CIS News for September 2023
The Center for Islamic Studies extends greetings of peace and a warm welcome to all new and returning students, faculty, visiting scholars and staff for the academic year 2023-2024!
We are grateful for the creative and diverse contributions from the CIS community, and especially our generous donors, and we look forward to public programs and events this year that highlight the many wonderful achievements of our students, alums, faculty, visiting and research scholars, staff, and our academic and community partners.
Please join us for the monthly gathering of Islamic Studies @ GTU where we present and discuss the academic work of our students, alums and scholars. We will meet in person for our first gathering of this academic year on September 8th at 3pm at the GTU library, room to be confirmed. This will be a welcome celebration with refreshments. Please email to confirm your attendance, and as always, we welcome your ideas and suggestions: mjiwa@gtu.edu
Our deep gratitude to Nosizwe Breaux-Abdur-Rahman, GTU doctoral student and Newhall fellow, for her ongoing leadership and participation in the Race, Religion and Belonging working group at the Berkeley Center for the Study of Religion, and also for her service as the HCSR department rep to the GTU Student Advisory Committee.
Congratulations to Jibreel Delgado, GTU doctoral student and current CARe research scholar, for being selected as a 2023-2024 Hispanic Theological Initiative (HTI) scholar at Princeton Theological Seminary.
Congratulations to GTU PhD candidate, Paula Thompson, on receiving a Newhall Award. She will be teaching a course this fall 2023 titled, Religion, Surveillance, and Racialized Bodies.
CIS gratefully acknowledges Carol Bier, CIS/GTU Research Scholar, for her scholarship, public events and global partnerships advancing dialogue and understanding, including her three-week trip in Sept to Central Asia visiting familiar Islamic architectural monuments about which she has published, museums exhibiting crafts and technologies she has documented, and cultural performances of traditions she has studied for nearly half a century! Countries include, Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan, Uzbekistan, Tajikistan, and Turkmenistan.
Congratulations also for her preparing of a publication on textile technologies of the Silk Roads for a conference that was hosted by the UC-Berkeley Tang Center for Silk Road Studies, and for an exhibition at the San Diego Museum of Art scheduled to open in September 2024, serving on the scientific advisory council, and preparing an essay on the awe and wonder of geometry in Islamic arts and architecture. Congratulations Carol!
CIS gratefully acknowledges Dr. Ahmed Khater, CIS/GTU faculty, for offering a series of public engagement classes and lectures at UC Berkeley and at Berkeley Law School in spring 2023, cosponsored by the CIS, which will continue throughout this academic year. Please visit the CIS events webpage for more information.
Congratulations to Dr. Mahjabeen Dhala, Assistant Prof of Islamic Studies and Director of the Madrasa-Midrasha Program for her participation in the upcoming Symposium on Women’s Spiritual Leadership: Transforming Lives, Embodying Wisdom on Sept 9th 2023. This will be a virtual conference hosted by Sustainability 360 at the GTU. Her presentation is titled, “Ecofeminist Readings of the Qur’an: Muslim Women Leading Change.”