NEW YORK

Radical Increments: Toward New Platforms of Engaging Iraqi Studies

As the rift between theory and application in the field of Iraqi studies has grown over the past three decades for political, social, economic and security reasons, the Conference seeks to create an informed space to address major intellectual and political issues pertinent to Iraq in a manner that bears practical utility. To that end, the Conference will bring together a number of scholars and researchers in the field of Iraqi studies as well as Iraqi policy makers, journalists and novelists, with the hope that this platform will help modify, extend, or reposition existing frameworks of knowledge to allow for new possibilities of application and action.
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April 24-25, 2015
Butler Library, Room 203

You MUST REGISTER by emailing Joscelyn Shawn Ganjhara Jurich (jsj10@columbia.edu)

Sponsored by the Middle East Institute, the Middle East, South Asian and African Studies Department (MESAAS), Butler Library, and al-Shaybani Foundation.

Conference Co-Organizers:
Muhsin al-Musawi, Columbia University
Yasmeen Hanoosh, Portland State
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Schedule

FRIDAY, APRIL 24
Location: Butler Library – Room 203

8:30-9:00am
Refreshments and Registration

9:15-9:30
Introduction: Dr. Muhsin al-Musawi, Columbia University
Opening Remarks: Dr. Lila Abu-Lughod, Joseph L. Buttenweiser Professor of Social Science, Director of the Middle East Institute, Columbia University

9:30-10:00
Opening Presentation: Dr. Mohamed Ali Alhakim, Iraq Permanent Representative and Ambassador to the United Nations

10:00-10:30
Keynote Address: Dr. Eric Davis, Rutgers University

10:30-12:00pm
Session I: Institutions, Infrastructure, Space
Chair: Yasmeen Hanoosh, Portland State University
Abeer Shaheen, Columbia University, “God’s Eye View into Transparent Baghdad.”
Claudia Lefko, Iraqi Children’s Art Exchange, “Baghdad Resolve: An International Collaboration to Improve Cancer Care in Iraq.”
Bridget Guarasci, Oberlin College, “Virtual Realities: The Wartime Labor of Eden in Iraq’s Marshes.”
Emily Stetler, Mount St. Mary’s University, “Education for a New National Identity: Sketching an Iraqi Critical Pedagogy.”
Yaseen Raad, American University of Beirut, “Consolidating Socio-Spatial Practices in a Militarized Public Space: The Case of Abu Nuwas Street in Baghdad.”

12:00-1:30pm
Lunch

1:30-3:00pm
Session II: Secularism, Religion, Politics
Chair: Mohammad Salama, San Francisco State University
Dr. Jabbar al-Obaidi, Bridgewater State University,
“Iraqi Media Post 2003: An Analytical, Historical, and Political Overview.”
Henrik Andersen, independent researcher, “The Politics of Corruption and Organized Crime in Contemporary Iraq.”
Dena al-Adeeb, New York University, “Architecture of Trauma: Embodied Practices and Resistance.”

3:00-4:00
Coffee Break

4:00-5:30
Session III: Iraq in Literature
Chair: Muhsin al-Musawi, Columbia University
Moneera al-Ghadeer, Columbia University, “Cannibalizing Iraq.”
Daniel Wolk, University of Chicago, “Confronting Corruption in the Iraqi City from Afar: Ṣakhī’s Khalfa al Saddah/Durūb al-fiqdān and al-Dāhūdī’s Dhākirat madinah munqariḍah.”
Ikram Masmoudi, University of Delaware, “Desertion: Then and Now.”
Mohammad Salama, San Francisco State University, “A Mimesis of the Future: The Dialectic of Writing and Forgetting in Luay Ḥamza ‘Abbās.”

SATURDAY, APRIL 25
Location: Butler Library, Room 203

8:30-9:00am:
Refreshments and Breakfast

9:00-10:30am
Session IV: Diasporic Continuities
Chair: Dr. Jabbbar al-Obaidi
Deborah al-Najjar, University of Southern California, “Iraq and the Consolidation of Grief.”
Sobia Khan, Richland College, “Enacting Disaster: The Iraqi Nights, a Site of Conflict and Crisis.”
Reemah al-Urfali, American University in Cairo “Translating Iraqi Women’s Literature: Between Gender and Genre.”

10:30am-12:00pm
Session V: Writing in Post-Occupation Iraq: Session in Arabic with translation
Chair: Ikram Masmoudi, University of Delaware
Dr. Taher al-Bakka, former Minister of Higher Education in Iraq, 2005-2008
Dr. Jabbar al-Obaidi, Bridgewater State University
Samuel Shimon, Banipal Literary Magazine, UK
Shakir Noori, Iraqi Journalist and Novelist

12:00-12:30
Closing Remarks: Professor Muhsin al-Musawi