Advisory: The United States, the Middle East and Islam

EDITORS: For more information on this event, contact the U-M Department of Near Eastern Studies at (734) 764-0314.

ANN ARBOR—On Tuesday (Sept. 25), the University of Michigan Department of Near Eastern Studies with the support of the U-M College of Literature, Science, and the Arts (LSA) and the Center for Middle East and North African Studies is convening a symposium/teach-in: “The United States, The Middle East and Islam: Reflections on the Current Crisis.” The session will begin at 7 p.m. in the Lydia Mendelssohn Theater of the Michigan League. A discussion will follow the presentation, which is free and open to the public.

Opening remarks will be given by LSA Dean Shirley Neuman. Carol Bardenstein, Near Eastern Studies, will moderate. Topics and U-M faculty participants include:

“The Politics of American Communities: Placing and Policing the Boundaries of National Unity,” Andrew Shryock, anthropology;

“Perceptions and Attitudes in the Arab World: Some Observations,” Mark Tessler, political science;

“Religion-based Violence,” Sherman Jackson, Near Eastern studies;

“Pakistan, the Taliban, and Anti-Americanism,” Najeeb Jan, history (a U-M graduate student who is just back from field-work in Pakistan on Taliban-affiliated religious schools);

“Rubble for Rubble, and Back to the Stone Age,” Anton Shammas, Near Eastern studies and comparative literature;

“Al-Qa’idah: The History of a Transnational Network,” Juan Cole, history.

In addition, Nabeel Abraham, anthropology/Arab-American studies, Henry Ford Community College, Dearborn, will discuss “Arab-Americans in Crises: Then and Now.”