BEGIN:VCALENDAR
VERSION:2.0
PRODID:-//Near Eastern Languages & Cultures - UCLA - ECPv6.17.4.1//NONSGML v1.0//EN
CALSCALE:GREGORIAN
METHOD:PUBLISH
X-WR-CALNAME:Near Eastern Languages & Cultures - UCLA
X-ORIGINAL-URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu
X-WR-CALDESC:Events for Near Eastern Languages & Cultures - UCLA
REFRESH-INTERVAL;VALUE=DURATION:PT1H
X-Robots-Tag:noindex
X-PUBLISHED-TTL:PT1H
BEGIN:VTIMEZONE
TZID:America/Los_Angeles
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20190310T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20191103T090000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20200308T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20201101T090000
END:STANDARD
BEGIN:DAYLIGHT
TZOFFSETFROM:-0800
TZOFFSETTO:-0700
TZNAME:PDT
DTSTART:20210314T100000
END:DAYLIGHT
BEGIN:STANDARD
TZOFFSETFROM:-0700
TZOFFSETTO:-0800
TZNAME:PST
DTSTART:20211107T090000
END:STANDARD
END:VTIMEZONE
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201218T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201218T140000
DTSTAMP:20201019T164259Z
CREATED:20201019T164259Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201019T164259Z
UID:15327-1608296400-1608300000@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Steadfast Imagining Session 5: Bidel in Modern Central Asia\, South Asia\, Afghanistan\, Iran: The Geopolitics of Literary Legacy
DESCRIPTION:Session 5 of the multidisciplinary workshop series on Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720) \nFriday\, December 18\, 2020\n1:00 PM – 2:00 PM (Pacific Time) \n  \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nThis is Session 5 of the multidisciplinary workshop\, Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d.1720) organized and led by Prof. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA\, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures) and Dr. Jane Mikkelson (University of Virginia) in cooperation with scholars working in Persian Studies\, Islamic Studies\, South Asian\, Near Eastern\, and Central Asian Studies\, English\, Anthropology\, and Comparative Literature. All sessions will be held in English\, and all reading materials (both primary and secondary sources) will be circulated and presented in English translation. \nBidel’s reception history in modern Afghanistan\, Iran\, Central Asia\, and South Asia is a fascinating and complex case study in the geopolitics of literary legacy. In Iran\, Bidel has been dismissed as an obscure poet whose difficult style relegates him to a peripheral corner of the Persian canon. Bidel’s legacy in South Asia is complicated by the emergence of vernacular traditions in northern India and the gradual disappearance of Persian from the Subcontinent shortly after Bidel’s death. In modern Central Asia\, Bidel plays an important role in the rise of national literatures during the Soviet period\, and he currently enjoys a flourishing afterlife in Afghanistan. Kevin Schwartz\, Zuzanna Olszewska\, Sam Hodgkin\, and Ahmad Rashid Salim join us to talk about Bidel’s legacy and the place of Bidel’s reception history in modern reevaluations of Persian literary history. \nIn conversation with Kevin Schwartz (Czech Academy of Sciences)\, Zuzanna Olszewska (Oxford)\, Sam Hodgkin (Yale)\, and Ahmad Rashid Salim (UC Berkeley) \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nFor more information about the workshop as a whole\, including the complete schedule of meetings\, please see the announcement here. \nThe workshop is sponsored and organized by UCLA Program on Central Asia (in collaboration with Iranian Studies)\, and co-sponsored by the Center for India and South Asia\, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, and the Center for Near Eastern Studies. \n  \nFor questions about the event\, please contact  caw@international.ucla.edu  \nSponsor(s):  Program on Central Asia\, Center for India and South Asia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, Iranian Studies
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/steadfast-imagining-session-5-bidel-in-modern-central-asia-south-asia-afghanistan-iran-the-geopolitics-of-literary-legacy/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Bidel-Large-tt-xxe.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201211T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201211T140000
DTSTAMP:20201019T164200Z
CREATED:20201019T164200Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201019T164200Z
UID:15325-1607691600-1607695200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Steadfast Imagining Session 4: Worlds Together Shined: Bidel\, Traherne\, and Experiments in Comparison
DESCRIPTION:Session 4 of the multidisciplinary workshop series on Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720) \nFriday\, December 11\, 2020\n1:00 PM – 2:00 PM (Pacific Time) \n  \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nThis is Session 4 of the multidisciplinary workshop\, Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d.1720) organized and led by Prof. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA\, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures) and Dr. Jane Mikkelson (University of Virginia) in cooperation with scholars working in Persian Studies\, Islamic Studies\, South Asian\, Near Eastern\, and Central Asian Studies\, English\, Anthropology\, and Comparative Literature. All sessions will be held in English\, and all reading materials (both primary and secondary sources) will be circulated and presented in English translation. \nThere are tantalizing similarities between the poetry of Bidel and his contemporaries and early modern English meditative poetry. These literary traditions are not in direct contact with each other\, yet they operate in strikingly similar ways (for instance\, in their assimilation of scientific ideas and engagement with philosophy and theology). Moreover\, these poets are co-inheritors\, through very different vectors\, of Aristotealian rationalism\, Neoplatonism\, and Avicennan ideas. How should we think about traditions that are not in direct contact with each other\, but have partially shared lineages? Timothy Harrison joins us to talk about our collaboration-in-progress. We are co-authoring an essay in which we investigate how Thomas Traherne and Bidel—living worlds apart\, not at all in contact—come to compose strikingly similar accounts of infant experience (being in the womb\, birth\, first sensations\, breastfeeding) at the same moment in the seventeenth century. In this session\, we make a pitch for the importance of collaboration and discuss possible methods for comparing premodern European and Islamic literary traditions. \nIn conversation with Timothy Harrison (English\, University of Chicago) \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nFor more information about the workshop as a whole\, including the complete schedule of meetings\, please see the announcement here. \nThe workshop is sponsored and organized by UCLA Program on Central Asia (in collaboration with Iranian Studies)\, and co-sponsored by the Center for India and South Asia\, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, and the Center for Near Eastern Studies. \n  \n  \nFor questions about the event\, please contact  caw@international.ucla.edu  \nSponsor(s):  Program on Central Asia\, Center for India and South Asia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, Iranian Studies
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/steadfast-imagining-session-4-worlds-together-shined-bidel-traherne-and-experiments-in-comparison/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Bidel-Large-tt-xxe.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201202T160000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201202T173000
DTSTAMP:20201114T001212Z
CREATED:20201114T001212Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201114T001212Z
UID:15377-1606924800-1606930200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center Lecture Series: Michael Jackson Bonner
DESCRIPTION:Sasanian Iran: A Personal View\nThis talk will focus on topics included in Dr. Bonner’s new book\, The Last Empire of Iran\, a narrative history of Sasanian Persia. Throughout this lecture\, Dr. Bonner will share with the audience the impetus for writing this book. The principle motivation was to portray the Sasanian state as the great world power that it was and to situate it properly between Rome and the nomad powers of Inner Asia. It addresses the classicising and Perso-Arabic historiographical traditions\, but special emphasis has also been given to Armenian and Syriac sources. Discussion will cover some of the key themes of the book\, including: the origins of the Sasanian state; the wider context of Eurasian history; interactions between Iran and the world of the steppe; and\, finally\, historiographical problems and the use of sources. \nAbout the Speaker\nDr. Michael Jackson Bonner is a Canadian political adviser and historian of Iran. A former classicist and student of James Howard-Johnston and Robert Hoyland\, he read for a master’s degree and doctorate in late-antique Iranian history at the University of Oxford. Dr. Bonner has advised members of Cabinet in both federal and provincial Canadian governments\, and is now a Director of Policy within the Government of Ontario. \n  \n  \nPlease click here to register for this event.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-lecture-series-michael-jackson-bonner/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/11/Bonner-Flyer.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201120T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201120T140000
DTSTAMP:20201019T164036Z
CREATED:20201019T164036Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201019T164036Z
UID:15323-1605877200-1605880800@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Steadfast Imagining Session 3: Crossings: Hinduism\, Islam\, and Bidel's Practical Comparative Religion
DESCRIPTION:Session 3 of the multidisciplinary workshop series on Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720) \nFriday\, November 20\, 2020\n1:00 PM – 2:00 PM (Pacific Time) \n  \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nThis is Session 3 of the multidisciplinary workshop\, Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d.1720) organized and led by Prof. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA\, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures) and Dr. Jane Mikkelson (University of Virginia) in cooperation with scholars working in Persian Studies\, Islamic Studies\, South Asian\, Near Eastern\, and Central Asian Studies\, English\, Anthropology\, and Comparative Literature. All sessions will be held in English\, and all reading materials (both primary and secondary sources) will be circulated and presented in English translation. \nIn the 1660s\, Bidel engaged in a friendly debate with a Hindu friend about imagination\, time\, and experience in Islam and Hinduism. By transcribing this debate in his autobiography\, Bidel acquaints readers with his critical concept of “crossings”—a method of practical comparative religion that draws on the resources of the imagination and lyric poetry. Prashant Keshavmurthy and Hajnalka Kovacs join us to discuss some of the other ways that Bidel encounters\, absorbs\, appropriates\, and transforms Indic ideas\, and the broader role of comparative religion in Bidel’s system of thought. \nIn conversation with Prashant Keshavmurthy (McGill) and Hajnalka Kovacs (Harvard) \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nFor more information about the workshop as a whole\, including the complete schedule of meetings\, please see the announcement here. \nThe workshop is sponsored and organized by UCLA Program on Central Asia (in collaboration with Iranian Studies)\, and co-sponsored by the Center for India and South Asia\, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, and the Center for Near Eastern Studies. \n  \n  \nFor questions about the event\, please contact  caw@international.ucla.edu  \nSponsor(s):  Program on Central Asia\, Center for India and South Asia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, Iranian Studies
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/steadfast-imagining-session-3-crossings-hinduism-islam-and-bidels-practical-comparative-religion/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Bidel-Large-tt-xxe.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201118T100000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201118T130000
DTSTAMP:20201026T165458Z
CREATED:20201006T213401Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201026T165458Z
UID:15290-1605693600-1605704400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center Workshop: Papyrus Amherst 63
DESCRIPTION:The Puzzling Papyrus: New Perspectives on Papyrus Amherst 63\nIn this workshop\, two of the world’s leading experts on Papyrus Amherst 63\, Professors Tawny Holm and Karel van der Toorn\, will reflect on recent scholarship on the Aramaic texts of this papyrus written in Demotic Egyptian script during the Persian Period. Since the decipherment of the papyrus\, scholars have turned to investigating the papyrus’ compositional setting\, as well as the hymns\, prayers\, and stories found in the papyrus\, some of which correspond to texts of the Hebrew Bible. Though the language\, script choice\, and other features of the papyrus have puzzled scholars for decades\, it speaks to the rich texts preserved by Aramaic-speaking populations in the region and provides access to Judean\, Aramean\, and other traditions. This workshop will discuss the content and organization of the papyrus and examine how its texts illuminate the diverse landscapes of peoples\, places\, traditions\, and languages in the ancient Near East under the Achaemenid Empire. \nThis workshop will feature the research of Professor Tawny Holm (Pennsylvania State University) and Professor Karel van der Toorn (University of Amsterdam). \nTextualizing Aramean Identities in Egypt: Papyrus Amherst 63\nProfessor Holm’s presentation highlights the new evidence that Papyrus Amherst 63 brings to our understanding of the Aramean and Aramaic-speaking diaspora in Egypt. The papyrus\, written in approximately the fourth century BCE in Aramaic but using Demotic Egyptian script\, is an anthology of Aramaic texts that reflect the traditions and collective cultural memory of a group of Aramean émigrés\, including Judeans and Samarians\, to Egypt in the first millennium BCE. The papyrus marries East and West in its nostalgia for lost landscapes\, cities\, and cult centers from across the Near East\, yet it also joins this nostalgia with themes of renewal and rejuvenation in a new land. It seems likely that the various compositions on the papyrus became anthologized as such in Egypt. \nThe Internal Organization of Papyrus Amherst 63\nBased on the 2018 published edition of Papyrus Amherst 63 Professor van der Toorn’s lecture will allow attendees of the workshop to engage with the most recent scholarship on the subject of the internal organization of the document.  His general subject will focus on how the document is organized\, but will also engage with students and other participants about any issue that arises in connection with the papyrus. \nProfessor Tawyn Holm’s Bio\nTawny Holm earned her Ph.D. in Hebrew Bible and Northwest Semitic Languages at The Johns Hopkins University\, and is now an Associate Professor of Classics and Ancient Mediterranean Studies and the Jewish Studies Program at Pennsylvania State University. Her main research areas are Hebrew Bible and Aramaic studies\, including Aramaic language and Aramean religion and culture. She is the author of Of Courtiers and Kings: The Biblical Daniel Narratives and Ancient Story-Collections (Eisenbrauns\, 2013)\, and Aramaic Literary Texts\, soon to appear in the SBL series “Writings from the Ancient World.” The latter is a bilingual edition of Aramaic literary texts from the Levant to Egypt\, in particular the multi-composition Papyrus Amherst 63\, written in Aramaic language but with Demotic Egyptian script. Other projects include a monograph on ancient Aramaic literature generally (under contract with de Gruyter)\, a critical edition of Papyrus Amherst 63 (also with de Gruyter)\, and a textbook of Imperial Aramaic currently under review. Professor Holm is also editing a collective volume\, Handbook of Religions in the Ancient Near East\, for Oxford University Press\, and co-editing with Juan Pedro Monferrer Sala the Proceedings volume of the 8th Biennial Meeting of the International Association of Comparative Semitics in 2019. Among other professional service\, she is an editorial board member of the Journal of Ancient Near Eastern Religions\, a member of the Eisenbrauns Editorial Committeee for Penn State University Press\, and Aramaic epigrapher for The University of Vienna Middle Egypt Project at Sheikh Faḍl. \nProfessor Karel van der Toorn’s Bio\nKarel van der Toorn is currently professor of Religion and Society at the University of Amsterdam. He studied Hebrew Bible and Semitic languages in Paris and Amsterdam; did his PhD on Sin and Sanction in Israel and Mesopotamia (1985). He wrote extensively on Israelite religion in the context of ancient Near Eastern civilisation. He published an edition of Papyrus Amherst 63\, along with translation and commentary\, in 2018 (in the series Alter Orient und Altes Testament\, 448; Münster: Ugarit-Verlag). His latest book Becoming Diaspora Jews: Behind the Story of Elephantine (Yale University Press\, 2019) explores the significance of Papyrus Amherst 63 for the history of the Jewish community at fifth century BCE Elephantine\, Egypt. \n  \nPlease click here to register for the Zoom Webinar.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-workshop-papyrus-amherst-63/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/352215v_0001.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201109T150000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201109T163000
DTSTAMP:20201007T164809Z
CREATED:20201007T164809Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201007T164809Z
UID:15294-1604934000-1604939400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Bilingual Lecture Series: Claudia Yaghoobi
DESCRIPTION:Embodiment\, Power\, and Politics in the context of Sigheh Marriages in Modern Iran\nFarahbakhsh’s Zendegi-ye Khosusi (2011) narrates the life story of a former religious zealot\, Ebrahim Kiani\, who has transformed into a Reformist. Ebrahim has a decent family life\, a wife\, Forugh\, and a son. One night at a party\, he is introduced to Parisa Zandi\, and their relationship culminates in their sigheh marriage. Highlighting the unsettling balance of the political and the personal\, the manipulation of religion\, double standards\, and gendered inequality\, Zendegi-ye Khosusi demonstrates the inimical power of patriarchy to protect and maintain male dominance. Farahbakhsh depicts the politicization of the female body and sexuality in the context of sigheh under the Islamic regime. I argue that Zendegi-ye Khosusi demonstrates the inimical power of patriarchy to willingly eliminate a female body in order to protect and maintain the male prerogative while precariously balancing political ideals\, personal desires\, and religious beliefs in a society dominated by gender disparities. \nPlease note that this lecture will be in English. \nTo register for this event and receive the Zoom webinar information\, please visit: \nhttps://ucla.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_aDcBSCLCRmSoqffOLBIppg
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/bilingual-lecture-series-claudia-yaghoobi/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Yaghoobi_Bilingual-Lecuture-Series_English.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="UCLA Iranian Studies":MAILTO:iranianstudies@humnet.ucla.edu
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201106T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201106T140000
DTSTAMP:20201019T163932Z
CREATED:20201019T163932Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201019T163932Z
UID:15321-1604667600-1604671200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Steadfast Imagining Session 2: Philosophy in the First Person: Bidel's Reception of Avicenna and Ibn ʿArabi
DESCRIPTION:Session 2 of the multidisciplinary workshop series on Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720) \nFriday\, November 6\, 2020\n1:00 PM – 2:00 PM (Pacific Time) \n  \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nThis is Session 2 of the multidisciplinary workshop\, Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d.1720) organized and led by Prof. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA\, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures) and Dr. Jane Mikkelson (University of Virginia) in cooperation with scholars working in Persian Studies\, Islamic Studies\, South Asian\, Near Eastern\, and Central Asian Studies\, English\, Anthropology\, and Comparative Literature. All sessions will be held in English\, and all reading materials (both primary and secondary sources) will be circulated and presented in English translation. \nThe end goal of philosophy is certain knowledge. What do imagination and lyric poetry have to do with this quest for certainty? Justine Landau and Domenico Ingenito join us to talk about the vital intersections between lyric poetry and philosophy in the premodern Persianate world. Placing Bidel in conversation with Avicenna and Ibn ʿArabī\, we will see how Bidel’s style of steadfast imagining traces a distinctive\, phenomenologically inflected path to certainty that is just as methodical and robust as the logic-driven procedures of systematic thought —and how lyric poetry for Bidel functions like philosophy in the first person. \nIn conversation with Domenico Ingenito (UCLA) and Justine Landau (Harvard) \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nFor more information about the workshop as a whole\, including the complete schedule of meetings\, please see the announcement here. \nThe workshop is sponsored and organized by UCLA Program on Central Asia (in collaboration with Iranian Studies)\, and co-sponsored by the Center for India and South Asia\, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, and the Center for Near Eastern Studies. \n  \n  \nFor questions about the event\, please contact  caw@international.ucla.edu  \nSponsor(s):  Program on Central Asia\, Center for India and South Asia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, Iranian Studies
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/steadfast-imagining-session-2-philosophy-in-the-first-person-bidels-reception-of-avicenna-and-ibn-%ca%bfarabi/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Bidel-Large-tt-xxe.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201104T160000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201104T173000
DTSTAMP:20201006T211455Z
CREATED:20200918T223717Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201006T211455Z
UID:15252-1604505600-1604511000@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center Lecture Series: Henry Colburn
DESCRIPTION:Achaemenid Egypt: The Archaeology of a Colonial Encounter\nTraditionally\, Egyptologists have regarded the period of Achaemenid Persian rule (the 27th Dynasty\, c. 526-404 BCE) as an unmitigated disaster for the Egyptians. This view\, however\, is based primarily on the perception that there is a scarcity of material from this period; in turn this scarcity is read through an orientalist lens as the result of oppression and political and economic turmoil. This is not to say that turmoil and oppression did not take place\, but that our understanding of this period should arise from a critical engagement with the evidence rather than an argument from silence. \nIn this lecture I argue that this scarcity is as much a consequence of modern factors as ancient ones. I provide several examples\, drawn from my recent book\, of material culture\, including statues\, stelae\, coins\, drinking vessels and tomb reliefs\, that can or must date to the 27th Dynasty. Each of these types of objects sheds different light on how the Egyptians – and other people living in Egypt – experienced Persian rule. These experiences could vary considerably\, ranging from exploitation to acculturation\, precisely the diversity of experience that comparative studies of colonialism lead us to expect. Thus Achaemenid Egypt was not an unmitigated disaster per se\, but a colonial encounter like any other. \nAbout the Speaker\nHenry Colburn earned a PhD in Classical Art and Archaeology from the University of Michigan. His research focuses on the art and archaeology of ancient Iran\, and on the regions of the Near East\, Eastern Mediterranean\, and Central Asia that interacted with Iran prior to the advent of Islam. His first book on this subject\, Archaeology of Empire in Achaemenid Egypt\, was published earlier this year. He has held fellowships at the Harvard Art Museums\, the Getty Research Institute\, and the Metropolitan Museum of Art\, and teaching positions at the University of California\, Irvine and the University of Southern California. He is currently a Research Associate of the Kelsey Museum of Archaeology at the University of Michigan by virtue of his ongoing work on the seals of the Persepolis Fortification Archive. \nPlease click here to register for the Zoom link.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-lecture-series-henry-colburn/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Colburn-Flyer-1.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201023T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201023T140000
DTSTAMP:20201019T163816Z
CREATED:20201019T163816Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201019T163816Z
UID:15318-1603458000-1603461600@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Steadfast Imagining Session 1: Introducing Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720)
DESCRIPTION:Session 1 of the multidisciplinary workshop series on Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d. 1720) \nFriday\, October 23\, 2020\n1:00 PM – 2:00 PM (Pacific Time) \n  \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nThis is Session 1 of the multidisciplinary workshop\, Steadfast Imagining: Lyric Meditation\, Islamic Philosophy\, and Comparative Religion in the Works of Bidel of Delhi (d.1720) organized and led by Prof. Domenico Ingenito (UCLA\, Near Eastern Languages and Cultures) and Dr. Jane Mikkelson (University of Virginia) in cooperation with scholars working in Persian Studies\, Islamic Studies\, South Asian\, Near Eastern\, and Central Asian Studies\, English\, Anthropology\, and Comparative Literature. All sessions will be held in English\, and all reading materials (both primary and secondary sources) will be circulated and presented in English translation. \nThis session introduces the remarkable Persian corpus of the Indian poet and philosopher Bidel of Delhi (1644–1720 CE). We will trace a broad overview of Bidel’s life\, thought\, literary style\, and distinctive practices of the self—his system of steadfast imagining. \nIn conversation with Paul Losensky (Indiana University) \nRSVP Here (Zoom registration) \nFor more information about the workshop as a whole\, including the complete schedule of meetings\, please see the announcement here. \nThe workshop is sponsored and organized by UCLA Program on Central Asia (in collaboration with Iranian Studies)\, and co-sponsored by the Center for India and South Asia\, the Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, and the Center for Near Eastern Studies. \n  \n  \nFor questions about the event\, please contact  caw@international.ucla.edu  \nSponsor(s):  Program on Central Asia\, Center for India and South Asia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, Center for Medieval and Renaissance Studies\, Iranian Studies
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/steadfast-imagining-session-1-introducing-bidel-of-delhi-d-1720/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Bidel-Large-tt-xxe.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201023T110000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201023T120000
DTSTAMP:20201006T211639Z
CREATED:20201006T211624Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20201006T211639Z
UID:15286-1603450800-1603454400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center Fall 2020 Welcome Event
DESCRIPTION:You Are Invited:\nPourdavoud Center Fall 2020 Welcome Event\nFriday\, October 23\, 2020 at 11:00am PST\nvia Zoom\n\nRegistration Required \n\nPlease join us for a digital fall reception to celebrate the continued success of the Pourdavoud Center for the Study of the Iranian World. In the company of Dr. Anahita Naficy Lovelace and Mr. Jim Lovelace\, the Center’s benefactors\, David Schaberg\, Dean of Humanities\, M. Rahim Shayegan\, the Center’s director\, our staff\, academic affiliates\, colleagues\, students\, and esteemed guests\, we shall be introducing the Center’s stimulating programming and research agenda for the Academic year 2020-21.\n\nProgram:\n\nWelcoming Remarks from:\n\nDean David Schaberg\nDr. Anahita Naficy Lovelace\nProfessor M. Rahim Shayegan\n\nFeatured Presentation by:\n\nDr. Ali Mousavi\n\nGateways to Iranian Archaeology\nThe Pourdavoud Gazetteer Project\n\n\n\nPlease click here to register for this event.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-fall-2020-welcome-event/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/10/Capture.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201005T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201005T160000
DTSTAMP:20200918T224641Z
CREATED:20200918T224641Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200918T224641Z
UID:15260-1601906400-1601913600@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Bilingual Lecture Series: Kaveh Madani
DESCRIPTION:Please join UCLA Iranian Studies for their first Bilingual Lecture Series events of the academic year.  These two lectures\, featuring the research of Dr. Kaveh Madani\, will be held virtually via Zoom.  He will present “Water Bankruptcy and Environmental Politics in Iran (A Conversation with Kaveh Madani)” on Monday\, October 5\, 2020 at 2:00pm Pacific Time. \nPlease note that this lecture will be in English. \nTo register for this event and receive the Zoom webinar information\, please visit: \nhttps://ucla.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_ICCWuSlwSOe9d7U2jSNRRw
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/bilingual-lecture-series-kaveh-madani-2/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Madani_Bilingual-Lecuture-Series_English.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="UCLA Iranian Studies":MAILTO:iranianstudies@humnet.ucla.edu
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201004T113000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20201004T133000
DTSTAMP:20200918T224440Z
CREATED:20200918T224440Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200918T224440Z
UID:15255-1601811000-1601818200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Bilingual Lecture Series: Kaveh Madani
DESCRIPTION:Please join UCLA Iranian Studies for their first Bilingual Lecture Series events of the academic year.  These two lectures\, featuring the research of Dr. Kaveh Madani\, will be held virtually via Zoom.  He will present “A Conversation with Kaveh Madani on Environmental Security in Iran and the Middle East” on Sunday\, October 4\, 2020 at 11:30am Pacific Time. \nPlease note that this lecture will be in Persian. \nTo register for this event and receive the Zoom webinar information\, please visit: \nhttps://ucla.zoom.us/webinar/register/WN_Xm_MGxf6Q3qxYT0pLHQFCQ
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/bilingual-lecture-series-kaveh-madani/
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/09/Madani_Bilingual-Lecuture-Series_Persian.jpg
ORGANIZER;CN="UCLA Iranian Studies":MAILTO:iranianstudies@humnet.ucla.edu
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200310T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200310T200000
DTSTAMP:20200310T154203Z
CREATED:20200128T224128Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200310T154203Z
UID:14557-1583863200-1583870400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Armenian Mythology
DESCRIPTION:  \nAll welcome \nPizza and refreshments will be served \nAll proceedings will be in Armenian \n  \nHrach Martirosyan is currently Lecturer in Eastern Armenian in the department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. After receiving his MA in Philology from Vanadzor Pedagogical Institute\, he pursued graduate studies under the supervision of Prof. Sargis Harutyunyan at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Armenian Academy of Sciences in Yerevan. His dissertation\n“Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon” forthcoming from Brill (c. 1000 pp.) forms part of the larger project to compile an Indo-European Etymological Dictionary. Thereafter\, he moved to Leiden University as a Guest Lecturer in the field of Classical Armenian from an Indo-European perspective (2011-2015). Subsequently\, he held a postdoc at the Institute of Iranian Studies of the Austrian Academy of Sciences\, Vienna (2015- 2017)\, investigating Armenian personal names of Iranian origin under the supervision of Velizar Sadovski in the framework of an Iranian Prosopographical Dictionary. Most recently\, he returned to his position at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics to continue etymological research on native Armenian vocabulary. \n  \nEvent Flyer\n  \nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”153″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/armenian-mythology/
LOCATION:365 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Armenian
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200310T134500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200310T153000
DTSTAMP:20200303T222120Z
CREATED:20200303T222044Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200303T222120Z
UID:14929-1583847900-1583854200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:'I Founded therein a Palace of Cedar': Constructing and Manipulating Distant Lands in the Ancient Near East
DESCRIPTION:Borders\, frontiers\, and the lands that lay beyond them were created and defined through a variety of physical\, geographical\, and moreover\, social and cultural means in Mesopotamia. This talk centers on the ways in which one such distant land\, the Cedar Forest (tir eren orqišti erēni) was construed in Sumerian and Akkadian textual sources\, as well as in artistic representations\, throughout the second and first millennia BCE. The image of the Cedar Forest finds its foundations in Old Babylonian literary texts\, where it is used as either an example of one far edge of the Mesopotamian world\, or as a setting for dramatic action\nsuch as the conflict between Gilgamesh and the monstrous Humbaba in the later Epic of Gilgamesh. Although these sources present images of the Cedar Forest as a fantastical\, nearly mythical land\, it was also anchored in reality\, linked to the cedar forests of Lebanon. The intersection of real and imagined qualities used to define distant lands allowed the Middle and Neo-Assyrian kings in particular to manipulate the image of these places for their own political\, religious\, and social gain. Through examining references to the Cedar Forest in royal inscriptions and other texts\, it becomes clear that such locations were carefully employed to mark the edges of political and military dominion\, a grand claim of the reach and extent of the Assyrian king’s rule. Though the Cedar Forest and other locations like it were connected to the core through trade and military encounters\, they remained abstracted and rendered fantastical by the subjective consideration of the distance that defined them. The mental map these locations collectively created was thus subject to shift over time\, continuously renegotiated based on the demands of political elites and social conceptions held by those who lived at the other end of the imagined world.\n  \n\nDr. Gina Konstantopoulos  \nAssistant Professor in the History of Ancient Western Asia \nUniversity of Tsukuba \n  \n  \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”163″ title=”false” description=”false”]\n 
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/i-founded-therein-a-palace-of-cedar-constructing-and-manipulating-distant-lands-in-the-ancient-near-east/
LOCATION:243 Royce Hall
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/03/Screen-Shot-2020-03-03-at-2.19.30-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200305T134500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200305T153000
DTSTAMP:20200227T182812Z
CREATED:20200227T170438Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200227T182812Z
UID:14914-1583415900-1583422200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:People of Empire: Assyrianness Through the Looking-Glass of the Neo-Assyrian State
DESCRIPTION:In the first half of the first millennium BCE\, the Neo-Assyrian state forged what Mario Liverani has called the world’s “prototype empire”. Empires are often associated with imperial peoples: a core population that maintains its distinctiveness and enjoys a privileged position within the imperial structure. Were the Assyrians such a people? The Neo-Assyrian state apparatus produced a great deal of textual material spanning many genres and purposes and covering much of its existence. A significant part of this material has been recovered and made available for scientific examination over the last two centuries. This rich body of evidence allows us to investigate how the Neo-Assyrian state understood “Assyrianness”. Who was regarded as Assyrian\, who was not\, and on what basis? \nI will argue that Assyrianness was not invested in a fixed differentiation between peoples within the empire. Assyrianness was instead bound up in the universal promise of empire. Assyrian imperialism sought to impose the divine order over the mundane world. Whatever conformed to the divine order was Assyrian by default: good\, proper\, “us.” Whatever did not conform to this order was the other: strange\, improper\, “them.” Refracted as it is through the looking-glass of the Neo-Assyrian state\, the evidence reveals an Assyrian identity located not in ethnonational constructs\, but in political subordination and modes of subsistence. This provides an interesting contrast with our understanding of other imperial peoples\, like those of Achaemenid Persia or of the familiar European colonial empires of the last few centuries. Assyrians were not an imperial people\, but the people of empire. \nEvent Flyer\n  \nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”162″ title=”false” description=”false”]\n  \n\n  \n  \n  \n  \nJonathan Valk \nLeiden University \n 
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/people-of-empire-assyrianness-through-the-looking-glass-of-the-neo-assyrian-state/
CATEGORIES:Assyriology,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/valk.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200303T183000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200303T200000
DTSTAMP:20200225T212352Z
CREATED:20200225T212240Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200225T212352Z
UID:14897-1583260200-1583265600@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Translating Daniel Varuzhan's Pagan Songs
DESCRIPTION:“Daniel Varoujan’s Pagan Songs shocked readers when it was published in 1912. Russian Armenian critics condemned its frank descriptions of eroticism as pornographic and disapproved of its poetic paganism as a symptom of the “nationlist disease”. For its unsympathetic view of Christianity and its glorification of the pagan era\, the Armenian church considered it criminally anti-Christian\, while feminists claimed Varoujan objectified women by depicting them as “being created for the sexual gratification of men”. On the occasion of the first full translation of Pagan Songs into English\, translator Hratch Demiurge discusses the book’s tumultuous reception and the hypocrisy of many of its critics; explains the nuances of the new translation with side by side comparisons with past attempts by other translators; and\, finally\, explores the origins of the pagan movement in Western Armenian literature started largely by Varoujan’s book\, and its connection to the upsurge in neopaganism in Armenia after\nthe fall of the Soviet Union.”\n\n\n\nHRATCH DEMIURGE is a comedian\, poet\,  teacher and translator. He is currently in the \nprocess of translating the satirical biographies  of the “Armenian Molière”—Hagop Baronian\n—a timely work on the incompetence and  corruption of Armenian bigwigs in the latter half of\nthe 19th century. He lives and works in Los Angeles.\n  \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”161″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/translating-daniel-varuzhans-pagan-songs/
LOCATION:Kaplan Hall 311
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20200302
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20200312
DTSTAMP:20200224T191522Z
CREATED:20200206T211353Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200224T191522Z
UID:14751-1583107200-1583971199@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Biennial Ehsan Yarshater Lecture Series
DESCRIPTION:The Ehsan Yarshater Lecture Series presentations at UCLA\, which has a counterpart at the Collège de France\, are delivered by a distinguished scholar whose work has impacted the study of the Iranian Civilization. Each biennial lecture series consists of four to five lectures on a single theme that is elaborated and amplified into a monograph. The 2020 Biennial Ehsan Yarshater Lecture Series honored guest lecturer is Professor Daniel Potts. \nThe 2020 Yarshater Lecture Series will be held in the Cotsen Institute of Archaeology at UCLA in Fowler A222. The lectures will take place at 4:00pm on March 2\, 4\, 6\, 9\, and 11\, 2020. \nPlease click here to view the full program. \nPlease click here to RSVP.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/biennial-ehsan-yarshater-lecture-series/
LOCATION:Fowler A222\, 308 Charles E Young Dr N\, Los Angeles\, CA\, 90024\, United States
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200227T134500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200227T151500
DTSTAMP:20200222T003215Z
CREATED:20200221T231102Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200222T003215Z
UID:14861-1582811100-1582816500@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Creating the Cult of a Goddess:  Politics and Religion at Mari in the Old Babylonian Period
DESCRIPTION:Traces of ancient Mesopotamian religion have been discovered by archaeologists working across the modern Middle East—temples and other religious structures\, worn by time; small fragments of once-opulent cult statues and temple furnishings; clay tablets inscribed with stories of and hymns to the gods; and mundane records of administrators\, concerned with tracking the many cults that could inhabit a single city. While the Assyriologist A. Leo Oppenheim cautioned that these remains were capable of revealing “only a dim reflection” of Mesopotamian religious practice\, and should therefore not be used to write a history of Mesopotamian religion\, I contend that these mundane remains in fact offer rich insights into the pervasive and dynamic nature of religion in Mesopotamian history. \nOffering a critical re-examination of administrative records from the ancient city of Mari\, the presentation examines a body of texts that refer to a goddess by the name of Ishtar Irradan along with a pair of ritual texts\, all found in the city’s palace archives. While the presentation uses this evidence to construct a lively story of cultic innovation and political ideology during a period of foreign rule in ca. 1800 BCE\, the ideas and methods developed here have important implications for the classification of ritual texts and the study of Mesopotamian literature as well as modern approaches to the study of polytheism and “divine multiplicity.” Finally\, the presentation considers the value of interdisciplinary approaches to the study of Mesopotamian history\, suggesting that the field of Assyriology and the training of Assyriologists can and needs to be driven forward by the engagement with the ancient material world—of which texts remain one crucial component. \n  \n\n  \n  \n  \n  \n  \nDr. Elizabeth Knott\nPostdoctoral Associate\, Babylonian Collection\, Yale University Research Affiliate\, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World\, NYU \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”160″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/creating-the-cult-of-a-goddess-politics-and-religion-at-mari-in-the-old-babylonian-period/
LOCATION:Fowler A222\, 308 Charles E Young Dr N\, Los Angeles\, CA\, 90024\, United States
CATEGORIES:Assyriology,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Screen-Shot-2020-02-21-at-3.16.59-PM.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200225T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200225T200000
DTSTAMP:20200224T182058Z
CREATED:20200128T223931Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200224T182058Z
UID:14554-1582653600-1582660800@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Armenian Dialects
DESCRIPTION:  \nAll welcome \nPizza and refreshments will be served \nAll proceedings will be in Armenian \n  \nHrach Martirosyan is currently Lecturer in Eastern Armenian in the department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. After receiving his MA in Philology from Vanadzor Pedagogical Institute\, he pursued graduate studies under the supervision of Prof. Sargis Harutyunyan at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Armenian Academy of Sciences in Yerevan. His dissertation\n“Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon” forthcoming from Brill (c. 1000 pp.) forms part of the larger project to compile an Indo-European Etymological Dictionary. Thereafter\, he moved to Leiden University as a Guest Lecturer in the field of Classical Armenian from an Indo-European perspective (2011-2015). Subsequently\, he held a postdoc at the Institute of Iranian Studies of the Austrian Academy of Sciences\, Vienna (2015- 2017)\, investigating Armenian personal names of Iranian origin under the supervision of Velizar Sadovski in the framework of an Iranian Prosopographical Dictionary. Most recently\, he returned to his position at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics to continue etymological research on native Armenian vocabulary. \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”155″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/armenian-dialects/
LOCATION:305 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Armenian
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200225T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200225T160000
DTSTAMP:20191202T201911Z
CREATED:20191202T201911Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20191202T201911Z
UID:14285-1582639200-1582646400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:From Enoch to Daniel: Reimagining the Past in the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls
DESCRIPTION:Sponsored by\nThe UCLA Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies\nCosponsored by\nThe Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures \nSince the late 1940s\, the approximately 1\,000 manuscripts discovered in caves alongside the Dead Sea – popularly called the Dead Sea Scrolls – have been reshaping in significant ways study of the Bible and ancient Judaism. Often left out of discussions about the scrolls are the approximately 30 Jewish literary works written in Aramaic. This talk will introduce the Aramaic Dead Sea Scrolls\, survey their use of earlier biblical traditions\, and assess their place in the broader landscape of ancient Judaism. \nDaniel A. Machiela (PhD\, Notre Dame) is Associate Professor and Chair of the Department of Religious Studies at McMaster University in Hamilton\, Ontario. His research focuses on ancient interpretation of the Hebrew Bible\, Second Temple period Judaism\, the Dead Sea Scrolls\, and Aramaic language. \n  \n  \nRSVP at https://www.cjs.ucla.edu/event/from-enoch-to-daniel-reimagining-the-past-in-the-aramaic-dead-sea-scrolls/
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/from-enoch-to-daniel-reimagining-the-past-in-the-aramaic-dead-sea-scrolls/
LOCATION:314 Royce Hall
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200224T130000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200224T150000
DTSTAMP:20200221T200323Z
CREATED:20200211T221135Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200221T200323Z
UID:14801-1582549200-1582556400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:New Insights into the Inscribed Landscape of the Wadi Hammamat Quarries
DESCRIPTION:Located halfway between the Nile and the shores of the Red Sea\, the Wadi Hammamat is the modern name of ancient greywacke and siltstone quarries in the Eastern Desert (Egypt)\, exploited from the Predynastic period onwards. Known to us since the time of its first explorers\, namely K. R. Lepsius and J. Burton (19th century)\, the Wadi Hammamat quarries were explored by many epigraphic and archaeological survey teams throughout the last century. After Dr. Annie Gasse’s survey in the 1980’s—which uncovered hundreds of new to-be-published inscriptions from all periods—new research is currently ongoing. Beyond (re-)publishing the Pharaonic epigraphic material (about 380 inscriptions) in close collaboration with Dr. Gasse\, Vincent Morel and Dr. Jean-Guillaume Olette-Pelletier are both seeking—in the course of their own research—to better apprehend this major quarrying area. From shedding new light on the symbolic landscape of the Wadi itself to drafting a new interpretive history of the local writing practices\, the multi-aspect research effort aims at recontextualizing ancient inscriptions\, too often considered as mere “expedition reports.” \n\nVincent Morel\nUniversité de Genève\nÉcole Pratique des Hautes Études – Université Paris\, Sciences & Lettres Yale University \n  \n\n  \nJean-Guillaume Olette-Pelletier Sorbonne Université\nYale University \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”159″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/new-insights-into-the-inscribed-landscape-of-the-wadi-hammamat-quarries/
LOCATION:243 Royce Hall
CATEGORIES:Egyptology
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/jpeg:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/DSC04392.jpg
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;VALUE=DATE:20200218
DTEND;VALUE=DATE:20200221
DTSTAMP:20200131T202950Z
CREATED:20200129T212010Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200131T202950Z
UID:14588-1581984000-1582243199@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center: 14th Melammu Symposium
DESCRIPTION:“Contextualizing Iranian Religions in the Ancient World”\nPlease click here to view the full symposium schedule.\n \nThe 14th Melammu Symposium: Contextualizing Iranian Religions in the Ancient World \nThe Pourdavoud Center for the Study of the Iranian World is convening the 14th Melammu Symposium at UCLA. The international three-day symposium held at Royce Hall will explore Iranian religions in light of ancient Near Eastern traditions and precedents. It hosts scholars whose work pertain to the interchange of ideas and practices between the ancient Near East\, Egypt\, the Classical and Hellenistic worlds\, and ancient Iran. The overarching themes of the symposium encompass: Elam\, the Ancient Near East\, and Persia; Ancient Egypt and Persia; the Divine in Achaemenid Material Culture; (Post-)Achaemenid Religious Practices in Literary Traditions; Religions and Religious Policy in the Hellenistic and Arsacid Worlds; and the Religious Landscape of the Sasanian World. \nPlease click here to RSVP.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-14th-melammu-symposium/
LOCATION:314 Royce Hall
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200212T160000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200212T180000
DTSTAMP:20191119T232418Z
CREATED:20191119T232418Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20191119T232418Z
UID:14242-1581523200-1581530400@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Pourdavoud Center Lecture Series: Gil Stein
DESCRIPTION:Please join the Pourdavoud Center for the Study of the Iranian World for a lecture by Professor Gil Stein. \nAchaemenids or Persians?  Burials\, Material Culture\, and Imperial Identities in the Euphrates Valley (5th-4th centuries BCE)\nThe Achaemenid empire was the largest empire in the world in the 5th-4th centuries BCE\, encompassing numerous polities and cultural groups within its 20 satrapies. To rule this enormous empire\, the Persian elites had to gain the active support of the people they governed to get them to participate in the administrative and military apparatus of the Achaemenid state. How did this actually work in practice? This lecture examines two enigmatic Persian-period burials at the site of Hacınebi\, on the Euphrates River crossing at Zeugma/Apamea\, to investigate the relationship between material culture and social identity in the multi-ethnic empire. Achaemenid material culture was an imperial synthesis that combined stylistic elements from Scythia\, Mesopotamia\, Egypt\, and other regions; as a result\, it is very difficult to identify the ethnicity of any person in a burial based only on the style of specific objects. Taken together\, textual\, artistic\, and archaeological data on burial practices\, military organization\, and material culture styles at Hacınebi highlight and help us to understand the complex hybrid identities and shared cultural koine that linked Persian and non-Persian elites across the cosmopolitan Achaemenid empire. \nAbout the Speaker\nGil Stein is Professor of Near Eastern Archaeology at the Oriental Institute of the University of Chicago and Director of the Chicago Center for Cultural Heritage Preservation. From 2002 to 2017 he served as Director of the Oriental Institute. He received his BA in Archaeology from Yale University and his PhD in Anthropology from the University of Pennsylvania. His research investigates ancient economies\, the archaeology of colonialism\, inter-regional interaction\, the development of the earliest cities and states in the Near East\, zooarchaeology\, and the preservation of cultural heritage. He has directed excavations at the Uruk period Mesopotamian trading colony of Hacınebi in Turkey\, at Halaf and Ubaid period site of Tell Zeidan in Syria\, and is currently excavating at the 7000 year old town of Surezha in the Kurdistan region of Northeast Iraq.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-lecture-series-gil-stein/
LOCATION:Royce Hall Room 306\, 10745 Dickson Plaza\, Los Angeles\, CA (CALIFORNIA)\, 90095
CATEGORIES:Humanities,Iranian,NELC,Pourdavoud Center
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200211T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200211T200000
DTSTAMP:20200128T230513Z
CREATED:20200128T223303Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200128T230513Z
UID:14548-1581444000-1581451200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:History of the Armenian Language: Chronology
DESCRIPTION:1. Indo-European Origins; Classical Armenian; Middle Armenian\n2. Western and Eastern Dialects\nAll welcome \nPizza and refreshments will be served \nAll proceedings will be in Armenian \n  \nHrach Martirosyan is currently Lecturer in Eastern Armenian in the department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. After receiving his MA in Philology from Vanadzor Pedagogical Institute\, he pursued graduate studies under the supervision of Prof. Sargis Harutyunyan at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Armenian Academy of Sciences in Yerevan. His dissertation\n“Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon” forthcoming from Brill (c. 1000 pp.) forms part of the larger project to compile an Indo-European Etymological Dictionary. Thereafter\, he moved to Leiden University as a Guest Lecturer in the field of Classical Armenian from an Indo-European perspective (2011-2015). Subsequently\, he held a postdoc at the Institute of Iranian Studies of the Austrian Academy of Sciences\, Vienna (2015- 2017)\, investigating Armenian personal names of Iranian origin under the supervision of Velizar Sadovski in the framework of an Iranian Prosopographical Dictionary. Most recently\, he returned to his position at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics to continue etymological research on native Armenian vocabulary. \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”154″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/history-of-the-armenian-language-chronology/
LOCATION:365 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Armenian
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200211T134500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200211T134500
DTSTAMP:20200210T180748Z
CREATED:20200204T171154Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200210T180748Z
UID:14692-1581428700-1581428700@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Episodes from the Early History of Knowledge:  Instruction Manuals in Cuneiform Scholarship
DESCRIPTION:This talk examines the early history of the instruction manual\, focusing on cuneiform texts identified as technical procedures. Addressed to “you” as the grammatical subject\, procedures—in Akkadian\, nēpešum\, from the verb epēšu “to make\, compute”— encompassed topics ranging from mathematics\, glassmaking\, horse-training\, perfumery\, medicine\, and astronomy. Over the course of two millennia\, procedures would develop into one of the most long-standing vehicles for knowledge transmission in cuneiform cultures. However\, the longevity of the textual format\, which on its surface appears to transmit practical know-how\, belies a more dynamic history of linguistic innovation\, scribal hermeneutics\, and lexical ingenuity. From Old Babylonian school houses to Assyrian state archives\, procedures provided a textual space within which scribes could contemplate the material world\, numeracy\, lexicography\, writing\, classification\, and knowledge itself. Using instructions for perfumery\, horse-training\, and glassmaking as the starting point\, this talk presents a history and historiography of procedures in cuneiform scholarship with the aim of defamiliarizing what we know about procedures\, and in turn\, reassessing the broader impact of these early instruction manuals within the emerging field of history of knowledge. \n\n  \n  \n  \n  \nDr. Eduardo A. Escobar\nStevanovich Institute on the Formation of Knowledge The University of Chicago \n  \nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”158″ title=”false” description=”false”]\n 
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/episodes-from-the-early-history-of-knowledge-instruction-manuals-in-cuneiform-scholarship/
LOCATION:Royce 243
CATEGORIES:Assyriology,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/02/Escobar-golden-record-ver-2.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200207T123000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200207T140000
DTSTAMP:20200128T231842Z
CREATED:20200128T231842Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200128T231842Z
UID:14570-1581078600-1581084000@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Searching for Israel's Ancestors in the Genomic Age
DESCRIPTION:Drawing on the presenter’s collaboration with Stanford scientists\, this talk will explore recent use of genetic evidence to uncover the ancient ancestors of the Jews. What has been learned from such evidence about the ancient Israelites\, and why has this kind of research proven so controversial? The talk seeks to address these questions in a way that is accessible to people whatever their scientific background. \nSteven Weitzman serves as the Ella Darivoff Director of the Herbert D. Katz Center for Advanced Judaic Studies at the University of Pennsylvania and as the Abraham M. Ellis Professor of Semitics Languages and Literatures in the department of Religious Studies. Among his publications is The Origin of the Jews: The Quest for Roots in a Rootless Age (Princeton University Press)\, awarded a National Jewish Book Award. \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”156″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/searching-for-israels-ancestors-in-the-genomic-age/
LOCATION:365 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Israel Studies
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/p.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200206T134500
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200206T150000
DTSTAMP:20200206T160749Z
CREATED:20200130T215333Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200206T160749Z
UID:14611-1580996700-1581001200@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Resource Mobilization\, Social Engineering\, and Opportunism: The Revival of Larsa in Nebuchadnezzar's Babylonian State Project
DESCRIPTION:When a Babylonian and Median coalition put an end to Assyrian domination over the Ancient Near East in the late 7th century BCE\, the Babylonian kings set about to revitalize the heartland of their new state\, the Neo-Babylonian empire. One of the cities that benefited from this imperial program of rebuilding and land reclamation was Larsa\, an ancient cult center of the sun god Shamash in what is now southern Iraq. The main architect of this project was Nebuchadnezzar II. Although he is most (in)famously known through the Bible\, he also left his imprint in numerous Babylonian sources. \nHowever\, because we have no state archives from that period\, temple and private records are the primary source for reconstructing modes of state intervention. Using an unpublished 6th century BCE private archive from Larsa and other textual sources\, I will show that Larsa and its temple were revived for a combination of economic\, political\, and religious reasons\, and that they were kept small and semidependent by design. Finally\, I will argue that Nebuchadnezzar opportunistically exploited this revival to cast himself in the figure of a state builder. In addition to contributing to our understanding of imperial state policies in the first millennium BCE\, this research highlights the use of everyday documents to reconstruct the socio-economic life of urban and non-urban populations in the Ancient Near East. \n\n  \nDr. Odette Boivin\nVisiting Assistant Professor\, Institute for the Study of the Ancient World\, NYU \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”157″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/resource-mobilization-social-engineering-and-opportunism-the-revival-of-larsa-in-nebuchadnezzars-babylonian-state-project/
LOCATION:365 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Assyriology,NELC
ATTACH;FMTTYPE=image/png:https://nelc.ucla.edu/wp-content/uploads/2020/01/od-e1580427986170.png
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200130T140000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200130T160000
DTSTAMP:20191202T201649Z
CREATED:20191202T201649Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20191202T201649Z
UID:14282-1580392800-1580400000@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Through the Female Gaze: Men in the Book of Genesis
DESCRIPTION:Sponsored by\nThe UCLA Alan D. Leve Center for Jewish Studies \nCosponsored by\nThe Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures \nWhile the bulk of biblical scholarship on the book of Genesis had been conducted by men and about men\, more recent works have used feminist approaches to center the female characters in Genesis from numerous perspectives\, enhancing our understanding of how the women in Genesis function. In light of these new works\, this talk will offer a critical reexamination of the men in the book of Genesis from a more feminist perspective to determine if previous scholarship on these characters can stand up to the female gaze. \nTammi J. Schneider is a Professor of Religion at Claremont Graduate University specializing in the Hebrew Bible and the ancient Near East. Her BA is in Hebrew Language and Literature from the University of Minnesota and she received her doctorate in Ancient History from the University of Pennsylvania. Her books include Sarah: Mother of Nations published by The Continuum International Publishing Group\, Judges in the Berit Olam series published by Liturgical Press\, Mothers of Promise: Women in the Book of Genesis by Baker Academic Press\, and An Introduction to Ancient Mesopotamian Religion by Eerdmans Publishing Company. She has participated in many archaeological excavations in Israel and is presently the director of the educational program at the excavation of Tel Akko in Israel. She is a past President of the Regional Society of Biblical Literature and chairs their session on the ancient Near East and the Bible. She also serves on the Finance/Audit and Investment Committee for the national Society of Biblical Literature and serves on the Genesis Session for their Annual Meeting. She is presently writing a book on “peripheral” men in the book of Genesis and editing a volume on Mesopotamia and the Bible. \nRSVP at https://www.cjs.ucla.edu/event/through-the-female-gaze-men-in-the-book-of-genesis/
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/through-the-female-gaze-men-in-the-book-of-genesis/
LOCATION:193 Kaplan Hall
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200129T160000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200129T180000
DTSTAMP:20200108T231006Z
CREATED:20191204T214842Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200108T231006Z
UID:14292-1580313600-1580320800@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Amuzegar Lecture Series: Robert Steele
DESCRIPTION:Please join the Iranian Studies Program for a lecture by Dr. Robert Steele. \nAncient Persia in Pahlavi Politics: The Imperial Celebrations of 1971 and Cultural Policy under the Shah\nIn October 1971\, heads of state\, political and cultural figures\, business leaders\, and journalists from around the world came to Persepolis at the invitation of Shah Mohammad Reza Pahlavi of Iran. They were there to celebrate the 2500th Anniversary of the Founding of the Persian Empire by Cyrus the Great. Many historians and commentators consider this event to have been a huge mistake – some even claim it sparked the widespread popular discontent with the Shah’s rule that culminated in the revolution of 1978/9. For decades\, coverage of the Celebrations has been characterized by sensationalism and an obsession with the supposed flamboyance of an oriental despot\, and a 2016 BBC documentary on the event titled Decadence and Downfall: The Shah’s Ultimate Party shows that not much has changed. This paper challenges the prevailing narrative of Celebrations\, looking beyond the extravagant parties to analyze them in the context of cultural policy in the late Pahlavi period. It examines what the regime sought to gain from holding such an event\, economically and politically as well as ideologically\, and the role played by the cultural structures of the Pahlavi state. \nAbout the Speaker\nRobert Steele is the inaugural recipient of the Jahangir and Eleanor Amuzegar Post-Doctoral Fellowship in Iranian Studies at the Department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. He earned his PhD from the University of Exeter’s Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies\, specializing in 20th century Iranian history. His first book\, titled The Shah’s Imperial Celebrations of 1971: Nationalism\, Culture and Politics in Late Pahlavi Iran\, will be published in 2020\, and will be the first comprehensive study on the subject. \n \nTo RSVP\, please click here.
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/pourdavoud-center-lecture-series-robert-steele/
LOCATION:Royce 306
CATEGORIES:Iranian,NELC
END:VEVENT
BEGIN:VEVENT
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200128T180000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20200128T200000
DTSTAMP:20200125T003525Z
CREATED:20200125T003500Z
LAST-MODIFIED:20200125T003525Z
UID:14536-1580234400-1580241600@nelc.ucla.edu
SUMMARY:Armenian Personal Names
DESCRIPTION:1. Native and Iranian Layers\n2. Divine Twins in the Armenian Epic\nAll welcome \nPizza and refreshments will be served \nAll proceedings will be in Armenian \n  \nHrach Martirosyan is currently Lecturer in Eastern Armenian in the department of Near Eastern Languages and Cultures at UCLA. After receiving his MA in Philology from Vanadzor Pedagogical Institute\, he pursued graduate studies under the supervision of Prof. Sargis Harutyunyan at the Institute of Archaeology and Ethnography of the Armenian Academy of Sciences in Yerevan. His dissertation\n“Etymological Dictionary of the Armenian Inherited Lexicon” forthcoming from Brill (c. 1000 pp.) forms part of the larger project to compile an Indo-European Etymological Dictionary. Thereafter\, he moved to Leiden University as a Guest Lecturer in the field of Classical Armenian from an Indo-European perspective (2011-2015). Subsequently\, he held a postdoc at the Institute of Iranian Studies of the Austrian Academy of Sciences\, Vienna (2015- 2017)\, investigating Armenian personal names of Iranian origin under the supervision of Velizar Sadovski in the framework of an Iranian Prosopographical Dictionary. Most recently\, he returned to his position at the Leiden University Centre for Linguistics to continue etymological research on native Armenian vocabulary. \n  \nEvent Flyer\nRSVP Below:\n[gravityform id=”146″ title=”false” description=”false”]
URL:https://nelc.ucla.edu/event/armenian-personal-names/
LOCATION:365 Kaplan Hall
CATEGORIES:Armenian,NELC
END:VEVENT
END:VCALENDAR