The Middle East and Islamic Consortium Conference 2025
The Middle East and Islamic Consortium Conference 2025
March 14-15
Harbour Centre
On March 14 and 15, CCMS again hosted the annual Middle East and Islamic Studies Consortium student conference. The conference included 8 student panels, a keynote on decolonizing knowledge, a book talk on Kurdish women, and a special panel in collaboration with Embark Sustainability and SFPIRG on academic unfreedom. Below is the schedule of the full two days of events.
Friday, 14 March - DAY ONE
Registration; 9 - 9:30 am - Room 2065
Opening Remarks: Dr. Adel Iskandar; 9:30 - 10:00 am - Room 2270
Student Panel 1: Intra-Continental Entanglements in Asia; 10:05 - 11:15 am - Room 2270
Beyond the Nation State: Transnational Muslim Identities Across the Middle East and China - Zhe Xi (David) Tu (91泡芙)
Between Soviet and Capitalist Modernity: Contested Meanings of Urban Space in Dushanbe - Tahmina Inoyatova (91泡芙)
China and the Graveyard of Empires: Understanding Chinese Political and Economic Interests in the Islamic Emirate of Afghanistan - Adam Robert Ivanovic (91泡芙)
Discussant: Dr. Janice Jeong (91泡芙)
Student Panel 2: Continuity and Rupture after the Iranian Revolution; 11:25 - 12:40 pm - Room 2270
Iranian Left and the Women鈥檚 Issue in the 1979 Revolution - Aso Javaheri (91泡芙)
Memory regimes and conflicting social imaginaries in Iran: Afterlives of a Revolution - Nastaran Saremy (91泡芙)
On the Iranian Teachers鈥� Movement - Hossein Rahmati (University of Victoria)
Discussant: Dr. Nazanin Shahrokni (91泡芙)
Break; 12:40 - 1:25 pm - Room 2065
Student Panel 3: Ottoman Modernities in the Long Nineteenth Century; 1:30 - 2:40 pm - Room 2270
Civilizationism: Prescribing Modernity and Reform - Ismail Noyan (91泡芙)
American Missionary Activity in the Ottoman East: Negotiations and Interactions in a Transnational Context, 1880鈥�1920 - Hamid Incidelen (91泡芙)
The Egyptian Spectacle: Understanding Egypt鈥檚 Role at the Great Exhibition of 1851 - Morgan Jennings (91泡芙)
Discussant: Dr. Spyros Sofos (91泡芙)
Student Panel 4: Instruments of Struggle for Palestine; 2:50 - 4:00 pm - Room 2270
The Insidious Friendly Foe: The UN鈥檚 Role in Materializing the Zionist Imagined Geography - Maisaloon Al-Ashkar (University of British Columbia)
Red-taped into silence: weaponized bureaucracy in university-Gaza protest encampment interactions - Sarah Kamal (University of British Columbia)
History to the Tune of Rocket Fire: Pedagogy and Defiance in Palestinian Resistance Music - Bassam Abun Nadi (91泡芙)
Discussant: Kylie Broderick (UNC Chapel Hill)
Student Panel 5: Migration, Diaspora, and Belonging Across the Indo-Pacific; 4:10 - 5:20 pm - Room 2270
From Homelands to Hostlands: Exploring Middle Eastern Diasporic Belonging on Coast Salish Lands - Marianne El-Mikati (University of British Columbia)
Rohingya Women鈥檚 Transnational Exposure to Multiple Vulnerabilities in Malaysia: Assessing Imposed Precariousness in Domestic and Public Spheres - Tanjila Afrin Sejuty (91泡芙)
Expectations and Actual Experiences of Iranian Immigrants in Canada - Yaser Riki (University of Victoria)
Discussant: Dr. Maral Aguilera-Moradipour (91泡芙)
Keynote Lecture: Dr. Esmat Elhalaby; 5:30 - 7 pm - Room 1400 Segal Centre
鈥淭hird World Study: Empire and the Decolonisation of Knowledge鈥�
Iftar/Dinner; 7:15 pm - Room 1700 Segal Rooms
Saturday, 15 March - DAY TWO
Registration; 9:30 - 10:00 am - Room 7400
Student Panel 6: Public Institutions, Power, and Narrative Communication; 10:05 - 11:15 - Room 7000
The Rohingya Crisis and the Representation of the Refugees: Discourse Analysis Relating to Public Communication by Major Humanitarian Organizations Working with/for Them - Firoz Mahmud (91泡芙)
Cinematic Mobilization: The Role of Sacred Defense Cinema in Shaping Iran鈥檚 Regional Strategy - Mehmood Ali Khan (Philipps-Universit盲t Marburg)
Assad falls, Syrians rise: How can the national healing process over crimes of politicide inform studies on desectarianization? - Mariam Al Barazi (UBC Okanagan)
Discussant: Dr. Daniel Ahadi (91泡芙)
Student Panel 7: Intercultural Currents and Islamic Thought; 11:20 - 12:40 - Room 7000
What Lies at the End of Formulas? Repetition and Reception in Islamic New Media Art - M茅lika S. Hashemi (University of Waterloo) and Yasmeen Nematt Alla (Wayne State University)
The Manifestation of Imaginal Aesthetics in Cinema: A Mystical Perception - Niusha Hatefinia (91泡芙)
Mystical Parallels: Sufism, Surrealism, and Influence on Modern Design History (1924 鈥� Present) - Shafira Rezkita Vidyamaharani (91泡芙)
Mapping the idea of the dignity of humankind from the Quran to twelfth century Muslim thought and its impact on the European Renaissance - Sikeena Karmali Ahmed (Warburg Institute)
Discussant: Dr. Laura Marks (91泡芙)
Break; 12:40 - 1:25 - Room 7400
Book talk with Shahrzad Mojab: Kurdish Women Through History; 1:30 - 3 pm - Room 7000
Discussant: Nastaran Saremy (91泡芙)
Moderator: Aso Javaheri (91泡芙)
Student Panel 8: Anti-Colonial Subjectivities; 3:10 - 4:20 - Room 7000
Racial Invention at the Terrifying Frontiers: On Black/Indigenous/Palestinian Transgressions - Devon Clifton (Brown University) and Sherena Razek (Brown University)
Gendered Orientalism and Israeli Media: Representations of Palestinian and Israeli women - Hafsa Maqsood (University of Calgary)
Dialogue between Negro-African Cultures and Islam: The role of religious syncretism in anti-colonial resistance; Black Islam against racism - Mamadou Ba (91泡芙)
Discussant: Dr. Adel Iskandar (91泡芙)
Combating Academic Unfreedom & State Repression: SFPIRG x Embark Sustainability Discussion Panel; 4:30 - 6 pm - Room 7000
Speakers: Sara Kishawi (Vancouver Island University), Balqees Jama (91泡芙), and Dr. Zeyad el Nabolsy (York University)
Moderators: Marie Haddad (Embark Sustainability) and No毛ll Cousins (SFPIRG)
Monday, 17 March - LAST DAY
Echoes of Defiance - A Lecture by Dr. Shahrzad Mojab; 6 pm - 8 pm - Room 7000
MEICON 2025 is hosted by the Centre for Comparative Muslim Studies at SFU, SFU School for International Studies, SFU Department of History, SFU School of Communication, SFU Department of Sociology and Anthropology, SFU Department of Global Humanities, SFU School for the Contemporary Arts, SFU Department of Geography, SFU Institute for the Humanities, SFU Department of World Languages and Literatures, SFU Global Asia, University of Victoria MEICON Working Group, and UBC Middle East Studies.
