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Call for Papers

Annual JUSUR Graduate Student Conference at the University of California, Los Angeles

Limits of the Frontier: Peripheralization, Boundaries and Liminality in the Middle East and the Islamic world

April 7-8, 2004
Deadline for submission of abstracts: Tuesday, January 20, 2004

JUSUR and the Gustav E. von Grunebaum Center for Near Eastern Studies at the
University of California, Los Angeles, are pleased to invite papers for a
graduate conference on temporal, spatial and thematic conceptions of
frontiers and peripheries in the Middle East, throughout Islamicate
societies and beyond, to be held on the UCLA campus.

We hope the conference will provide a stimulating venue for graduate
students across the field to meet and present their work and to discuss
broad-ranging issues of boundaries and peripheralization in society,
history and religion.  Papers might fall within, but are not limited to,
the following kinds of topics:

  • Geographical exploration, pilgrimage roads, internal and international
    migration
  • Liminality in class, ethnicity, and society 
  • Peripheralization through historical periodization
  • Theories and notions of "boundaries," "frontiers" and "peripheries"
  • Political, economic and cultural centers and peripheries
  • Intellectual and cultural transmission and the reinforcement or
    disassembling of regional identities

We encourage work from a variety of disciplines and approaches, especially
literary and cultural studies, and work that bridges history, ethnic
studies and area studies. Presentations will be limited to 20 minutes, with
time set aside for discussion. Limited funding is available to reimburse
select travel and accommodation expenses for participants delivering
papers.

Please submit a one-page abstract for a 20-minute presentation (7-8 pages),
along with your current curriculum vitae, no later than January 20, 2004,
either electronically to  jusur@ucla.edu, or in hard copy to the following
address:

Hassan Hussain
JUSUR Conference Planning Committee
Gustav E. von Grunebaum Center for Near Eastern Studies
10286 Bunche Hall, UCLA
Los Angeles, CA 90095-1480

Published: Thursday, February 26, 2004

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