Arts to Expose Another Side of Arab Culture
Lorraine Ali
Music Critic Newsweek Magazine

November 3
Bourdieu's Battle in Algeria: War, Ethnosociology, Photograph
Helene Lipstadt
Research Affiliate, MIT

November 24
Photographing the Void: The Camera and the Representation of Islamic Architecture
Gary Otte
Photographer
Vancouver, Canada

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Spring 2003

March 10
Islam on the Internet: From Private Discourse to Public Sphere
Jon W. Anderson
Department of Anthropology, Catholic University of America
Department of Arab Studies, Georgetown University

April 14
Looking for Gender and Sexuality in Qajar Visual Culture
Afsaneh Najmabadi
Departments of Women's Studies and of History
Harvard University

April 28
"Brotherly Love": The Safavid Household and the Index of Belonging
Sussan Babaie
Department of the History of Art
The University of Michigan

May 5
Achievement and Disaster:
Ernst Herzfeld's Excavation at Samarra 1911-1913

Thomas Leisten
Department of Art and Archaeology
Princeton University

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Fall 2002 (back to top)

September 16
Individual and Community in South Asian Islam since 1850
Asha Jalal
Department of History, Tufts University

October 7
Picasso's Reconquista
Natasha Staller
Department of Fine Arts, Amherst College

November 1
Piano and Clarinet Recital
Kinan Azmeh, clarinet & Rami Khalife, piano

November 18
Displaying Hierarchies:
Ritual Uses of the Space at Sufi Zawiyas in Aleppo

Paulo Pinto
Visiting Professor, Fluminense Federal University, Rio de Janeiro

November 20
The Poetics of Concealment:
Al-Nabulusi,s Encounter with the Dome of the Rock

Samer Akkach
AKPIA Post-Doctoral Fellow

December 2
Between Prayers: Proscribed Scenes from a Historic Monument
Film by Chala Hadimi
2002 MIT AKPIA/SMArchS Graduate

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Spring 2002

February 11
Through the Eyes of a Child?: Looking at Persianate Painting Again  
David J. Roxburgh
History of Art and Architecture
Harvard University

March 4
Practical Orientalism, Practical Occidentalism:
Contesting the Islamic Heritage on Crete

Michael Herzfeld
Department of Anthropology
Harvard University

April 17

Third Spaces:
On the Design Discourses Between Traditionalism and Modernism

Bulent Tanju
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

April 29
Describing Colossal Egypt
Darcy Grimaldo Grigsby
Department of History of Art
University of California at Berkeley

May 15
The Water Supplies and Their Impact on Urban Development in Ottoman Istanbul
Kimiyo Yamashita
Aga Khan Program Post-doctoral Fellow

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Fall 2001 (back to top)

October 1
Across the Border: Making Migrants' Spaces
Gulsum Nalbantoglu
Dept. of Interior Architecture & Environmental Design, Bilkent University, Ankara
Cancelled lecture.

October 29
The Venetian Palace and the Islamic World
Deborah Howard
St John's College, Cambridge University

November 26
Changing Urban Enviroment:
Residential and Public Architecture in late Ottoman Damascus

Stefan Weber
Deutsches Archaeologisches Institut, Damascus

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Spring 2001

February 5
The One-which-is-two, Mosque Battles and Other Stories: Architecture, Religion and Politics in the Indonesian World
Abidin Kusno
Metropolitan Studies Program, New York University

February 12
Architecture of the Public Square: Representations of the City and City Life in Jaffa (1799-1950)
Ruba Kana'an
Barakat Trust Fellow in Islamic Art & Archeology Oriental Institute, Oxford, UK

February 19
Ruins into Monuments: Memory, Nation and Modernity in the Restoration of the Great Mosque of Damascus and the Krak des Chevaliers
Heghnar Watenpaugh
Department of Art and History, Rice University

February 26
Social Memory and Practices of Commemoration:
Lahore's Monumental Past

William J. Glover
Department of Architecture, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor

March 5
The Historical Imagination:
The place of Mimesis in the study of Islamic Architecture in Iran

Kishwar Rizvi
Post-Graduate Fellow, Yale University

April 23
Urban Development and Patronage of Islamic Architecture in 15th - 17th Century Ottoman Bosnia/Hercegovina
Machiel Kiel
Aga Khan Visiting Scholar, Harvard University
University of Utrecht, The Netherlands

April 24
Ottoman Expressions of Early Modernity and the Inevitable Question of Westernization  
Shirine Hamadeh
NEH / ARIT Post-Doctoral Fellowship
American Research Institute in Turkey

May 1
Weaving Historical Narratives:Tuesday Beirut's Last Mamluk Monument
Howayda Al-Harithy
Department of Architecture and Design
The American University of Beirut

May 18 & 19
Symposium:
Exploring The Frontiers of Islamic Art and Architecture