Call for Papers
Date: June 30-July 1, 2025 
Venue: Old Divinity School, St John’s College, University of Cambridge, Cambridge, UK
Abstract Submission Deadline: January 5, 2024

The British Association for Islamic Studies (BRAIS) is delighted to announce that it will be hosting its 2025 Annual Conference at the University of Cambridge, in the historic surroundings of the Old Divinity School at St John’s College.

2025 will mark the tenth anniversary of BRAIS’s Annual Conference, with the first taking place at the University of Edinburgh back in 2014.

Organizers invite scholars from across the many sub-disciplines of Islamic Studies to share their latest research. They invite proposals for individual papers, as well as whole panels, from senior and early-career scholars from Professor to PhD level, as well as colleagues from beyond the academic world who have specialist expertise or unique insights to share. This includes colleagues based in centers of further education, museums and traditional centers of religious learning, among others.

​​Islamic Studies is broadly understood to include all topics and disciplinary approaches relating to the study of Islam and Muslim societies, across all time periods from the formative to the classical, and pre-modern to the contemporary.

BRAIS 2025 Suggested Themes

• Archives and Archival Studies
• Art, Architecture, Numismatics, Epigraphy and Material Culture
• Black Islam(s) and African Diaspora Studies
• Decolonizing the Curriculum, including New Periodization and (Inter)Disciplinary Approaches
• Digital Humanities in Islamic Studies
• Economy, Marketing and Finance
• Education and Pedagogy
• Environmental Humanities and Ecology
• Gender Studies
• Genocide Studies
• Hadith Studies
• History and Historiography
• Intellectual History and the History of Science
• Interreligious Relations and Comparative Studies
• Islam and Muslims in the Media: Print, Online and on Screen
• Islamic liberation theology and theologies of resistance
• Law
• Libraries and Book Cultures
• Literature and Cultural Studies including Postcolonial Studies
• Manuscript Studies and Codicology
• Music
• Muslims in Asia
• Muslims in Britain/Europe/North America and other minority contexts
• Philosophy, Theology and Ethics
• Qur’anic and Tafsir Studies
• Scholasticide and Epistemicide
• Sociology, Anthropology and Political Science
• Sufism and Mysticism

Please feel free to submit panel or paper proposals that are not represented in the above-mentioned themes.

Submitting Papers

For individual papers, a 200-word abstract of the paper should be submitted along with your details using the form via this link.

Submitting Panel Proposals

BRAIS particularly welcomes proposals for whole panels curated around certain themes or methodologies. Panels will ideally include four individual papers, but panels of three individual papers will also be considered. For panels, a 200-word outline of the theme of the panel, together with 200-word abstracts of each individual paper and the biography of each presenter should be submitted using the form available via this link.

The deadline for paper and panel submissions is Sunday 5 January 2025 at 11:59pm GMT. If you have any questions, please contact the Conference Committee on: brais.conference@ed.ac.uk

Founded in 2013, BRAIS is a learned society and professional organisation focused on enhancing research and teaching about Islam and Muslim cultures and societies in UK higher education. BRAIS’ Management Hub is currently based at the Alwaleed Centre for the Study of Islam in the Contemporary World at the University of Edinburgh.

More information on: The British Association for Islamic Studies

Date: April 3-4, 2025
Venue: University of Oxford, Oxford, UK
Abstract Submission Deadline: October 31, 2024
Convener: Dr. Christopher Cooper-Davies, Faculty of History, University of Oxford

The workshop explores Shi’ism and Muslim confessionalization from a global historical perspective, with a special focus on migrations and connections across borders and continents.
Its main objective is to flip the central dichotomy at the heart of work on global trends in Islam to date: rather than asking how Shi’i communities globally have been influenced and shaped by religious, political and intellectual developments occurring in the Shi’i heartlands of Iran and southern Iraq, it seeks to understand how processes of Shi’i sect-formation and modern trends in Shi’ism – intellectual, cultural, political and theological – have been shaped by the reality and perception of a global Shi’i public, stretching across the Middle East, Iran and South Asia, but also in Africa, Europe, North America and South America.

The early modern transnational connections which enabled the formation and coherence of the Shi’i world stretch from India, through Iran and on to southern Iraq, Lebanon and the Arabian Peninsula.
The scholars, merchants and pilgrims sustaining these connections were highly mobile, multi-lingual trans-national actors. But from at least the beginning of the twentieth century, these well-established trans-regional connections were complemented by new migratory pathways, across and between colonial empires and into the new worlds of North and South America.

Migration to Europe, the Americas and East and West Africa posed challenges and opportunities for Muslim migrants from the Middle East and South Asia, as they struggled to assert their Islamic identity in majority Christian societies. While intra-Islamic confessional identity was often tempered by the homogenizing experience of migration, it was not long before transnational Shi’i identities, institutions and networks crystallized, undergirding what might be called global Shi’ism today. The central concern of this workshop is to interrogate this transformation.

Organized under the umbrella of the ERC-funded Moving Stories project at the University of Oxford, the workshop will sit at the intersection of histories of movement, migration, religious-political thought and sect-formation. It will situate stories of diaspora, displacement and integration within the broader history of mid-twentieth century Shi’i revivalism and reform.

Modern trends in Shi’ism are conceived as processes of communal identity formation, mass conversion, politicisation and institutionalisation. Often denoted with the controversial epithets ‘sectarianism’ or ‘sectarianisation’, these interlinked phenomena provide a framework for differentiating Shi’i religious cultures of the pre-modern era from those emerging since the nineteenth century.
Yet while a rich literature exists on the tomes and journals which propagated modern Shi’i intellectual production, such work is generally siloed from the parallel historical phenomenon of mass migration in the global Middle East.

With these issues in mind, the workshop seeks to answer the following broad questions:

• What human, cultural and intellectual connections were sustained between the diverse localities to which Muslims migrated in the nineteenth and twentieth century and the Shi’i heartlands of Lebanon, Southern Iraq and Iran?
• What similarities and differences can we discern about the historical development of Shi’ism and intra-Islamic relations in each context?
• What methodological difficulties do we confront as historians trying to piece together the patchwork of global Shi’ism in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries?
• To what extent can we frame Shi’i modernist thought as a global discourse?
• How does this approach help us to understand processes of politicization and the development of Shi’i Islamist politics?
• Where does Shi’ism fit in within the emergent unruly discipline of global intellectual history?

Organizers welcome 400-word abstracts on the following broad topics:

• The history of Shi’i diasporas, communities and traditions in North America, South America, Europe, the Caribbean, Africa, Asia and beyond.
• Global approaches to the study of Shi’i intellectual and political thought.
• Micro-histories of mobile Shi’is in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
• Shi’ism and geopolitics before 1979.
• Shi’i institution building between the Middle East and the Mahjar.
• Comparative Approaches to Shi’i and non-Shi’i sect-formation and sectarianism in global perspectives.
• Methodological work on the challenges of writing a global history of Shi’ism in the mid-twentieth century.

The workshop will take place over two days on Thursday and Friday 3 and 4 April 2025 and will include 15-minute presentations from all the participants, followed by a 45-minute discussion.
Participants will be required to submit a c. 5,000–8,000-word paper by 28 February 2025 for circulation among the participants. The bulk of the session will be dedicated to discussion of the pre-circulated papers, which means all participants will have to attend having read all the papers. It is their ambition to collate these contributions into a special journal issue or edited volume.

The Organizers will be able to provide a contribution to travel costs to and from Oxford for the participants, as well as accommodation for two or three nights. Those participants with access to funding from their home institutions will be asked to contribute towards their travel costs in order to enable the participation of early career researchers.

If you would be interested in participating, please send a single PDF file containing a 400-word abstract and CV to movingstories@history.ox.ac.uk by 31 October 2024.

Please direct any questions to the workshop convener, Dr. Christopher Cooper-Davies, at christopher.cooper-davies@history.ox.ac.uk

More information on: University of Oxford

Call for Papers
Date: May 20-22, 2025 
Venue: Online and Aga Khan Centre, 10 Handyside Street, London N1C 4DN, United Kingdom
Organizer: The Institute of Ismaili Studies (IIS)
Abstract Submission Deadline: December 15, 2024

The conference aims to promote the study of devotion to the Prophet Muhammad and his family (often defined as the Ahl al-Bayt) as a key component of Islamic thought and practice, both in history and as the lived reality of millions of Muslims.

Rather than side-lining such devotions as ‘non-canonical’ or as the prerogative of sectarianized minorities, the goal is to accord them the centrality that they deserve as a pervasive and enduring component of Muslim piety.

Devotion to the Prophet and his family is expressed in an immense variety of Islamic traditions, only a minority of which have received sustained academic attention.

Accordingly, they aspire through this conference towards a more representative scholarly account of Prophet- and Ahl al-Bayt-centered devotion as a field of study, exploring material from historical periods, geographical regions and particular groups that have attracted less attention to date, as well as fostering engagement across disciplinary boundaries.

Shiʿi Islamic traditions, are, of course, a principal locus for devotion to the Prophet and his family, but are by no means the only one, and they welcome papers that focus upon non-Shiʿi traditions also. Furthermore, in pursuing a broader account of these devotions in different contexts, they hope to explore and affirm the integrity of ‘devotion’ to the Prophet and his family as an object of enquiry, in conversation both with contemporary academic theorizations and with the wealth of literature that Muslim authors have produced on the subject since Islam’s early centuries.

The organizers encourage submissions addressing any topic related to the conference’s overall theme of devotion to the Prophet and his family, with no a priori constraints regarding geographical region, historical period or discipline.

The following list, meanwhile, suggests some major themes that applicants may wish to consider:

Thematic and theoretical considerations

• Devotional rites as sites of inter-group encounter
• Relationships between private and public devotional practices
• Relationships between devotion and the (de)construction of identities
• Intersections between text, practice and/or material culture
• Theorizations of devotional ritual, both within Islamic traditions and in conversation with academic ritual theory

Media of devotion

• Devotional poetry
• Musical and artistic traditions of devotion
• Liturgical traditions
• Architectures of devotion
• Devotional narratives and representations of the past

Examples of underrepresented areas for study

• Shiʿi traditions other than Twelver Shiʿism
• The devotional discourses of socially marginalized groups
• Sunni Ahl al-Bayt-centred devotional traditions
• Devotions from the Islamic west, including West Africa

The proceedings of the conference will be published in an edited volume by the Institute of Ismaili Studies with I. B. Tauris, as part of the Shiʿi Heritage Series.

The language of the conference (and published papers) will be English.

Please send your abstract (max. 300 words), accompanied by a short biography (max. 200 words), as a single pdf file to gwarner@iis.ac.uk. The deadline for abstracts is 15^th December 2024. A decision regarding accepted papers will be made by mid-January 2025.

The conference will be held in-person at the Aga Khan Centre, London, and funds will be available for presenters’ travel expenses and accommodation. Online participation will be made possible for presenters who are unable to travel. Scholars at all career stages are encouraged to apply.

Source: The Institute of Ismaili Studies

Call For Papers
Date: December 06-08, 2024
Venue: Harvard University, Cambridge, MA
Abstract Submission Deadline: October 15, 2024

The American Society of Islamic Philosophy and Theology’s sixth annual conference will be held December 6- 8, 2024. It will be a hybrid conference, with some papers presented online via Zoom, and some in person on the Harvard campus. More details about the conference are forthcoming.

Submission Guidelines
They invite academic studies of scholars, methods, institutions, texts, and topics typically considered within the domain of philosophy, as well as those that treat kalam-theology, Islamic legal philosophy (usul al-fiqh), or other intellectual trends that at times may be seen as distinct from philosophy. Papers may be within specific disciplines (Philosophy, Islamic Theology, Religious Studies, etc.) or may be interdisciplinary. Active engagement with contemporary issues via the methods of various forms of Islamic philosophy is also welcomed and encouraged.

They are particularly interested in proposals that relate to this year’s conference theme: “Curricular Interventions from Within”. This year’s conference hopes to hear from teachers, professors and other creators of curriculum who teach from within the Islamic tradition and focus on education rooted in pre-modern curriculum while simultaneously engaged deeply with the contemporary world. Submissions can be normative, constructive, or descriptive provided that they are academically rigorous.

This conference is open-ended and invites applications from a wide variety of topical settings. Topics need not be limited to the conference theme.

They welcome co-authored abstracts involving scholars from different disciplines, panel proposals, as well as individual proposals. Each paper session will have 20 minutes to present followed by a Q/A session.

Please visit www.asipt.org for more information about their past conferences.

Abstract Deadline
Please submit an abstract (https://airtable.com/appAIQwpjsNvEWfXA/shrw3zP5kvtHhCYNn) of no more than 500 words excluding bibliography by October 15, 2024. If accepted for the conference, papers will receive first consideration for publication in the Journal of Islamic Philosophy, pending successful peer review. All participants must be registered for the conference to present their papers.

Contact Information
Please submit your paper proposals by the October 15, 2024 deadline to https://asipt.org/conferences/conference-paper/.

Questions should be sent to Conference Director, Dr. Aaron Spevack and Conference Organizer Michaela Spampinato at islamphil@gmail.com.

The conference is sponsored by the Journal of Islamic Philosophy, the American Society of Islamic Philosophy and Theology, Harvard’s Near Eastern Languages and Civilizations, and Brandeis’ Near Eastern and Judaic Studies. Generous funding for this conference has been provided by the Templeton Foundation.

Source: Middle East Studies Association

Call for Papers
Date: February 5, 2025
Venue: Online
Abstract Submission Deadline: October 15, 2024

The Qur’ān, the sacred scripture of Islam, profoundly impacts the culture, society and politics of the predominantly Muslim Turkic world. However, the interpretation and application of the Qur’ān varies depending on the historical, geographical and political context of each country. This online conference will analyze how the Qur’ān is understood and practiced in different communities of the Turkic world, and how it shapes their relationships with other regions and countries. This is an area of great potential regarding original research, at a time that the broader Turkic identity is strengthening, with chaos in neighboring regions.

Themes and Questions of the Research

This research seeks to elucidate the following topics:

• Transmission and Translation of the Qur’ānic Text among the Turkic World
  • Discuss the historical and linguistic aspects of the transmission and translation of the Qur’ān among Turkic countries, including tafsīr production.
  • Analyze the main challenges and opportunities of translating and interpreting the Qur’ān in different Turkic languages and dialects.
  • Compare and contrast the different styles, methods and approaches of translation and interpretation across the Turkic world.
• The Qur’ān’s Impact on the Development of Islamic Culture and Identity in the Turkic States
  • Examine the ways in which the Qur’ān has shaped the political, social and cultural identities and institutions of the Turkic world.
  • Explore how the Qur’ān has interacted with other sources of authority and legitimacy, such as tribal traditions, customary laws, cultures and languages of the Turkic world.
  • Assess how the Qur’ān has fostered diversity and pluralism, as well as unity and solidarity, within and across the Turkic world.
• The Qur’ānic Interpretive Methodology (Hermeneutics) and Frameworks in the Turkic World
  • Identify the main interpretive methodology and frameworks (classical, modern, Ḥanafī/Māturīdī/Ashʿarī/Salafi/Sūfī etc.) used to understand/interpret the Qur’ān in the Turkic world.
  • Discuss how different methodologies and frameworks have influenced various movements and trends of Islamic thought and practice among Turkic peoples.
  • Scrutinize the ways in which Turkic countries have generated legal judgements, ethical principles, theological doctrines, mystical perceptions, artistic expressions and political ideologies from the Qur’ān.
  • Compare and contrast the ways in which the Turkic world has adjusted and applied Qur’ānic teachings to particular historical and cultural backgrounds.
  • Consider the challenges and opportunities for renewed engagement with the Qur’ān in the Turkic world and how this can contribute to the development of Islamic thought and practice in the region.
  • Explore how the Qur’ān is approached in the face of modern issues such as migration, colonization, modernization, secularization, nationalism, globalization and democratization.

Prospective participants are requested to submit: (a) A short abstract (300-500 words) that outlines the aims, relevant literature, methodology and original contribution of the paper; and (b) A brief biography (max. 200 words) that includes the author’s academic background and research interests.

The selected papers will be published as an edited book after the conference via a reputable publisher. Based on the submitted papers, the edited book project might have two possible areas of focus: Modern period only, or Classical and modern periods.

Important Dates

• Abstract submission: 15 October 2024
• Notification of acceptance: 30 October 2024
• Announcement of final program: 15 November 2024
• For accepted proposals, extended abstract submission (1500 words) due: 15 January 2025

For further information and to submit proposals contact hcoruh@csu.edu.au.

More information on: Centre for Islamic Studies and Civilisation

Call for Papers
Date: April 3-4, 2025
Venue: University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA
Abstract Submission Deadline: October 1, 2024
Keynote Speaker: Dr. Zahra Ayubi (Dartmouth College)

In a world in which the humanities are increasingly marginalized, what is the importance of the study of Islamic philosophy? How might traditional texts speak to present crises and concerns? How do contemporary, new ventures within the field engage in the present moment? How does Islamic philosophy serve not only as an object of study, but also as a living tradition and repertoire of wisdom in our contemporary age? Furthermore, how do we, as scholars of the 21st century, wield the ways in which we have been shaped by our own circumstances to grant us insights into this medieval tradition, and how might we navigate the many prejudices that color our readings?

Recognizing and asserting the dynamism of Islamic philosophy, in both historical and lived forms, this conference seeks to explore its capacity to serve as a resource for thinking through and responding to modern concerns, to shape moral imagination, and to encourage innovative, embodied, or humanitarian scholarly methods. In so doing, it seeks to consider and cultivate the future directions of a rapidly diversifying field.

The conference is organized in conjunction with the “Islamic Philosophy in Conversation” working group, led by Dr. Nora Jacobsen Ben Hammed (UC Berkeley) and Dr. Elizabeth Sartell (Lewis University). While all paper submissions will be given equal consideration, the conference aligns itself with the goals of the working group. Therefore, submissions from a diverse group of applicants, especially emerging scholars of Islamic philosophy who identify as female, non-binary, or as belonging to a historically-marginalized group are encouraged.

The conference will include two traditional panels (15-20 minutes per presenter) as well as longer sessions workshopping the papers of two emerging scholars. Additionally, the audience will be engaged in a discussion of a primary text in translation, as well as a keynote lecture, both led by Dr. Zahra Ayubi.

The organizers plan to publish the proceedings of this conference as a special issue of a peer-reviewed journal. All participants should be open to submitting their papers as part of this issue. Participants should therefore present work that is in-progress rather than already published.

The conference will be held at the University of California, Berkeley on Thursday, April 3 and Friday, April 4, 2025.

The conference will fund round-trip economy travel for all presenters to Berkeley, CA. The conference will also provide lodging for graduate student and non-tenure track faculty presenters. Tenured and tenure-track faculty without access to institutional funding may request lodging as well; requests will be evaluated based on need and availability.

To apply, email your C.V. as well as a title and abstract of 500-750 words to FalsafaInConversation@gmail.com by October 1, 2024. Additionally, kindly indicate if you prefer to present on a traditional panel (15-20 minute presentation) or to workshop your paper. Participants will be notified of their acceptance in November 2024.

More information on: The PhilPapers Foundation