CFP: The fourth 'New Frontiers in Islamic Studies'

CFP: The fourth 'New Frontiers in Islamic Studies'                                 German-Israeli Summer School - Berlin 09/14

Freie Universität Berlin (Research Unit Intellectual History of the Islamicate World) and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (The Institute of Asian and African Studies, The Nehemia Levtzion Center for Islamic Studies)

15.09.2014-19.09.2014, Berlin, Freie Universität Berlin
Deadline: 01.04.2014

Freie Universität Berlin (Research Unit Intellectual History of the Islamicate World) and The Hebrew University of Jerusalem (The Institute of Asian and African Studies, The Nehemia Levtzion Center for Islamic Studies) solicit applications for:

The fourth NEW FRONTIERS IN ISLAMIC STUDIES German-Israeli Summer School, funded by the Einstein-Stiftung, Berlin

The transmission of ideas between religious communities in the medieval world of Islam, 15-19 September 2014 at Freie Universität Berlin

Jews, Christians, and Muslims, the educated elite as well as uneducated masses, had Arabic (and at times Persian) as their common language and therefore naturally shared a similar cultural background. Often reading the same books and all speaking and writing in the same language, they created a unique intellectual commonality in which an ongoing, constant exchange of ideas, texts, and forms of discourse beyond communal barriers was the norm. This characteristic of the medieval world of Islam - which created what has aptly been described as a "whirlpool effect" or a "crosspollination" - requires that the study of the intellectual tradition of any of the three monotheistic religions disregard religious borders and that the one-dimensional perspective that still prevails in modern research be replaced by true multi-dimensionalism. The same applies for the so-called "Eastern Question", i.e., the Muslims' interaction with the intellectual traditions of the East, i.e., Iranian, Indian, Central Asian and perhaps even further East, and the people who transmitted and developed them. The purpose of the School will be to familiarize the student participants with an integrative approach to the historiography of intellectual developments in the medieval, post-medieval and early modern period. Such a methodology requires first of all that the various intellectual histories be read together in order to analyze the ways in which their thought was formed and fashioned. Only such an integrative
approach can allow us to fully grasp the various multidimensional flows of ideas and their respective transformation. In addition to the philosophical/theological analysis of the material in question, the
social aspects of the transmission of writings particularly beyond communal barriers shed an important light on the ways in which these processes of transmission took place. Through a number of exemplary
topics, this methodological approach will be presented to theparticipants.

Convenors: Prof. Sabine Schmidtke (Freie Universität Berlin), Prof.Reuven Amitai (The Hebrew University of Jerusalem) 
Cordinator: Ronny Vollandt

For further information and application please see http://www.ihiw.de/w/e/summerschool/ or contact Ronny Vollandt (ronny.vollandt@fu-berlin.de)

Applications, which should include CV, brief statement on current research project, and letter of motivation, will be accepted until 1 April 2014.

Quelle: http://hsozkult.geschichte.hu-berlin.de/termine/id=23647