Faculty News

Middle East Research Fellowships 2014-2015

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The Middle East Initiative at Harvard Kennedy School is now accepting applications for the Middle East Research Fellowship Program for the academic year 2014-2015.

The Middle East Research Fellowship Program offers one year pre- and post-doctoral fellowships for research related to Middle Eastern governance and public policy. All fellowships carry a stipend. Fellows range from recent recipients of the Ph.D. or equivalent degree, to university faculty members, to employees of government, international, humanitarian, and private research institutions with significant professional experience. Applicants for pre-doctoral fellowships must have passed general examinations prior to appointment. We welcome applications from political scientists, historians, economists, sociologists, legal scholars, and other social scientists, as well as from policy practitioners. We also encourage applications from women, minorities, and citizens of all countries.

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Call for Applications: APSA MENA Workshop in Amman, Jordan

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The American Political Science Association (APSA) is pleased to announce a call for applications from individuals who would like to participate in a summer workshop series that seeks to explain cross national variations in challenges to old regimes during the early stages of the Arab Spring Movements. The first one-week workshop will be hosted by Birzeit University and the Palestinian American Research Center (PARC), from May 11-16, 2014, at the American Center for Oriental Research (ACOR) in Amman. A follow-up workshop will be held at Lebanese American University in Beirut in September 2014. The organizers, with a grant from the Carnegie Corporation of New York, will cover all the costs of participation for up to 24 qualified applicants. The workshop will be conducted in English.

The deadline for applications is March 14, 2014. Program information and application instructions can be found online here.

The workshop is targeted at Ph.D. students and early career faculty. While the program primarily caters to political scientists, it is also open to scholars from any social science discipline undertaking research relevant to the workshop theme. By bringing together up to 20 scholars from the MENA region, as well as four advanced PhD students from US and European universities, the program aims to support political science research and teaching in the Arab Middle East and North Africa, and strengthen research networks linking US scholars with their colleagues overseas. The 2014 workshops will be the second series in APSA’s annual MENA Workshops program. The first MENA Workshop was held in February, 2014 at the American University in Cairo, Egypt.

The 2014 workshops will be led by Denise DeGarmo (Southern Illinois University, Edwardsville, USA), Lourdes Habash (Birzeit University, Palestine), Fred H. Lawson (Mills College, USA), and Ghada alMadbouh (Birzeit University/PARC, Palestine). Participants will explore the dynamics of regime change, using the case studies of the Arab Spring as a topical empirical basis for this exploration. The goal of this program is to engage participants in proposing innovative research questions and deploying non-standard methodologies to enhance their studies of the Arab Spring and its implications concerning regime change.

American Political Science Association
1527 New Hampshire Ave, NW Washington, DC 20036-1206
Ph: (202) 483-2512
Fx: (202) 483-2657
E-Mail: menaworkshops@apsanet.org

Call for Papers: Handbook of Media and Culture in the Middle East

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Editors : Gholam Khiabany, Tarik Sabry, Helga Tawil-Souri

The aim of the Handbook of Media and Culture in the Middle East is to direct attention to the multivalent and multi-local characteristics of knowledge production, media, and culture in the region. It highlights the necessity, once again, of the need and the possibilities of going beyond the false binaries, and of speaking with a ‘third voice’. It addresses key questions such as:

  • Is Middle Eastern Media Studies a periphery or should it be regarded as part of a wider project of (social) science of society?
  • Does it have a particular hermeneutics?
  • How do we address the particularities of the region while also considering broader socio-cultural and media shifts?

While challenging the provincialism of perceived ‘universal’ theory of media and society, this handbook also highlights the perceived ‘alternative’, i.e. militant particularism, which is just the flipside of the vacuous  universalism it deplores, rather than a genuine alternative to it.

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International Summer Academy for Doctoral and Post-Doctoral Researchers

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In the framework of the research program “Europe in the Middle East – the Middle East in Europe” (EUME) the Berlin-based Forum Transregionale Studien, the Max Weber Stiftung – German Humanities Institutes Abroad, and the  École de Gouvernance et d’Économie in Rabat invite scholars from the fields of Comparative Literature, Cultural Anthropology, Middle East Studies, Political Science, History, Geography, Urban Studies and Sociology to apply for an international Summer Academy that will be convened from 25.8. – 5.9. 2014 at the École de Gouvernance et d’Économie (EGE) in Rabat on the theme

CONFLICT AND MOBILITY IN THE CITY:
URBAN SPACE, YOUTH AND SOCIAL TRANSFORMATIONS

(Closing date: 31 March 2014)

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Call for Papers – McGill Journal of Middle East Studies (MJMES)

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The McGill Journal of Middle East Studies (MJMES) is now accepting submissions for its 2013-2014 issue! The Journal is an excellent opportunity to gain experience in writing, submitting, and revising articles for an academic journal. If selected for publication, an author’s article will be printed in the Journal and distributed to various libraries and institutions around the world as well as on our website: http://mjmes.com

MJMES encourages undergraduates, recent graduates, graduate students, post-docs and professors all to contribute to the Journal. Papers must be written in in English, French, or Arabic, and abide by standards of academic  integrity regarding plagiarism and citation.

MJMES also accepting submissions of photo essays comprised of at least nine photographs and cover photos. Both papers and photo essays must be submitted by e-mail to mejournal@gmail.com by February 10, 2014. The journal is also currently accepting shorter contributions on a rolling basis for its blog: http://mjmes.wordpress.com

To be eligible for publication, a student’s paper must be at least 10 pages in length, contain insightful and original research and/or analysis, significantly concern the modern Middle East, receive a grade of an A- or better. MJMES will also accept papers that have been written outside of a classroom context and are thus ungraded. Papers must be written in in English, French, or Arabic, and abide by standards of academic  integrity regarding plagiarism and citation.

If you have any further questions about the mission, content or requirements of the Journal, please do not hesitate to contact MJMES at the e-mail address mentioned. Past volumes may be viewed on the website in the Archives section.

Zehra Arat joins Middle East Studies Faculty

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The University of Connecticut has embarked on a four-year hiring initiative to expand its faculty by approximately 500 tenure-track positions. As a result of this initiative, we welcome Zehra F. Kabasakal Arat, Professor of Political Science, who has also joined the Middle East Studies faculty. She is involved in the subfields of comparative politics, political theory, and international relations. Her publications focus on human rights, with an emphasis on women’s rights, as well as processes of democratization, globalization, and development. She also conducts empirical research by employing both qualitative and quantitative methods. Currently she is working on several projects, including: theorizing women’s rights and empowerment and assessing the progress; the gap between the theory and practice as reflected in the relationship between human rights scholars and non-governmental organizations (NGOs); the impact of domestic actors (e.g., political parties) and politics on human rights policies; and human rights discourse and practices in Turkey since the 1920s.

View her faculty page.

Lefebvre named Fulbright Scholar Specialist Program Fellow

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Prof. Jeff Lefebvre has been selected as a Fulbright Scholar Specialist Program Fellow (2012-2017). Fulbright Specialist Fellows are awarded a five-year term during which time they may receive two 2-6 week research/teaching appointments at universities overseas. He has been invited to spend 2-3 weeks at the University of Jordan by Dr. Zaid Eyadat, Dean of International Studies and Political Science, University of Jordan. Lefebvre will lecture and participate in a conference on the Arab Spring and the Middle East.