Dr. Kamran Asdar Ali, Co-Editor-in-Chief of Critical Pakistan Studies, was recently featured in a video where he presented his aspirations for Critical Pakistan Studies to be a high-standard, first-rate, and top-tier interdisciplinary source of information on Pakistan. Critical Pakistan Studies is a new open-access journal published with the support of Cambridge University Press that tackles broader interdisciplinary issues in addition to Pakistan and Pakistanis.
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Pre-2018 Conferences & Workshops
Pakistan After 9/11: The Turnaround
Wolfson College
Cambridge University, England
April 21 - 22, 2005
Wolfson College at Cambridge University will host a conference on Pakistan in collaboration with Allama Iqbal Fellowship and the Institute of Strategic Studies in Islamabad.
Sessions include:
Redefining National Security
Major Strands of Foreign Policy
Evolution of Pakistan State and Society: Political and Economic Issues
Evolution of Pakistan State and Society: Education, Media, and Women's Issues
Between State Ideology and Popular Culture: Urdu Literature and Urdu Media in Contemporary Pakistan
South Asia Institute
University of Heidelberg, Germany
Organized and held July 20-22, 2006 by The Department of Modern South Asian Studies (Languages and Literatures), South Asia Institute, University of Heidelberg
You can view or download a one-page summary, a full program, and a list of participants.
Femininities and Masculinities in Indian Politics
Centre for South Asian Studies
University of Edinburgh, Scotland
March 15-16, 2008
View a flyer for this conference.
The 22nd Pakistan Workshop: 'Spaces of Dialogue'
Department of Anthropology
Durham University, England
Held May 9-11, 2008, Rook How Meeting House, Lake District, Cumbria, England
Workshop on Pakistani Migration and Transnationalism
International Peace Research Institute
Oslo, Norway
January 14-15, 2010
The workshop gathered scholars who have worked specifically on issues relating to migration from Pakistan.
Veiled Constellations: The Veil, Critical Theory, Politics, and Contemporary Society
York University
Toronto, Ontario
June 3-5, 2010
Co-Sponsored by:
Department of Political Science (graduate program)
Centre for Human Rights
Department of Sociology (graduate program)
Department of Communication and Culture (graduate program)
Graduate Students Association
York University
Assessing the Complexities of South Asian Migration
Wilfrid Laurier University
Waterloo, Ontario
May 19-21, 2011
The conference posits that examining South Asian migration necessitates interdisciplinary and international collaborative approaches to both conceptualization and field studies.
AIPS-HEC History Dissertation Writing Workshop
May 11-13, 2009
The AIPS in collaboration with HEC organized a 3 days dissertation writing workshop for Pakistani History students. Dr David Gilmartin (Professor History, Nort Carolina State University) and Dr Robert Nichols (Associate Professor, History, Stockton College, New Jersey) conducted the 3-day academic workshop. With the support of Higher Education Commission, Islamabad, twelve PhD-History students from Pakistani universities were invited to AIPS Islamabad to participate in the workshop.
You can view a call for papers, a report by AIPS Treasurer Anita Weiss, and a list of participants.
Anthropology and Sociology Dissertation Workshop
17-19 May, 2010
The American Institute of Pakistan Studies (AIPS) in collaboration with the HEC is pleased to invite proposals for a dissertation workshop for doctoral students in anthropology and sociology in Pakistan. The AIPS, established in 1973, is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization whose mission is to encourage and support research on issues relevant to Pakistan and the promotion of scholarly exchange between the United States and Pakistan. AIPS aims to facilitate scholarship within academe in Pakistan in various disciplines through the holding of dissertation workshops. This dissertation workshop is for doctoral students in anthropology and sociology at Pakistan-based universities, and will be run by the eminent anthropologist Dr. Kamran Ali, University of Texas-Austin, with the participation of Dr. Humeira Iqtidar, South Asia Center Fellow, Cambridge and faculty member at LUMS.
AIPS-HEC Dissertation Writing Workshop (Gender Studies)
1-3 November, 2010
The AIPS-Islamabad center hosted the 3rd dissertation writing workshop on Gender Studies in collaboration with Higher Education Commission, Pakistan from November 1 - 3, 2010. Twelve doctoral students from various Pakistani universities were selected to attend the workshop. Dr Anita Weiss (Professor, International Studies Program, University of Oregon) and Dr Saba Gul Khattaq (Member, Planning Commission of Pakistan) conducted the three day interactive workshop on gender studies. Students had a productive time at the workshop and most of them were able to reform their proposals and improve their research questioning ability.
The inaugural dinner of the workshop was held at the Lok Virsa café, Islamabad on October. Dinner. Relevant faculty members, deans, chairs and US, Pakistan government officials attended the reception dinner and interacted with the selected students of the workshop.
AIPS-HEC Dissertation Writing Workshop (Politics, IR, Govt. Studies)
5-8 December, 2010
The AIPS-Islamabad center in collaboration with Higher Education Commission, Islamabad organized the 4th dissertation writing workshop for doctoral and M.Phil scholars of Politics, IR and Government Studies in Islamabad from December 5 – 8, 2010. Dr Christopher Candland (Professor of Politics, Wellesley College, USA) and Dr Rifaat Hussian (Chair, Department of Strategic Studies, Quaid i Azam University, Islamabad) conducted the three day interactive workshop. Students had a productive time at the workshop and each of the participant will submit an improved version of their research proposal to both the workshop leaders for review and records.
History Dissertation Workshop
16-18 May, 2011
The American Institute of Pakistan Studies (AIPS) in collaboration with the HEC is pleased to invite proposals for a dissertation workshop for doctoral and M. Phil. students in history in Pakistan. The AIPS, established in 1973, is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization whose mission is to encourage and support research on issues relevant to Pakistan and the promotion of scholarly exchange between the United States and Pakistan. AIPS aims to facilitate scholarship within academe in Pakistan in various disciplines through the holding of dissertation workshops. This dissertation workshop is for doctoral students in history whose research is focused on the history of South Asia. It will be run by the eminent historian, Dr. Yasmin Saikia, who holds the endowed Hardt-Nickachos Chair in Peace Studies at Arizona State University, with the participation of Pakistani historian Dr. Tanvir Anjum, Quaid-e-Azam University.
History Dissertation Workshop
19-21 December, 2011
The American Institute of Pakistan Studies (AIPS) in collaboration with the HEC is pleased to invite proposals for a dissertation workshop for doctoral and M. Phil. students in history in Pakistan. The AIPS, established in 1973, is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization whose mission is to encourage and support research on issues relevant to Pakistan and the promotion of scholarly exchange between the United States and Pakistan. AIPS aims to facilitate scholarship within academe in Pakistan in various disciplines through the holding of dissertation workshops. This dissertation workshop is for doctoral students in history whose research is focused on the history of South Asia. It will be run by the eminent historian, Dr. Yasmin Saikia, who holds the endowed Hardt-Nickachos Chair in Peace Studies at Arizona State University, with the participation of Pakistani historian Dr. Tanvir Anjum, Quaid-e-Azam University.
AIPS—HEC Dissertation Workshop on History, Political Science & Education
Islamabad, September 19-21, 2012
The overarching theme of the workshop was “Debating/Educating Pakistan: Alternative Conceptions.”
The AIPS, established in 1973, is a non-profit, non-partisan educational organization whose mission is to encourage and support research on issues relevant to Pakistan and the promotion of scholarly exchange between the United States and Pakistan. AIPS aims to facilitate scholarship within academe in Pakistan in various disciplines through the holding of dissertation workshops. This dissertation workshop was for doctoral students in history, political science and education whose research is focused in part on education in Pakistan. It was led by the eminent scholar, Dr. Matthew Nelson, Reader in Politics in the Department of Politics and International Studies, School of Oriental and African Studies, University of London, with the participation of Pakistani scholar Dr. Abdul Rauf, Department of Political Science, University of Peshawar.
This workshop brought together M.Phil and doctoral students in Pakistan who are developing dissertation proposals or are in early phases of research or dissertation writing and who seek to develop richer, more subtle or robust understandings of their fields. It engaged aspiring scholars and assisted them in such things as developing and reformulating research questions, placing research within theoretical contexts, facilitating the organization and structure of the dissertation, and sharing global norms of scholarship in research, writing and citation structures.
Workshop Summary by Matt Nelson, Workshop leader:
The AIPS Office in Islamabad was very pleased to host, in collaboration with Pakistan's Higher Education Commission (HEC), a very successful 3-day PhD workshop in late September. Focusing on history and politics, the workshop was led by Dr Matthew Nelson from the Department of Politics at SOAS (London) and Dr Abdul Rauf from the Department of Political Science at the University of Peshawar. Dr Julie Flowerday, who had recently arrived in Islamabad before beginning a nine-month stay at the University of Gujrat, joined us for the workshop and provided invaluable support as well.
Eleven students from across Pakistan--Quaid-e-Azam and the Islamic University in Islamabad, Karachi University and Jamshoro University in Sindh, Punjab University and the University of Gujrat, and Peshawar University--met for a welcome dinner at the Islamabad Serena Hotel with representatives from the Higher Education Commission and faculty members from QAU and IIU. This was followed by three days of intensive work focusing on the relationship between 'concepts' and 'cases', the construction of an effective literature review, and the leap from a strong research question to appropriate research methods. Additional sessions focused on working with different types of supervisors, locating research topics focused on Pakistan within a wider universe of academic literature, and understanding the expectations of international PhD examiners. After brief comments from the workshop leaders, each session included extensive work in small groups. Most of the students had not met before the workshop, but the atmosphere of collegiality and serious debate was electrifying.
A small sample of the research topics will provide a sense of current scholarly interests: (a) the multiple dimensions of Pashtun resistance to British rule, (b) the allocation of scarce family resources to landed property litigation rather than health or education in Punjab, (b) divergent trajectories of ethnic integration on the part of Pashtuns and the Baloch, (d) the demographic drivers of urban politics in Karachi, (e) the relative importance of 'patronage' and 'policy' in Pashtun voting patterns, (f) how Pakistani parliamentarians undermined their own legitimacy during the 1970s, and (g) the drivers of Russian economic power in Central Asia.
In addition to the workshop, Dr Nelson also delivered special lectures at the University of Gujrat and Quaid-e-Azam University. A profile regarding his work will be published in [waiting for details from Wajahat Ali, who did the interview].
AIPS-HEC Dissertation Writing Workshop (Gender Studies)
Islamabad, January 28–30, 2013
The American Institute of Pakistan Studies (AIPS) in collaboration with the HEC is pleased to invite proposals for a dissertation workshop for doctoral and M. Phil. students in the social sciences who are focused on writing a dissertation on women and gender issues in Pakistan. The AIPS, established in 1973, is a bi-national research and educational organization whose mission is to encourage and support research on issues relevant to Pakistan and the promotion of scholarly exchange between the United States and Pakistan. AIPS aims to facilitate scholarship within academe in Pakistan in various disciplines through the holding of dissertation workshops. This dissertation workshop is for M.Phil and Doctoral students in any of the social sciences whose research is focused on women and gender issues in Pakistan, and will be run by the eminent sociologist, Professor Anita M. Weiss, University of Oregon, with the participation of Professor Pervez Pathan, Director Sindh Development Studies Centre, University of Sindh Jamsho (Ph.D., Agricultural Economics, University of London).
This workshop intends to bring together M.Phil and doctoral students in Pakistan who are developing dissertation proposals or are in early phases of research or dissertation writing focused on women and/or gender issues in Pakistan (including anthropology, development studies, economics, Pakistan studies, political science, sociology, and women’s studies) and who seek to develop richer, more subtle or robust understandings of their fields. It intends to engage aspiring scholars of political and social analysis and assist them in such things as developing and reformulating research questions, placing research within theoretical contexts, facilitating the organization and structure of the dissertation, and sharing global norms of scholarship in research, writing and citation structures.
The workshop will be limited to 12 students, ideally from a broad array of universities within Pakistan. The workshop will last three days (with arrival on Monday January 21). Applicants need not have advanced to candidacy but must have at least drafted a dissertation research proposal. Applications are also welcome from doctoral students in the early phases of writing their dissertations. Students will be provided with reading assignments – a few short articles and each other’s proposals – which must be read prior to the commencement of the workshop. Workshop participants will be selected on the basis of the submitted project, the potential for useful exchanges among them, and a concern to include a wide range of perspectives and intellectual rigor.
Each day will include a working lunch to facilitate further discussion. The HEC will provide round-trip transportation to Islamabad and four nights accommodation in the HEC hostel in Islamabad for all student participants. There will be an inaugural dinner Monday evening January 21st. The first day of the workshop, January 22nd, will focus on discussions of seminal articles (those circulated in advance) as well as issues such as developing research questions, methodologies, bibliographies, etc. The second and third days will constitute discussions of dissertation proposals by each participant (which had previously been submitted and circulated). Participants will address both theory, methods, substance, and structure of each dissertation proposal, and tie these to the discussions held on the first day.
Final Report (Download) from Dr. Pervez Ahmad Pathan (Curriculum Vitae)
University of Michigan Conference
Monmouth College Conference
Title: Conference on Pakistan
Date: April 7-9, 2014
Monmouth College has organized a two-day conference on Pakistan to take full advantage of speaker Zahid Hussain’s visit! This interdisciplinary conference will have presentations on contemporary political and social issues, as well as music performances and a presentation on film and literature in Pakistan.
In addition, the Buchanan center for the Arts in the city of Monmouth will sponsor an evening of sitar music to be held at their center in downtown Monmouth during the conference timeline.
Contextualizing Pakistan: From Within and Without
Date: April 11-12, 2014
Our joint conference aims to examine how historical and socio-cultural interconnections shape and influence identity in Pakistan. It does not move away from the study of state and society but, instead, examines how “external” connections (i.e., the “without”) at the national, regional and local levels can contour identities (and conflicts about it) “within” Pakistan. The conference will be organized around two themes:
1. The first theme examines how regional and local identities within Pakistan are/were shaped and constituted by “external” phenomena (e.g., historical legacies that predate Partition, identities that Partition undid and/or re-imagined, socio-cultural formations that extend from beyond the state’s territorial limits and/or the geography of post-1947 and 1971 Pakistan). Whether focused on or in Sindh, Punjab, the northern administrative units, Baluchistan or Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, we hope to bring into comparative dialogue work on regional and local identities that have been shaped by (but not subsumed by) state-centered narratives about the nation of Pakistan.
2. The second theme focuses on continuities and disruptions that have shaped (and continue to influence) the networks of movement that link Pakistan’s territory to other locations in the Indian Ocean region and the world at-large. While these networks (linked to employment, trade, pilgrimage, imperial connection and religious affiliation) often predate the creation of Pakistan, they continue to historically and socio-culturally shape identity in Pakistan. This second theme aims to bring together studies about networks of movement to explore, as under the first theme, how life “outside” of Pakistan contours and shapes what it means to be Pakistani.
A main goal of this conference is to draw new bodies of research into conversation with older scholarship on state and society so as to develop a vision of Pakistan Studies that is mutually shaped by historical and socio-cultural phenomena which are both “outside” and “inside” the territorial boundaries of the Pakistani state.
Site Re-Envisioning Pakistan: The Political Economy of Social Transformation
Date: April 4-5, 2014
We would like to inform and invite you to an international conference on Pakistan to be held at Sarah Lawrence College this spring. The conference aims to bring together a range of diverse perspectives to examine historical realities and current challenges facing Pakistan.
Pakistan’s tumultuous economic and political history reflects a socio-economic policy based on an orthodox ‘modernization’ paradigm with marginal trickle-down effects. Its politics of governance has focused equally narrowly on questions of security while paying lip service to democracy. In spite of increased calls for better governance and a move away from this technocratic paradigm, an ahistorical and simplistic understanding of its history and contemporary realities continue to plague scholarly work, policy making, and media coverage of the country. As against such approaches, this conference provides an alternative analytical framework on Pakistan, bringing together scholars from various disciplines in the humanities and social sciences, writers, journalists and activists. Given its thematic emphasis, the conference will be of interest to specialists on Pakistan, as well as activists and members of the general public interested in gaining a deeper understanding of the processes of socio-economic and political transformation in Pakistan, and within countries of the global south more generally.
This conference is co-sponsored by the American Institute of Pakistan Studies.
Conference on Islamic Identities, Gender & Higher Education in Pakistan
Sponsored by American Institute of Pakistan Studies, in collaboration with Quaid-i-Azam University and others, and held January 12-14, 2007 in Islamabad.
Gandhara at the Cross Roads of Civilizations - Art and Architecture
Held April 10-12, 2007 in Lahore.
Pakistan in the Current Global (Dis)order: Perspectives from the Social Sciences
14th-16th December 2007
Lahore School of Management Sciences (LUMS)
This conference re-addressed some of the weaknesses in the current status of knowledge and discourse on Pakistan by going beyond intelligence and media concerns and exploring a broad range of themes related to globalization and transnationalism, and also to the national civil society.
The aim to initiate an appropriately grounded academic discussion on the state of Pakistan and its communities, and placed the issue of religion in proper perspective by addressing other critical problems facing Pakistan today.
We hosted panels and invited papers related especially to the following themes:
The politics and economics of structural reform
The new contestations of urban space
The past and future of social movements
The terrain of global versus local culture
The role of media and Academia
The role of Islam vis-a-vis the Pakistani state and society
Conference on the "Leaders of Pakistan Movement"
The National Institute of Historical and Cultural Research, Centre of Excellence, Quaid i Azam University, Islamabad in collaboration with International Islamic University, Islamabad organized a two-day conference on "Leaders of Pakistan Movement" from April 7-8, 2008 at the International Islamic University in Islamabad. Leading scholar professor Sharif al Mujahid gave the key note address while Dr. M. Qasim Jan (Vice Chancellor, Quaid i Azam University, Islamabad) presided the conference. Notable scholars on Pakistan movement presented papers on Pakistan's founding leaders during the conference in Islamabad.
National Conference on "Economic Challenges Being Faced by Pakistan"
The two day National Conference on Economic Challenges Faced by Pakistan was arranged and held on June 2-3, 2008 by the International Islamic University, Islamabad (IIUI).
Download more information or view the online announcement.
ASPS Biennial Convention
The Association for the Study of Persianate Societies (ASPS) Fourth Biennial Convention took place from February 27-March 1, 2009 in Lahore, Pakistan.
Past ASPS conferences have provided a rare and valued opportunity for scholars from West, Central and South Asia, Europe and North America to participate in an interdisciplinary dialogue.
More information here.
Tehrik-e-Niswan: Tees aur Aik Saal
A conference in Karachi to celebrate 31 years of Tehrik-e-Niswan
24-26 December, 2010
To explore the interconnections between performance art and the politics of gender and class, participants from Bangladesh, India and Pakistan demonstrated how the cultural forms of theatre, dance, music, film and the fine arts have been used to advocate for gender and class equity.
News Coverage of the Conference
Dawn.com: Conference on performing arts raises questions
Dawn.com: Celebration of women`s movement begins today
Aman ki Asha: Linking hands, across political fences
The Express Tribune: Culture develops over time: Sheema Kermani
The Express Tribune: Tees aur aik saal: Documenting and celebrating our cultural history
Cultural Heritage Issues in Pakistan: Archaeology, Museums and Conservation
January 6-8, 2011
Margala Hotel, Islamabad
Sponsored by the American Institute of Pakistan Studies with support from the US Embassy, Islamabad.
In collaboration with the Department of Archaeology and Museums Ministry of Culture, Government of Pakistan.
The Cultural Heritage of Pakistan is rich and diverse, with significant potential for further research, conservation and tourism development. This conference has been organized to enhance the national and international profile of Pakistan’s rich cultural heritage by bringing together US and Pakistani scholars who will present papers on a wide range of topics. The main goal of this conference will be to highlight the important new archaeological discoveries made over the past ten years, by both Pakistani and foreign scholars, The conference will also have sessions with speakers who will discuss how museums and site management can become more focused on outreach and education, and to present new and innovative ways to conserve both sites and artifacts. Additional topics to be considered will be how to manage cultural heritage in the face of natural disasters, such as earthquakes and man-made disasters such as bombings and attacks by people trying to destroy cultural heritage.
Twenty-six leading scholars from Pakistan and ten from the US have been invited to present their new findings. All of these scholars have been involved in recent excavations and research on earlier excavations. The presenters have been selected by a steering committee made up of US and Pakistani scholars. This conference will be a chance for Pakistani and US scholars who have spent considerable time in Pakistan to exchange ideas on the major issues of Cultural Heritage research, preservation, conservation and education. Students from universities throughout Pakistan will be able to attend the conference and see the importance of cultural heritage. Most important will be the fact that the conference will be held in Islamabad and that members of the various ministries of Education, Culture and Tourism can attend to find out what the most important issues are. The conference will result in a significant edited volume that will be printed in Pakistan in order to make it available to the local schools and universities. In this way the results of the conference will be disseminated widely within the country as well as internationally.
6th Annual Humanities and Social Sciences Conference
Lahore University of Management Sciences, Lahore, Pakistan
March 25 - 27, 2011
The Annual HSS Conference is both a unique and ideal arena to promote intellectual enterprise, endorsing cooperation with experts from across the world. While there is an established tradition of global exchanges at the state and organizational levels within Pakistan, nonetheless we feel that academic exchanges are not as well established. Therefore, we hope to bridge this gap and create new academic links that can be sustained beyond this conference and develop expertise, skills and knowledge that are necessary in planning and dealing with future natural or human led disasters.
Development Challenges Confronting Pakistan
Islamabad, May 6-7, 2011
This conference brought together scholars, policymakers and practitioners concerned with development and social transformation in Pakistan to forge a substantive understanding of the structural impediments that affect Pakistan’s ability to eliminate poverty, promote social justice, achieve its economic goals, and implement policies to promote equity and political cohesiveness. The conference will analyze the linkages between Pakistan’s development goals, local institutions, the state’s legal framework, and prospects for sustainable futures in a variety of arenas in Pakistan. It will not focus on pragmatic development challenges such as where to put in new schools, how to introduce new hybrid seeds or new systems of local governance. Instead, the conference has the dual goals of (a) creating a sound understanding of the processes that will shape Pakistan’s future and (b) develop practical recommendations for a strategy on institutional transformation to help Pakistan achieve its development agenda.
The global community concerned with development and social transformation has identified and analyzed ‘structural impediments’ that constrain countries’ efforts to alleviate poverty and promote sustainable social development. The UNDP, in launching its Millennium Development Goals, contends that there are “practical, proven solutions” to breaking out of the poverty traps that entangle poor countries, such as “investing in human development,” increasing agricultural productivity, emphasizing human rights and social equity through democratic governance, and promoting environmental sustainability by improving urban management. Such rhetoric, however, is difficult to translate into realistic, practical applied programs. In Pakistan, in particular, there has been limited substantive research to identify the prevailing unique blend of structural impediments to development.
Indeed, Pakistan’s prospects to promote viable, sustainable social development appear bleaker today than a decade ago. This conference, therefore, seeks to rectify this void by analyzing Pakistani institutions (e.g., the economy, legal infrastructure, the changing contours of violent conflict, women’s status and rights, agricultural transformation) to anticipate what could be changed to promote more productive interactions between them to facilitate Pakistan’s achievement of its development goals. Policy makers and development professionals will be able to attend the conference and see the importance of a robust understanding of the institutional foundations of the development work in which many are engaged. Most important will be the fact that the conference will be held in Islamabad and that members of various Pakistani ministries (Planning, Education, Economic Affairs, Food and Agriculture) and ODA donors (World Bank, ADB, USAID, DFID) can attend to improve their understanding of how these issues are interconnected.
The conference will result in two publications: (a) a significant edited volume that will be printed in Pakistan to make it available to local schools, universities, donor agencies, and international actors present in Pakistan. In this way the results of the conference will be disseminated widely within the country as well as internationally. The final papers will be due by the end of June so that publication can proceed rapidly. The basic editing will be done by Weiss and one Pakistani scholar and published in Pakistan; and (2) a conference overview. The latter will contain an Executive Summary of the conference, abstracts of all papers, and recommendations for a strategy on institutional transformation to facilitate Pakistan’s achievement of its development agenda. This will be disseminated quickly to various stakeholders (Pakistani policymakers, ODA donors, US embassy personnel, and others) working in the arena of Pakistan’s development prospects.
Program
Abstracts and Speakers' Biodata
Table of contents for upcoming volume from this conference.
Talk by Aitzaz Ahsan
Women's Studies Conference
August 27-28, 2011
Centre for Excellence in Gender Studies
Quaid-e-Azam University, Islamabad
Conference Steering Committee: Professor Anita M. Weiss, University of Oregon; Dr. Farzana Bari, Quaid-e-Azam University; Nasreen Aslam Shah, University of Karachi; Dr. Anis Haroon, National Commission on the Status of Women
This two-day conference seeks to bring together a wide range of scholars and practitioners to explore women’s changing roles, status and rights in Pakistan today. It seeks to explore the synergy between such changes occurring at the national policy level with the reality of women’s lives at the local level.
Importantly, too, in bringing together scholars and practitioners, it hopes to develop a corpus of knowledge that can be published in the Journal of Feminist Studies (Quaid-e-Azam University), the Journal of Women’s Studies (University of Karachi), and other publishing venues.
A total of six panels are planned: one each morning and two each afternoon. The steering committee has identified topics around which these panels will be organized, including one that celebrates Fifty Years of the MFLO. One distinguished scholar or policymaker, either from Pakistan or the U.S., is being invited to participate on each panel. The remainder of the participant slots will be filled through responses to this Call for Papers.
Each of the panels intends to engage participants not only in describing and analyzing women’s involvement with the subject at hand, but also in thinking about movement and change. The six panels are entitled as:
- Navigating Systems of Law & Justice
- Moving Past Conflict and Disaster
- Creating Real Democracy
- Learning from Women’s Indigenous Knowledge
- Engendering Pakistan’s Economy: Women’s Economic Emergence
- Celebrating Fifty Years of the Muslim Family Laws Ordinance (MFLO)
Suggestions for Publishing Women’s Studies Research
International Conference on Archaeology and Cultural Heritage in Pakistan and Adjacent Regions
Margala Hotel, Islamabad Jan 5-7, 2012
Sponsored by the American Institute of Pakistan Studies
with support from the US Embassy, Islamabad
In collaboration with the Department of Archaeology and Museums
Ministry of National Heritage and Integration
Government of Pakistan
Pakistan lies at the intersection of important historical and modern trade and exchange networks that link Afghanistan and Central Asia to the Indus Valley region and beyond to Peninsular India. The Indus valley and adjacent regions have also played an important role in maritime trade to the regions of Gujarat, Oman and the Arabian/Persian Gulf area. This conference would bring together leading archaeologists and museum specialists of Pakistan with US scholars and scholars from adjacent regions to discuss their most current research and develop future collaborative projects. The topics will range from the Prehistoric and Proto-Historic Indus Valley, to the Early Historic and Islamic Periods
This conference will be a chance for Pakistani, US, and other regional scholars to share their recent discoveries and discuss ongoing problems of dating and classification. Other aspects of Cultural Heritage research, preservation, conservation and education will also be discussed. In addition to inviting leading scholars from throughout Pakistan, we also plan to invite a five leading scholars from both India and Afghanistan and may have selected scholars from other regions such as Kuwait and Oman.
Students from universities throughout Pakistan will be able to attend the conference and see the importance of cultural heritage. Most important will be the fact that the conference will be held in Islamabad and that members of the various ministries can attend to find out what the most important issues are. The conference will result in a significant edited volume that will be printed in Pakistan in order to make it available to the local schools and universities. In this way the results of the conference will be disseminated widely within the country as well as internationally.
The Pakistani Public
Conference organized by: Aamir R. Mufti (UCLA) and Sadia Abbas (Rutgers)
December 26-28, 2012
Co-sponsored by AIPS, Lahore University of Management Sciences, and US Embassy, Islamabad
"The public sphere” is an important concept of social theory and has become indispensible for our understanding of the transition to modern forms of culture, state, and society. Coined by the German sociologist Jürgen Habermas half a century ago, the concept allowed scholars to explain the institutional settings, the ideological and cultural contents, and the class and gender structure of the rise of “the public” in Western Europe during the great historical transition of the eighteenth-century. It is also a European word that is commonly used in the Pakistani languages? The symposium will address the possibility of thinking about and representing “the public” in the midst of the historical transition that is contemporary Pakistan. How exactly should we understand this transition and the discourse around the public that it produces? How do we fruitfully distinguish it from the European trajectories that scholars in the West take to be normative forms of modernization? The participants—who include scholars from several disciplines (literary criticism, political science, anthropology, sociology, art history, architecture and urban planning), artists, cultural activists, and writers of both English and Urdu—will bring the diverse perspectives of their disciplines and practices to the discussion.
There is no intellectual agenda for the content of the presentations and discussions. But it seems to us that three broad areas of concern are relevant here. The first is the dynamics of socioeconomic class in the constitution of the public sphere. Tied everywhere to the emergence of a middle class, in postcolonial societies like Pakistan the public sphere is especially defined by inequality of access and control. A generation of Indian scholars has spoken of this extreme form of class inequality as “subalternity” in order to distinguish it from class structure in Western Europe. In a whole range of questions concerned with public life in Pakistan today—from women’s rights, to the role of religion and the situation of minorities—the fissure of class runs like a visible seam through the debates and discussions. The second focus will be on the varieties of aesthetic practice that populate Pakistan’s vibrant cultural life in the present moment, from literature in English, Urdu and the other Pakistani languages to music and the visual arts. The recent years of political and social crisis in Pakistan have also been a time of remarkable creative achievement across all these media and forms, with writers, musicians, and artists acquiring success in international cultural circles as much as inside Pakistan. How do we understand the public lives of this diverse aesthetic production and what do we imagine its publics to be? Is the vast mediascape that has emerged in Pakistan in recent years a hindrance or a help to this creative life? The third focus will be on public spheres beyond the nation-state itself. Various publics within Pakistan may be said to belong from time to time, and according to temporary and contingent logics, to the subcontinental, diasporic, Islamic, and even cricketing public spheres. We need to attempt to highlight and analyze how these three sets of issues intersect with each other in the constitution and transformation of a “public” in contemporary Pakistan.
Final Program for the Conference (download)
Final Report from the Conference (download)
Rethinking the Urban in Pakistan
Conference organized by: Department of Architecture and Planning, NED University of Engineering & Technology, American Institute of Pakistan Studies, South Asia Institute, University of Texas – Austin and Habib University, Karachi
January 1-3, 2013
This workshop is envisaged as an exchange between academics and activists who primarily work on urban Sindh in Pakistan. It will encourage interdisciplinary perspectives and bring together urban planners, architects, historians, anthropologists, sociologists, artists, film makers, fiction writers and others involved in thinking about cities in Sindh in creative and novel forms. The forum will create a space to enter into a dialogue to understand the contemporary urban forms and contexts as they transform in Sindh and in a comparative perspective. The endeavor is to bring a group of interdisciplinary expertise on the subject together to create room for dialogue and discussion across various dimensions and open up new ways to think about the cities in Sindh.
Karachi Conference
November 1-3, 2013
The Karachi Conference aims to converge and celebrate critical discourse on Karachi’s cultural mosaic, the processes of its historic evolution and its impact on Pakistan’s development and culture.
Urban Life and the Working Poor in South Asia
Conference Organized by: CAORC and the Department of Architecture and Planning, NED University, Karachi
January 4-5, 2016
The workshop will explore how the working poor survive in their private and work lives in South Asia’s expanding cities. We seek to encourage discussion on the life worlds of the poor in urban South Asia, specifically how working class men and women experience the economically uncertain urban milieu. The workshop will link the issue of economic marginalization and poverty to larger and pertinent discussion on minority rights, access to land tenure, distribution of wealth, equitable access to resources, gender equity and food security. Related to this, we want to discuss issues of urban form and aesthetics, leisure and pleasure, and the new ways in which young and old reconfigure urban space to create meaningful lives for themselves. How the urban is visualized, what affect it produces, what kinds of creative energies it unleashes and how new media takes on this challenge remain discussions that need further retrospection and analysis.
The Second International Karachi Conference
Conference Organized by: CAORC in Karachi
November 21-23, 2014
This conference was sponsored by AIPS, the Indus Valley School of Art and Architecture, the Arts Council of Pakistan, the Karachi Youth Initiative (KYI), and the Avari Group, in addition to other partners. The keynote for the conference was delivered by Dr. Kamran Asdar Ali. The primary objective of the Karachi Conference is to highlight the importance of Karachi and all facts of its urban existence through a scholarly exercise, for understanding the role that it has assumed as a regional hub. A second objective is to bring together local and international academic institutions, scholars, and development and social activists who have worked in Karachi, to engage with each other and with other like-minded local individuals for future academic endeavors, especially those relevant to the city.
The first two days of the conference were devoted to its academic proceedings, where different scholars covering various facets of Karachi spoke in thematically designed sessions, and the third day was devoted to film screenings in and on Karachi. Dr. Asma Ibrahim, President, delivered an introductory address. Other sessions focused on Karachi’s history, Karachi’s intangible heritage, ‘The Role of Women in the Socio-Political History of Karachi,’ ‘Citizenship and emerging socio-political realties,’ Money, density and conflict,’ and ‘Socio-physical Infrastructure.’ This last session is also known as the Parveen Rehman session, and is held every year within the conference. It is dedicated to a development related theme, in memory of the slain Karachi development expert. In 2014, renowned planner and architect Arif Hasan acted as chair, and oversaw the delivery of three papers by development professionals on problems connected to Karachi’s urban-scape. The conference ended with a summation of by Senior Advisor Dr. Kaleemullah Lashari, and the day was brought to a close by a performance on Karachi by renowned artist Sheema Kirmani and her troupe.
Locally Sourced: Recovering the Local in History, Culture and Politics in Pakistan
Conference Organized by: Matthew A. Cook (North Carolina Central University), David Gilmartin (North Carolina State University) and Zulfiqar Ali Kalhoro (Pakistan Institute of Development Economics) and funded by the Department of Education at the Pakistan Institute for Development Economics, Islamabad
August 7-8, 2015
The conference, “Locally Sourced: Recovering the Local in History, Culture and Politics in Pakistan,” consisted of two day-long sessions of papers and discussions that focused on the role of “local studies” in the development of Pakistani history and culture. It began with an overview of the important (if sometimes controversial) roles that “local” histories play in the larger development of historical studies internationally. The conference then focused on the particular pressures that have tended to limit the role of local history in the reconstruction of Pakistan’s colonial and recent past. Senior and junior scholars from a variety of disciplines (e.g., history, literary studies, and anthropology) presented case studies, ranging from a historical study of local organizing by railway workers in Lahore, to a study about a local press and its role in on-going ethnic violence in Karachi, to a presentation on the Karachi International Book Fair as a way to define the “literary local,” to local histories of Hindu castes in Tharparkar, to the relationship between international networks and Gwadar’s local Baloch history, to a micro-history of “virtuous” investing in a local Karachi market, to a history of local competition between Hindu castes and it shaped the British annexation of Sindh. Each paper presentation produced its own lively discussions about the “local” in the history of Pakistan. The larger value of the conference to Pakistan Studies lay in the explicit foregrounding of the “local” as a concept for both expanding and deepening the ways that scholars can approach Pakistan’s complicated history.
The complete conference program can be viewed on the AIPS website.
The City in South Asia Conference
Conference Organized by: CAORC at the Department of Architecture and Planning, NED University, Karachi, Pakistan
January 3-6, 2016
The workshop encouraged a broader discussion on the life worlds of the poor in urban South Asia, specifically on how working class men and women experience the economically uncertain urban milieu. Rather than concentrating on perceived failures of the South Asian mega-city—whether in terms of infrastructure, governance, or economic development—the papers emphasized seeing the emerging fabric of urban South Asia as the result of ordinary peoples’ sustained productive deployment of sensibilities, practices, efforts, and collective formations. The workshop presentations sensitized the audience to the changing cultural, political and social milieu of Karachi, Dhaka, Colombo, Mumbai, Chennai, Lahore, and other cities. Further, it addressed how issues of gender, caste, religious and ethnic difference, and sexuality are pivotal to understanding contemporary urban lifeworlds in South Asia.
State, Society and Democracy in the Postcolony Conference
Conference Organized by: Mashal Saif (Clemson University) and funded by CAORC at Lahore University of Management and Sciences (LUMS), Lahore, Pakistan
August 5-6, 2016
This conference focused on the impact of neoliberalism on state, society and democracy in the postcolonial world. Most papers focused on Pakistan but several also examined other parts of the Global South, particularly other regions in the Indian subcontinent. There were more than a hundred attendees in addition to the almost forty presenters. A very rich and innovative set of papers was presented by a diverse group of scholars. The scholars ranged from professors in the United States to graduate students from all over the world. The conference also had a high number of local Pakistan-based scholars present their work.
A defining feature of the conference was its focus on the state and society in South Asia through Foucauldian lenses. Examinations of everyday citizens’ engagements, imaginations and negotiations with state in South Asian are an emerging trend to which the conference contributed. Pakistan is often peripheral to other such examinations of the South Asian state. In contrast to this dominant trend, the conference situated Pakistan at the heart of its study while also placing it in conversation with its South Asian neighbors, particularly India.
The conference was very well received and covered by numerous media.
Cinema and Transnationalism in Pakistan and South Asia: Regional Histories
Conference Organized by: Esha Niyogi De (UCLA) and funded by CAORC at Lahore University of Management Sciences (LUMS), Lahore, Pakistan
September 1-2, 2016
This two-day-long event—co-organized by Dr. Esha Niyogi De (UCLA) and Dr. Ali Khan (LUMS) and hosted by the Department of Humanities and Social Sciences at LUMS—brought to Pakistan the South Asian Regional Media Studies Network (SARMSNet). This cross-border initiative fostered collaborative scholarship on the histories of cinema and media shared by Pakistan, India, and Bangladesh. Considering the histories of cinema in Pakistan and the Subcontinent, a number of presentations examined the regional travels of images, artists, and industrial resources, and how traditions and their cultural influences intertwine with one another. While participants were deeply concerned with the politics of nation, ethnicity, and gender born of specific geopolitical conditions in the Subcontinent, they explored the role film and media networks have also played in destabilizing divisive identities. Some papers studied how popular cinemas illuminate everyday practices of same-sex friendship and cross-ethnic solidarity, whereas some others discussed gendered imaginations of justice and human rights in films on conflict, war, and terror. Historically specific readings of Pakistani Cinema (Urdu, Punjabi) were complemented by analyses of transregional flows, which emphasized the historical linkage between film industries and urban landscapes across South Asia. It brought together leading academics who work on Pakistan, including:
• Dr. Rahat Imran, Assistant Professor, Institute of Social & Cultural Studies, University of the Punjab, Lahore,
• Dr. Imran Munir, Assistant Professor, Institute of Social & Cultural Studies, University of the Punjab, Lahore,
• Dr. Naveen Zehra Minai, Assistant Professor, Institute of Business Administration, Karachi,
• Dr. Tariq Rahman, HEC Distinguished National Professor Emeritus & Dean, School of Education, Beaconhouse National University, Lahore,
• Dr. Ali Khan, Associate Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, LUMS, Lahore,
• Dr. Sadaf Ahmad, Associate Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, LUMS, Lahore,
• Dr. Nida Kirmani, Assistant Professor, Department of Humanities and Social Sciences, LUMS, Lahore,
• Dr. Elora Halim Chowdhury, Associate Professor & Chair, Department of Women’s and Gender Studies, University of Massachusetts, Boston,
• Dr. Kamran Asdar Ali - Associate Professor, Department of Anthropology; and Director, South Asia Institute, University of Texas, Austin,
• Dr. Joel Gordon, Professor, Department of History, University of Arkansas, Fayetteville,
• Dr. Karen Leonard, Professor, Department of Anthropology, University of California at Irvine, Irvine,
• Dr. Sanaa Riaz, Assistant Professor, Department of Sociology and Anthropology, State University of Colorado at Denver,
• Dr. Esha Niyogi De, Faculty, Department of English, UCLA,
• Dr. Nasreen Rehman, Faculty, Department of Asian and Middle Eastern Studies, Cambridge University
Along with those who were present virtually through Skype
• Iftikhar Dadi - Associate Professor, Departments of History of Art and Art, Cornell University, Ithaca,
• Dr. Madhuja Mukheerji, Associate Professor, Department of Film Studies, Jadavpur University, India
• Dr. Abhijit Roy, Associate Professor, Department of Film Studies, Jadavpur University, India
Fourth International Karachi Conference
Conference Organized by: Karachi Conference Foundation and funded by CAORC at the Arts Council of Pakistan, Karachi
December 9-11, 2016
Fourth International Conference on Karachi was a three-day conference organized by the Karachi Conference Foundation and co-sponsored by AIPS using its ECA funds. The conference was held in National Museum Auditorium, Burnes Gardens, Karachi, Pakistan. The conference addressed topics such as: Urbanization Trends in Karachi; Memory, Tradition and Community; Governance & Citizenship; Development and Civil Society; and Environmental Degradation.
Eighth Karachi Literature Festival
Conference Organized by: Oxford University Press Pakistan and funded by CAORC at Beach Luxury Hotel, Karachi
Date: February 10 – 12, 2017
AIPS co-sponsored (ECA funded) Karachi Literature Festival is a literary festival that brings together international and Pakistani writes to promote reading and showcase writing at its best. The festival features debates, discussions, talks, English and Urdu mushaira, a book fair, book launches, readings, singings, satire, theatre, film screenings, music and dance. AIPS Vice President Matthew A. Cook and AIPS Trustees Anita Weiss and Ayesha Jalal attended this festival. Matt Cook was part of several important sessions at the festival and Anita Weiss launched her book Interpreting Islam, Modernity, and Women’s Rights in Pakistan.
Ayesha Jalal (AIPS Trustee), Mustansar Hussain Tarar, Bobby Sager, and Mohammed Hanif delivered this year’s keynote addresses.
Montstuart Elphinstone: Between Local and Global Forces Conference
Conference Organized by: Prof. Shah Mahmoud Hanifi, American Institute of Afghanistan Studies (AIAS) and funded by CAORC at Jnanapravaha, Mumbai, India
April 20 – 21, 2017
This AIPS (co)sponsored Conference was held in Jnanapravaha Mumbai on April 20 – 21, 2017. The Conference, which was funded by ECA funds and organized by Prof. Shah Mahmoud Hanifi of James Madison University, brought together 28 scholars from Afghanistan, Bangladesh, India, Nepal, Pakistan, Singapore, Sri Lanka and the United States. This conference examined the enduring intellectual and political impact of Mountstuart Elphinstone (1779 – 1859) through consideration of knowledge formations he represented and those he engaged in South Asia. During the course of two days, participants compared shared histories and divergent historical experiences arising from a) the production and institutionalization of colonial knowledge formations during imperial era; b) the simultaneous destabilization and reinvigoration of colonial knowledge formations in the context of nationalism and national education programs; and c) the emergence of trans-national intellectual communities and scholarly networks in the contemporary period of neo-liberal globalization. The conference was modeled upon a series of inter-South Asian ORC conferences. The Elphinstone Conference highlighted Afghanistan’s deep historical, cultural, and organic relationship to South Asia and will be a pathway for increasing communications between AIAS and other South Asian ORCs.
Research Methodology Workshop
Conference Organized by: US Department of State at Margalla Hotel, Islamabad
September 29-30, 2017
The Research Methodology Workshop was held on September 29-30, 2017. This AIPS (co)sponsored workshop was facilitated by COSS/Women University of Peshawar and led by AIPS member Dr. Julie Flowerday. This conference brought together 20 participants. Majority of the participants were junior scholars and women.
Workshop Series Theme: Visual Analysis: Art, Architecture and Media
Organizer: Iftikhar Dadi
Iftikhar Dadi, Cornell University, is organizing a workshop series based on the theme of Visual Analysis: art, architecture and media. A series of three seminars on methodological questions and case studies on these areas will be offered during 2015. Participants will include faculty in the higher education sector from across Pakistan. The seminars will focus on assisting participants in developing their own curriculum and teaching at the undergraduate and graduate levels, and provide them with frameworks useful in furthering their individual research projects. The seminars are divided into 1) modern and contemporary art, 2) architectural history and theory of South Asia, and 3) South Asian media cultures: history, theory, and criticism.
Workshop I was held in January 19-23, 2015. It was an intensive 5-day workshop on art history and visual studies. Led by Iftikhar Dadi, associate professor at Cornell University in the Department of History of Art, the workshop included twelve participants from various institutions of higher education from across Pakistan. Besides Dadi, the workshop was also led by two guest instructors, Zahid Chaudhary, associate professor at Princeton University, and Hammad Nasar, director of research at Asia Art Archive in Hong Kong. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop II is proposed for 2015. The aim of the workshop is to critically evaluate the discourse on South Asian architecture, through a close analysis of primary sources and secondary literature. The aim is to introduce the workshop members to the methodologies of architectural history and theory.The city of Lahore will be our case study, with a focus on the Mughal, British, and modern periods. In-class seminars will be complemented by site visits. Seminar participants will be expected to lead discussions and produce a brief research abstract at the end of the workshop. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop III is also proposed for 2015 and to be led by Bhaskar Sarkar, Film and Media Studies, UC Santa Barbara. The focus is on South Asian Media Cultures: History, Theory, Criticism. Methodologies for the study of cinema, television, and digital media, including narratology and textual analysis, ideological analysis, archival research, media ethnography, media materialities, industrial and policy analysis. Partition and cinema; emerging videocinemas; documentary; media materialities; media and the arts; media piracy.(Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
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Workshop Series Theme: Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Management
Organizer: Mark Kenoyer
J. Mark Kenoyer, University of Wisconsin-Madison, organized a workshop series on teaching Archaeology and Cultural Heritage Management. The objectives of this series was to provide examples of how archaeology is being taught in both large and small US Universities. Invitations were sent to universities that have active programs of teaching archaeology and cultural heritage management. Selected participants attended all three workshops to receive the full benefit of this series. Kenoyer partnered with Quiad-i-Azam University for the delivery of the series.
Workshop I was held for five days, from February 2 – 6, 2015 with teaching sessions and two field trips. It was led by Dr. J. Mark Kenoyer from the University of Wisconsin-Madison.The goal of the workshop was to strengthen the teaching of archaeology and cultural heritage in Pakistani Universities through the development of appropriate teaching pedagogy and goals. was attended by 15 faculty (6 women and 9 men) from universities in Balochistan, Gilgit/Baltistan, Khyber Pakhtunkhwa, Punjab and Sindh. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop II was held for five days, from June 8-12, 2015,and led by Katie Lindstrom of the University of Wisconsin-Madison. The different sessions focused on the following topics and special readings were provided to the participants in advance of the workshop so that they will be prepared to actively participate in discussions and working sessions: 1. Creating a syllabus, establishing learning goals, and building in assessment that aligns with your learning goals; 2. Creating hands-on assignments that apply archaeological concepts without going into the field; 3. Teaching the principles of archaeology as both a science and social science and 4. How to use Powerpoint Presentations to effectively to engage students. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop III will be held later in 2015 and will be led by Uzma Rizvi of the Pratt Institute, New York and Qasid Mallah of the Shah Abdul Latif University. This final workshop will focus on the following topics special readings will be provided to the participants in advance of the workshop so that they will be prepared to actively participate in discussions and working sessions: 1. Teaching about Politics and the Past; 2. Teaching about Archaeology and the Public; 3. Teaching about Art, Community Development, and Social Change and 4. Teaching World Archaeology and Global Heritage.The fifth day of the this final workshop will be involve presentations by the participants. This will allow them to share with each other how the workshops have helped them to develop stronger teaching practices in their home universities and to propose new ways of enhancing the teaching of archaeology and cultural heritage management. (Find the narrative report and workshop photo here)
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Workshop Theme: Peace-building and Conflict Resolution
Organizer: Paula Newberg
Paula Newberg, University of Texas at Austin, is organizing a series of workshops on the theme of Peace-building and conflict resolution. The intended audience for these workshops is social science and law faculty.
Workshop I was themed on rights and the rule of law in building peace was held from March 10-14, 2014. Goals of the workshop were to provide a background in the fundamentals of the subject, gain familiarity with tools of the trade, and help create a syllabus, or teaching module, in one or more elements of the subject. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop II was themed on Peace and Conflict Studies and was held in January 12-16, 2015. It was led by Paula Newberg, UT Department of Governance. (Find the interim report and workshop photos here)
Workshop III is proposed for later in 2015 with the theme of building peace and resolving conflicts. The workshop is focused on state structure and constitutionalism, political processes at nation, provincial and local levels; traditional dispute resolution mechanisms; tools for building peace (pre- and post-conflict), and mitigating peace (during conflict). (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
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Workshop Theme: Pakistan and Peace Studies-Methods and Making
Organizer: Yasmin Saikia
The questions surrounding the study of peace are many, and the need for answers urgent. What do we mean by peace and non-peace? What are the dynamics between the self and Other that can either lead to peace or non-peace? What is the place of such concepts as trust, hospitality, neighborliness, friendship and tolerance in transforming relationship between self and Other? Are there different cultures and traditions regarding the relationship of self and Other? Are there contemporary social ideologies that either limit or enhance the capacity for understanding between self and Other and for working toward peace? If so, what are they and how can we best study them? Pakistan is an ideal location to carry out this work. With its many different ethnic, linguistic, and religious groups, and its long history of both peace and non-peace, Pakistan offers numerous cases that, if studied and taught from a scholarly angle, hold tremendous possibilities for contributing to this field in ways that will benefit both Pakistan and peace studies globally.
The three-part seminar series will address these questions from theoretical and methodological angles, with a clear teaching and/or research outcome. Each workshop will run for a full week, and will include readings, case studies, and guest lectures. Each seminar participant will be asked to specify a concrete outcome that they will produce from the workshops—either a new or revised syllabus or a research-based conference paper. A central component of each workshop are assignments designed to apply the readings, case study and lecture information to the syllabus or paper development, which will be presented and defended by the participants in a final culminating workshop. Proposed workshop topics and questions include:
Workshop I: What is Peace? How does it apply in Pakistan?
Workshop Leader: Dr. Yasmin Saikia
This workshop is designed to explore the meanings of peace from multiple and often conflicting perspectives. Peace is often perceived as a universal monolith; preserved as an icon and an ideal, it is thought of as a singular vision for humanity to realize. Yet just as we study different types and forms of violence—political, social, religious, economic, cultural, and environmental—this workshop will examine different modes of peace and explore their relevance through different sites of contestation. Some of the theoretical questions that will be engaged include: the relationship of religious and secular notions of peace and human rights and their application to the political and social sphere; the notion of everyday ethics and adab to the cultivation of peace; diverse systems of justice, particularly systems of restorative justice, and their role in transforming conflict; issues of economics, including trade, tourism, regionalization and globalization in exacerbating or reducing conflict; and the role of media in peace and conflict. Relevant issues for case studies include: Sunni-Shia relations; the impact of the drones on youth outlook; the relationship of India and Pakistan; the role of the media; and the need for an enemy in the construction of identity. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop II: What methods can we use to study peace? How can we incorporate social media in our teaching and research?
Workshop Leader: Chad Haines, maybe accompanied by Hasan Davulcu
This workshop will explore different methodological approaches from the humanities and social sciences for studying peace. Some of the methods that will be explored include qualitative methods such as ethnographic, historical, and discourse studies; quantitative methods such as survey research; and new methods that combine traditional and computational/digital methods. Workshop participants will learn to distinguish between interpretive, analytic and normative studies, with a particular emphasis on exploring how different methods produce different outcomes. A central component of this workshop will be a field research practicum that will involve participant observation. Specifically, seminar participants will be asked to consider ways in which different communities, including the local, state or national government, produce peace in the public or civic space. Seminar participants will also be shown how to use computer-based technology to produce a “web ethnography” so as to examine more critically claims about social media versus what is happening on the ground.
Workshop III: Building Peace into Education and Research: Peer-Review of Syllabi/Conference Papers.
Workshop Leader: Benjamin Broom and Yasmin Saikia
This workshop will be structured around a peer-review process in which seminar participants will present either the syllabus that they created or their conference paper for critique and revision. During the previous workshops, sessions will be held that focus on framing questions for teaching and research that incorporate relevant theoretical and methodological approaches, and demonstrating how those components are reflected in the different academic products. Participants preparing syllabi will be asked to defend their work through the following components: 1) syllabus outline; 2) annotated bibliography; 3) assignments, their objectives and relevance; 4) teaching one topic from the syllabus; and 5) how they incorporated use of the internet in their syllabus. Participants preparing a conference paper will be asked to defend the following: 1) Thesis: Why is this topic and approach important? How does it contribute to the understanding of peace and Pakistan? What is the original contribution the work is making? 2) Revisions: How do you know when your work needs revision? Who is there to help you? What is your process for revising? 3) Next Steps: What do you want to do next--submit to conference or revise it for publication? What is your plan for accomplishing that goal? Who will help you? 4) Sharing Research in a Public Medium: How do you revise scholarly work for public consumption? What are the components of a good public piece?
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Workshop Theme: Cataloging and Librarianship Workshops & the Cataloging and Preservation of the Rare Collection of the Anjuman-i Taraqqi-i Urdu Library
Organizer: Christopher Ryan Perkins & Pushkar Sohoni
Anjuman-i Taraqqi-I Urdu (ATU) Library is one of the most valuable of early Urdu and Persian printed materials. These materials, however, were cataloged on cards in the mid-twentieth century. The cataloging requires enhancement and an upgrade to new technology to meet the needs of scholars today. In addition, there is a need for libraries in Pakistan to update their systems to integrate more fully with the global community of libraries whereby materials can be located and accessed. In order to improve the catalog at ATU and other libraries in Pakistan and provide education, this workshop series proposes input from expert librarians, the hiring/training of catalogers, two workshops, and the use of a digital platform to host the catalog and integrate it with OCLC WorldCat. These steps will improve awareness of current library practices, provide access to the ATU's collections, and bring them to the forefront of Pakistani literary studies while making them available to scholars of South Asia and the greater Persianate world.
Workshop I
Workshop Leaders: Dr. C. Ryan Perkins & Dr. David Hirsch
This will be thematic workshop over two days with content on the following: a) library sciences and the role of a research library, b) technological changes in the research library, c) cataloging and romanization standards, d) linked data and WorldCat, and e) controlled vocabularies and subject headings.
On the first day, the leaders will teach about the broader field of library science and the role of research library. How have technological changes transformed the field and the practice of the library? What are the key components for having a robust research library in the 21st century? On the second day, the question will pertain to the importance of cataloging to international standards. What is OCLC/WorldCat? The emphasis will be on cataloging standards, controlled vocabularies, subject headings, and access points for individual records. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Workshop II
Workshop Leader: Dr. C. Ryan Perkins
This will be a two-day workshop to train hands-on skills. The focus of this workshop will be on creating catalog records and uploading them to OCLC/WorldCat. Several technical aspects of cataloging, including the use of diacritics, authority files, subject headings, and Romanization will be addressed. MARC and RDA cataloging standards will be the basis for performing accurate cataloging operations. The skills covered in this workshop include: a) creation of MARC records, b) Use of authority files, c) Library of Congress subject headings, and d) uploading records to WorldCat. (Find the narrative report and workshop photos here)
Sufi Shrines Workshop
On August 1-4 2014, fourteen scholars from eight countries met near Aurangabad, Maharashtra, in a workshop sponsored by six American Overseas Research Centers (AORCs), organized and hosted by AIIS. The theme of the workshop, “The Practice, Performance, and Politics of Sufi Shrines in South Asia and Beyond,” was collaboratively conceived by four South Asian AORCs (the American Institute of Bangladesh Studies, American Institute of Pakistan Studies, and American Institute of Sri Lanka Studies, together with AIIS), and its proposal was written by Carl Ernst, noted Islamic studies scholar at UNC Chapel Hill.