On June 8, 2014, CIRS and the Stony Brook Institute for Global Studies (SBIGS) held the first working group under the collaborative research initiative World Regions: The Middle Eastern Pivot. Scholars from various disciplinary backgrounds gathered for the meeting in Doha to discuss topics related to the concept of “regions,” the construction of regional identities, and world regions…
On June 22-23, 2014, CIRS held the concluding Social Currents in the Maghreb research initiative working group in Washington D.C. Participants gathered for the second time to discuss their research findings and solicit feedback from a multi-disciplinary cohort of working group members. The topics and themes discussed ranged from the mobilization of social movements in the Maghreb to…
On August 13-14, 2014, CIRS held the second working group meeting under the "Transitional Justice in the Middle East" research initiative. Regional and International scholars and experts gathered for the concluding meeting to solicit feedback on their individual paper submissions. The papers tackled a variety of themes and topics, ranging from theoretical underpinnings of transitional justice, to…
Damian Radcliffe, leader of the Rassed research program at Qatar’s Ministry of Information and Communications Technology (ictQATAR), delivered the inaugural CIRS Monthly Dialogue of the 2014-2015 academic year with a lecture on “Attitudes to Cybersafety and Online Privacy in the Middle East” on September 16, 2014. Emphasizing the importance of the topic, he noted that, despite their varying characteristics,…
On September 27-28, 2014, CIRS held the first Working Group on “The Digital Middle East” research initiative. Academics from various backgrounds gathered for this first meeting to discuss their research findings and papers around the Digital world in the Middle East. The topics ranged from the effects technology has had on the Arab uprisings to state…
Justin Gengler, Senior Researcher at the Social and Economic Survey Research Institute (SESRI) of Qatar University, delivered a CIRS Monthly Dialogue on “Studying Public Opinion in Qatar” on October 13, 2014. SESRI conducts nationally-representative, scientific household surveys of the different social groups residing in Qatar, including the local national population, professional expatriates, and labor migrants.…
On October 25-26, 2014, CIRS held its first Working Group under “The Changing Security Dynamics of the Gulf” research initiative. Academics from various disciplines gathered for their first meeting to discuss evolving national and regional security dynamics, and to identify research gaps that need to be addressed. The group drew attention to different, prevailing definitions of…
Ole Wæver, Professor of International Relations at the Department of Political Science, University of Copenhagen, and Director of the Center for Resolution of International Conflicts, delivered a CIRS Focused Discussion on October 27, 2014 on the topic “Global Security in a Post-Western World.” Introducing the lecture, Wæver noted that when world events change so quickly and…
Ian Almond, Professor of World Literature at the Georgetown University School of Foreign Service in Qatar, headed a CIRS Faculty Research Workshop on "Dissecting the Native Informant: A Case Study of Nirad C. Chaudhuri" on November 16, 2014. The workshop was held to discuss his latest work examining the related ideas of melancholy, political conservatism, and native informancy.…
Buthaina Al Ansari, founder and Chairperson of Qatariat T&D Holding Company and Senior Human Resources Director at Ooredoo, delivered a CIRS Monthly Dialogue on the topic of “Sheroes—How Female Leaders are Changing Qatar” on November 17, 2014. Al Ansari introduced the talk, which focused on the status of female leadership in Qatar, by explaining that…
On November 20-21, 2014, in partnership with the youth-oriented social initiative organization, Silatech, CIRS launched the “Youth in the Middle East” research initiative with a two day working group meeting. The meeting was hosted by the Center for Contemporary Arab Studies (CCAS) at the Georgetown University campus in Washington, DC, where participants gathered from various countries…
On December 1, 2014, Neha Vora, Assistant Professor of Anthropology at Lafayette College, delivered a CIRS Monthly Dialogue on the topic “Impossible Citizens: Dubai’s Indian Diaspora.” Much of the research she conducted was during the “boom” years of Dubai’s economic growth, when “Brand Dubai” was establishing the city as a commercial and tourism hub to attract…