NMCGSA 18th Annual Graduate Student Symposium
Power, Patronage, and Politics: Taking Stock of Empires
Location: The Faculty Club of the University of Toronto
SYMPOSIUM SCHEDULE
WEDNESDAY FEBRUARY 26th AFTERNOON – “EMPIRES”
2:00pm
Opening Remarks
SESSION A: MATERIAL CULTURE FROM FRONTIER TO METROPOLE
CHAIR: Robert Martin (University of Toronto) Presiding
2:05 pm
Ayse Bike Baykara (University of Illinois Urbana Champaign), Politics of the Arena and How did Roman
Pergamon Utilize Architecture to reflect a particular identity and ideology?
2:25 pm
Candis Haak (University of Toronto), Royal Patrons of Pilgrimage: Space, Ritual, and Reference as
Subject Makers of the Vijayanagara Empire
2:45 pm
Aimee Miles (Koç University), Roman civic infrastructure as pacification and propaganda: Case studies
in Lycia and Pamphylia from the 1st century B.C. to the 1st century A.D.
3:05 pm
Radovan Kabatiar (University of Toronto), Life on the Periphery, Life at the Crossroads. Subsistence
strategies at Kinet Höyük (Turkey) in the Late Bronze and Early Iron Ages
3:25-3:40 PM COFFEE BREAK
SESSION B: THE NEO-ASSYRIAN EMPIRE
CHAIR: Odette Boivin (University of Toronto) Presiding
3:40 pm
Jennifer Finn (Ludwig-Maximilians Universität), Rethinking The Sin of Sargon within Assyro-Babylonian
Imperial Discourse
4:00 pm
Yan Jia (Harvard University), Opening the Imperial Doors of Assyria: A Spatial Reading of the NeoAssyrian Monumental Doors from Balawat
4:20 pm
Amanda Lanham (Harvard University), The Art of Emulation: “Assyrianization” at Tell Fekheriye and
Carchemish
4:40 pm
Tracy L. Spurrier (University of Toronto), “Alme, Akšud, Ašlula šallassunu!” Searching for evidence of
Neo Assyrian Kings sharing their glory
5:00-5:30 PM
DEFINING EMPIRE DISCUSSION
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 27th MORNING – “THOUGHT”
9:30 AM
WELCOME COFFEE HOUR
SESSION C: MEDIEVAL ISLAMIC THOUGHT
CHAIR: Mustafa Banister (University of Toronto) Presiding
10:00 am
Yehia Amin (University of Toronto), Between Peripatetic and Mystic: Studying Suhrawardi's Early
Thought
10:25 am
Khalil Andani (Harvard Divinity School), The Metaphysics of Tawhīd: Ismā‘īlī and Akbarī Perspectives
10:50-11:05 AM
COFFEE BREAK
SESSION D: REFLECTIONS ON MODERN INTELLECTUAL THOUGHT
CHAIR: Usman Hamid (University of Toronto) Presiding
11:05am
Dina Fergani (University of Toronto), Abdallah al-Nadim and the 19th century Egyptian intellectual
milieu: Modern, all too modern?
11:30am
Sabrina M. Guerrieri (University of Toronto), Shari’ati’s Third World Existentialism: reconciling “antimaterialism” and “Islamic Marxism”
11:55am
Netanel Silverman (University of Toronto), What Grows from New York Concrete: Haim Nahman
Bialik’s Romantic Tidhar (Elm Tree) and Mahmoud Darwish’s Ironic Zanbak (Lily)
12:20-2:00 PM LUNCH BREAK
THURSDAY FEBRUARY 27th AFTERNOON – “EGYPT”
SESSION E: ANCIENT EGYPT
CHAIR: Janet Khuu (University of Toronto) Presiding
2:00 pm
Thomas H. Greiner (University of Toronto), Byblos and its Egyptian Connections in the late 2nd
Millennium BC
2:25 pm
Renata Schiavo (Pisa University), Royal and non-royal ancestor worship in Ancient Egypt: a diachronic
perspective
2:50-3:05 PM
COFFEE BREAK
SESSION F: EGYPT IN THE 19TH AND 20TH CENTURIES
CHAIR Noha Abou-Khatwa (University of Toronto) Presiding
3:05 pm
Fadia Bahgat (McGill University), The Case of the Maltese Women Evaders
3:30 pm
Meira Gold (University of Toronto), Victorian Egyptology in Context: The Egypt Exploration Fund's
search for the biblical exodus route
3:55 pm
Eric Schewe (University of Michigan), No Photography in Military Areas: The Imperial Origins of
Egyptian Spacial Security Techniques in World War II
SESSION G: INSIDE SYRIA TODAY
CHAIR: Tracy L. Spurrier (University of Toronto) Presiding
4:20 pm
Rasha Elendari (University of Toronto), and Joanna Kader (Gordon Kirke Q. C.), Assad and Isis: Syrians
on the horns of a dilemma
5:30 PM
SYMPOSIUM RECEPTION – NMC DEPARTMENT (4 BANCROFT AVE) CONFERENCE ROOM 200B