This course surveys Muslim history-writing in Arabic from its beginnings to the nineteenth century. Through reading the work of historians such as al-Baladhuri, al-Tabari, Miskawayh, Ibn ‘Asakir, Ibn Khaldun, and al-Jabarti, we investigate different genres of historical writing and examine the various methodologies employed by Muslim historians.
3 years of Arabic or the equivalent
This course will give an overview of the archaeology of ancient Mesopotamia. We will examine the material remains of various cultures in and around ancient Mesopotamia and engage with themes of social complexity, urbanism, collapse, and continuity/change through time. Students in this survey course will gain basic knowledge of the archaeological data used to create a picture of life in the Mesopotamian region in ancient times.
“This course fulfills the requirements of a survey course in Mesopotamian civilization as defined by the Ancient PhD programs in NELC and MA program in the CMES.”
This course provides an interdisciplinary survey of modern Shi’a thought and identity in the Middle East. It complicates dominant narratives and conventional understandings of sectarianism, Shi'a Islam, and geopolitical conflict in the Middle East by differentiating between distinct yet overlapping factors such as state competition (i.e. between Iran and Saudi Arabia), historical legacies of empire and state building, and actual substantive theological and intellectual differences between Shi’a and Sunni Islam. It looks at the origins of Shi’ism and who the Shi’a are today as the second largest denomination within Islam including their diverse ethnic, geographic, cultural, and political backgrounds. The course will focus on modern intellectual and political movements in Shi’a thought from the post-colonial period onwards including Shi'a revivalist thought and national liberation movements in the early 20th century; Shi’a clerical innovation and institutions (including wilayat al-faqih, the theocratic system dominant in Iran); mass pilgrimage practices and sociological changes in the Shi’a world; Iran's Islamic revolution; and, the transnational politics of Shi’a political parties and armed movements, such as the Lebanese Hezbollah, Iraq’s Popular Mobilization Forces (Hashd al-Sha’abi), and Yemen’s Ansarallah (the Houthis). The course will also cover the “Axis of Resistance” that has Iran, Syria, Hezbollah and other partners engaging in new socio-political and intellectual paradigms in the Middle East.
This course is an introduction to the religions of the ancient Middle East—Egypt, the Levant, Anatolia, and Mesopotamia—with an emphasis on the variety to these religions and the ways regional religious expression and practice changed over time. We will read several famous myths, hymns, and other narrowly “religious” texts—including excerpts from the Akkadian creation myth Enūma eliš, the Egyptian Book of the Dead, and a Hittite myth of a disappearing god. But we will also explore visual art and other material culture sources and we will read letters, treaties, and other more mundane texts to define how these sources differently show how religion manifested “on the ground.” The social and political resonances of religion will be stressed, with examples ranging from kings dubiously claiming the rediscovery of important religious texts to international theft of divine statues. We will discuss the influence of ancient Middle Eastern religions on that of neighboring regions, especially the Greco-Roman world. Students will pursue creative projects with the goal of more deeply understanding ancient Middle Eastern religions; these may include adapting a known religious phenomenon to a different medium or genre or even fabricating new texts, images, or practices while demonstrating their innovative benefits and historical connections to skeptical adherents.
The main objective of this sequence is to provide students with the skills necessary to approach modern Hebrew prose, both fiction and nonfiction. In order to achieve this task, students are provided with a systematic examination of the complete verb structure. Many syntactic structures are introduced (e.g., simple clauses, coordinate and compound sentences). At this level, students not only write and speak extensively but are also required to analyze grammatically and contextually all of material assigned.
A selection of Turkish printed texts in Arabic script from the nineteenth and twentieth centuries is introduced in order of difficulty. Hakan Karateke's unpublished "Ottoman Reader" serves as a text book. The texts are drawn from historical textbooks, official documents, novels, and other genres.
This sequence features proficiency-based instruction emphasizing speaking and writing skills as well as reading and listening comprehension at the intermediate to advanced levels in modern Turkish. Modern short stories, novel excerpts, academic and journalistic articles form the basis for an introduction to modern Turkish literature. Cultural units consisting of films and web-based materials are also used extensively in this course, which is designed to bring the intermediate speaker to an advanced level of proficiency.
Advanced Turkish students will develop their language skills in speaking, reading, translating, listening, and writing, while learning about Turkish society and culture at the same time. To address all of these aspects each class is divided into three sections which focuses on a specific skill.
The second quarter of a two-section course in which Elementary Kazakh and Elementary Uzbek will be offered as one class, with the option for students to study one or the other, or both simultaneously.
This sequence features proficiency-based instruction emphasizing grammar in modern Turkish. This sequence consists of reading and listening comprehension, as well as grammar exercises and basic writing in Turkish. Modern stories and contemporary articles are read at the end of the courses.
