News of the Association

 

Report from Tajik Regional Offices

In July/August 2008, Board Member Dr. Jo-Ann Gross traveled to Tajikistan where she met with the directors of ASPS branches in Dushanbe and Khorogh. In Dushanbe, Dr. Gross met with Lola Dodkhudoeva, director of the local ASPS branch, which is located in the Institute of Oriental Studies and Written Heritage. Among the planned activities of the Dushanbe branch is a roundtable scheduled for November 2008 with the President of the Academy of Sciences on the status of Iranian Studies in Tajikistan and the launching of new publication featuring research on Iranian history and culture in Tajikistan. The Dushanbe branch has also organized a panel for the upcoming ASPS conference in Lahore.
Dr. Gross also met with the director of the new ASPS branch in Khorog, Umed Mamadsherezodshoev. The Khorog office is now organizing activities for fall 2008 and spring 2009, and plans to focus the first of its seminars on the historiography of Badakhshan. Dr. Mamadsherzodshoev also is planning to publish a bi-annual majalah in Tajik and Persian on Badakhshan studies, with the assistance of Sabohat Donayorova, co-director of the Khorog office. Dr. Mamadsherzodshoev will participate in a panel on Badakhshan organized for the ASPS Lahore conference.

ASPS at MESA 2008

Thematic Conversation: Civil Society and Constitutionalism in Iran and Egypt
The ASPS is sponsoring a thematic conversation at the 42nd annual meeting of the Middle East Studies Association to be held in Washington DC, November 22-25, 2008. The panel is titled "Constitutionalism and the Rule of Law in Egypt and Iran," and it will feature Atef Said (University of Michigan), Mehrangiz Kar (Harvard University), Mehrzad Boroujerdi (Syracuse University), Samer Shehata (Georgetown University) as participants, and Farideh Farhi (University of Hawaii at Manoa) as conversation leader.

ASPS Business Meeting and Reception
All ASPS members shall be encouraged to attend the ASPS Business Meeting at MESA as well as the Reception afterwards. The ASPS Business Meeting will be held Saturday, November 22, 2:00-3:00 PM, in Jefferson. The ASPS reception will be held from 8:00-10:00 PM in the Marriott Wardman Park Hotel.
The following ASPS meetings will be closed to the public:

Board Meeting, Saturday, Nov 22, 3:00-4:00PM, Jackson.
JPS editorial board meeting, Saturday, Nov 22, 5:00-6:30PM, Jackson.
Lahore Conference Organizing Committee Meeting: Sunday, Nov 23, 9:00-11:30AM, Tyler.

New Student Member on ASPS Board

ASPS members voted a new student member to the ASPS board of directors in March 2008. Roja Fazaeli received the largest amount of votes. Roja Fazaeli, having recently completed her PhD, is now a lecturer in Islamic Studies at Trinity College Dublin. She received her PhD from the Irish Centre for Human Rights, National University of Ireland, Galway in 2008. Her thesis was a study of women's rights in Iran, comparing and critiquing international human rights law and Islamic law. Roja was the recipient of the Government of Ireland scholarship for Humanities and Social Sciences. She has been a visiting scholar to the Feminist Legal Theory Project at the Emory School of Law, Atlanta, GA, and the Institute for the Study of Women and Gender (IRWaG) at Columbia University, New York. In 2006, Roja served as the human rights trainer for Amnesty International, Irish Section. She has also worked as a consultant to Frontline (Defenders of Human Rights Defenders) and several NGOs in Iran. Roja was the chair of the South-West Asia Millennium Devel-opment Goals Youth Leadership Initiative with the United Nations and is a member of the executive committee of UNIFEM Ireland. She is also one of the co-founders and was the vice-president of the Iranian Society of Ireland.


Report from the President, Spring 2008

At the meeting of the ASPS Board of Directors on No-vember 17, 2007 in Montreal, I had the pleasure of welcoming five new members to the Board-the largest influx in one year: Shahzad Bashir, Houchang Chehabi (Travel Fellowship Program, Ex Officio), Mirjam Ku�Nnkler, Parvaneh Pourshariati and Sunil Sharma.

The most important decision taken at the meeting was to hold our next biennial convention in Lahore at the end of February 2009. Shahzad Bashir will be in charge of the organization of the Lahore Convention. Mirjam Ku�Nnkler agreed to take over the Editorship of the Newsletter from Rosemary Stanfield-Johnson. Parvaneh Pourshariati will chair the Organization and Programs Committee.

The Editorial Board of the Journal of Persianate Studies held its first meeting in Montreal on November 18, 2007. Two representatives from our new publisher, Brill, joined the meeting, and we had a useful discussion of the editorial policy as well as some technical issues. The Soudavar Memorial Foundation has graciously renewed its grant to support the publication of the journal, and the inaugural issue is in press and scheduled to appear at the end of June 2008. As you know, the JPS replaces our annual publication, Studies on Persianate Societies, the last (3rd) volume of which appeared last fall.

A generous grant from Mr. Simon Adamiyatt of Bear, Stearns & Co. has enabled us to launch the joint publication of a monograph series of previously unpublished primary texts, jointly with the Miras-e Maktub Institute in Tehran, under the series title: Sources on Persianate Civilization. The books will be made available to the members of ASPS and affiliated associations such as MESA at a discount price, and distributed to libraries in the region through our Regional Offices. ASPS Secretary-Treasurer Habib Borjian signed the contract on behalf of the ASPS in Tehran. The first issue will be a history of Herat written during the Saljuq period and edited by Iraj Afshar.

ASPS jointly sponsored a symposium with the Stony Brook Institute of Global Studies on November 15, 2007, 2:00-6:30PM at Stony Brook-Manhattan. It was chaired by Houchang Chehabi, Boston University, and included the following papers:
�gThe Challenge of the Rule of Law in Iran,�hArdechir Amir-Arjomand, UNESCO Chair of Human Rights, Shahid Beheshti University, Tehran "Survival through Dispossession: Privatizations of Public Goods in the Islamic Republic," Kaveh Ehsani, Goft-o-gu Editor, Tehran, and the University of Illinois, Chicago �gIn the Name of Maslaha: The de facto Seculariza-tion of Legislation in the Islamic Republic," Mirjam Ku�Nnkler, Princeton University �gThe Dilemma of Democratization without Social Mobilization: the Missing link between Social Re-sistance and Political Activism in Iran," Ali Rezaei, Calgary University. Archechir Amir-Arjomand unfortunately could not attend because of visa difficulties, but sent his paper which I read in translation.

The first of the two Thematic Conversation sessions, �gBuilding Linkages between Civil Society and Constitutionalism in Iran,�h organized by Mirjam Ku�Nnkler and chaired by Mehrzad Boroujerdi, took place at the MESA Convention on Monday, November 19, 2007, and was a great success. The Thematic Conversation will be continued at the 2008 MESA Convention, this time comparing constitutionalism and the rule of law in Iran and Egypt. Participants of the thematic conversation will be Mehrzad Boroujerdi, Farideh Farhi, Mehrangiz Kar, Atef Said, and Samer Shehata.

Unlike last year, ASPS did not sponsor any regular sessions at the MESA 2007 Convention. This is a pity because the ASPS-sponsored sessions were very successful in the past, and we would like to continue them in order to maintain the ASPS presence at MESA. Parvaneh Pourshariati has kindly agreed to chair the Organization and Programs Committee. Please send her proposals for sessions at MESA, ISIS and other professional conventions.

Said Arjomand,
Stony Brook