2009-10 News and Transitions
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Dear Friends of the Abbasi Program,

As the summer winds to a close, we are excited to kick-off the 2009-10 Academic Year with several announcements concerning our affiliates and events.

● The Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies welcomes new program director, Shahzad Bashir. Shahzad is Associate Professor in the Department of Religious Studies, and he specializes in the intellectual and social history of Iran and Central and Southern Asia from the fourteenth century to the present. He is the author of numerous articles and two books, Messianic Hopes and Mystical Visions: The Nurbakhshiya Between Medieval and Modern Islam (2003) and Fazlallah Astarabadi and the Hurufis (2005). Shahzad is currently finishing a book entitled Bodies of God’s Friends: Sufis in Persianate Islamic Societies.

We express our gratitude to Robert Gregg, Teresa Hihn Moore Professor of Religious Studies, who has been the program director since 2002. During his tenure, the Abbasi Program helped create at Stanford a vibrant, interdisciplinary community focusing on the study of Islam and Muslim societies. Bob, now retired, will be on campus this year, bringing to a conclusion his book manuscript about early Jewish, Christian and Muslim interpretations of a number of “sacred” stories that the Hebrew Bible, Christian Bible and Qur'an have in common.

● Michael Cooperson joins the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies as a visiting professor in Autumn 2009 and Winter 2010. Michael is Professor of Arabic Language and Literature at the University of California, Los Angeles. He received his PhD from Harvard University. Among his numerous publications are Classical Arabic Biography (2000), Interpreting the Self: Autobiography in the Arabic literary tradition (2001), Al-Ma’mun (2005) and The Dictionary of Literary Biography: Arabic Literary Culture, 500-915 (2005). His current research focuses on the career of the musician Ibrahim al-Mawsili to study the uses of Persian narrative traditions in Arabic biography and the nature of Persian and Arab ethnicity in the early Abbasid period. Michael will teach three courses during his stay at Stanford -- COMPLIT 222 Time-Travel Literature (Autumn 2009: Mon & Wed 2:15 pm-3:45 pm), HISTORY 281D/381D The Origins and Formation of Islam (Winter 2010: Mon & Wed 2:15 pm-3:45 pm), and RELIGSTU 222C/322C Debauchery and Asceticism (Winter 2010: Tue & Th 2:15 pm-4:05pm).

● Dr. Stéphane Lacroix, 2008-09 Abbasi Program Postdoctoral Fellow, will start as Assistant Professor in the Middle East-Mediterranean Studies Program at Sciences Po in Paris. During his stay at Stanford, Stéphane taught three courses, submitted a number of scholarly articles, and completed his  book manuscript, entitled Les Islamistes Saoudiens: Une Insurrection Manqué (Presses Universitaires de France, November 2009). A slightly revised English version of his book will be published by Harvard University Press in 2010. Stéphane’s new research will focus on transnationalization of Salafism in particular Western and South-East Asian cases. We wish him all the best in his new position and look forward to his research updates.

● We are now on Facebook! To join our Facebook group, please go to http://www.facebook.com/p.php?i=1237885863&k=Z4F2QVRSS4TA3GCEYCXU&oid=51863307886. The name of our group is The Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies, Stanford University.

● Have you marked your calendar for our Fall 09 events? A copy of the schedule is available at http://www.stanford.edu/dept/islamic_studies/events.html.

● Still shopping for classes? Make room in your schedule for courses on the study of Islam and Muslim societies. Course listings are available at http://www.stanford.edu/dept/islamic_studies/courses.html

We look forward to seeing you at our upcoming events. Should you have any questions or concerns, please do not hesitate to contact our office by email at abbasiprogram @ stanford.edu.