Conference: Reason and Esotericism in Shi'i Islam (April 4, University of Chicago)

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Mar 30, 2014
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Conference: Reason and Esotericism in Shi'i Islam (April 4, University of Chicago)

By : Jadaliyya Reports

The University of Chicago Shi`i Studies Group presents

A Shi`i Studies Symposium: "Reason an Esotericism in Shi`i Islam"

4 April 2014, 8.45am - 6:00pm Coulter Lounge, International House, 1414 East 59th Street, Chicago, IL

Hermeneutics, Law, Theology, Heresiography, Epistemology, Politics, and Anthropology

Speakers:

  • Tahera Qutbuddin 
  • Paul Walker
  • Hassan Ansari 
  • Bella Tendler
  • Ed Hayes
  • Rodrigo Adem
  • Mushegh Asatryan
  • George Warner
  • Ata Anzali 
  • Sajjad Rizvi
  • Matt Melvin-Koushki
  • Alireza Doostdar
  • Olly Akkerman 
  • Devin Stewart
  • Hamid Reza Maghsoodi

This event is free and open to the public. Funding and support provided by the Martin Marty Center at the Divinity School, the Division of the Humanities, the Franke Institute for the Humanities, the Council for Advanced Studies, the Islamic Studies Workshop and the Middle East History and Theory (MEHAT) workshop, the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, the Center for Middle Eastern Studies, the Central Asian Studies Society, the Center for International Studies, the Norman Wait Harris Fund and International House’s ‘Global Voices’ program.

Persons with disabilities who may need assistance should contact the International House Office of Programs & External Relgations in advance of the program at 773-753-2274.

Read more about the Shi`i Studies Group at the University of Chicago

Schedule 

8.15-8.45: Registration/coffee

8.45-9.00: Opening remarks

9.00-11.00: Panel 1: Pre-modern tafsīr and taʾwīl

Hassan Ansari: The Tafsīr al-ʿAskarī: a brief history of the development of a Shiʿi text

George Warner: Explaining Prayer: A Passage from Ibn Bābawayh’s ʿIlal al-Sharāʾiʿ in Context

Tahera Qutbuddin: Principles of Fatimid Esoteric Interpretation (taʾwīl): An Analysis Based on the Majālis mu’ayyadiyya of al-Muʾayyad al-Shirazi (d. 470/1078)

Paul Walker: Examples of Taʾwīl in Fatimid Ismaili Texts

11-11.15: Coffee break

11.15-1.15: Panel 2: Pre-modern texts and contexts

Bella Tendler: ʿAbd Allāh b. Sabaʾ and the role of the Nuṣayrī Bāb: Rehabilitating the Heresiarchs of the Islamic Tradition

Ed Hayes: Proto-Nuṣayrī Opposition to Jaʿfar ‘the Liar’ and the Business of Building Coalitions Between Mainstream and Esotericist Imamis

Mushegh Asatryan: The World and Worldview of Early Shiʿi Ghulāt (8th-9th cc). 

Rodrigo Adem: Ismaili Doctrine: Context and Sources 

1.15-2.15: Lunch

2.15-4.15: Panel 3: Politics and anthropology of knowledge

Alireza Doostdar: The Occult Sciences in Iran: Between Sanction and Censure

Olly Akkerman: The Politics of the Bohra Bāṭin Archive: Ismaili Manuscript Culture and the Language of Secrecy  

Devin Stewart:  Taqiyya and Tawriya, or the Art of Ambiguity

Hamid Reza Maghsoodi: To Define the Indefinable; the Epistemology of Maktab-i Maʿārif-i Khurāsān

4.15-4.30: Coffee break

4.30-6.00: Panel 4: Middle-early modern

Ata Anzali: Philosophers, Sufis, and their Opponents in the Late Safavid period: Some Observations

Sajjad Rizvi: Esoteric Shiʿism in the Later School of al-Ḥilla: Walāya and Apocalyptism in Rajab al-Bursī and al-Ḥasan b. Sulaymān al-Ḥillī

Matt Melvin-Koushki: Occultism, Imamophilism and Rationalism in Timurid-Safavid Iran: The Case of Lettrism

6.00-8.00: Reception
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Inaugural Issue of Journal on Postcolonial Directions in Education

Postcolonial Directions in Education is a peer-reviewed open access journal produced twice a year. It is a scholarly journal intended to foster further understanding, advancement and reshaping of the field of postcolonial education. We welcome articles that contriute to advancing the field. As indicated in the editorial for the inaugural issue, the purview of this journal is broad enough to encompass a variety of disciplinary approaches, including but not confined to the following: sociological, anthropological, historical and social psychological approaches. The areas embraced include anti-racist education, decolonizing education, critical multiculturalism, critical racism theory, direct colonial experiences in education and their legacies for present day educational structures and practice, educational experiences reflecting the culture and "imagination" of empire, the impact of neoliberalism/globalization/structural adjustment programs on education, colonial curricula and subaltern alternatives, education and liberation movements, challenging hegemonic languages, the promotion of local literacies and linguistic diversity, neocolonial education and identity construction, colonialism and the construction of patriarchy, canon and canonicity, indigenous knowledges, supranational bodies and their educational frameworks, north-south and east-west relations in education, the politics of representation, unlearning colonial stereotypes, internal colonialism and education, cultural hybridity and learning  in  postcolonial contexts, education and the politics of dislocation, biographies or autobiographies reflecting the above themes, and deconstruction of colonial narratives of civilization within educational contexts. Once again, the field cannot be exhausted.

Table of Contents

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[Click here to access the articles of the issue.]