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New York University Abu Dhabi Institute (NYUADI) has recently announced a series of events open to the public throughout the month of September. Driven towards fostering students’ creativity and critical reflection, this is one of the university’s initiatives to equip students with the necessary ingredients to expand their frontiers of knowledge.
The series of public events for the month of September includes:
The Decline and Fall of the Safavid Empire
September 14 , 2014, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
In today’s intellectual climate, decline has become a contested notion with regard to the history of Middle Eastern states, even while we still legitimately talk about Dutch, British, and now, American decline. In the case of the Iranian dynasty of the Safavids, the notion of decline preceding their abrupt fall in 1722 is impossible to deny, circumvent, or ignore. To gain a better perspective on the causes of this fall, this lecture compares conditions in the Safavid realm with those in two adjacent states—the Ottomans and the Mughals. The conclusion examines the historiographical lessons of Safavid decline, and what today’s rulers and citizens of the region might learn from this example.
Speakers
Rudi Matthee Munroe Distinguished Professor of History, University of Delaware
Commodities, Culture, and Maritime Technology: Connecting the Indian Ocean World
September 17, 2014, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
Fishermen, sailors, and merchants travelled the Indian Ocean as early as the third millennium BCE, linking the world’s earliest civilizations from Africa to East Asia in a complex web of relationships. The commodities exchanged and transported through voyages and sold at markets or bazaars along the Indian Ocean littoral included aromatics, medicines, dyes, spices, grain, wood, textiles, gems, stones, ornaments, metals, and plant and animal products. While trade might have underpinned many of these relationships, the Ocean was also a highway for the exchange of religious cultures and specialized technologies. The expansion of Hinduism, Buddhism, Islam and Christianity helped define the boundaries of this Indian Ocean ‘world’, creating networks of religious travel and pilgrimage. This lecture presents an overview of the forces that united the societies of the Indian Ocean world before the 14th century.
Speakers
Himanshu Prabha Ray Chairperson, National Monuments Authority, New Delhi
Hamama
September 21, 2014, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
Receiving the Special Jury Award from the 2010 Dubai International Film Festival and Best Documentary from the 2011 Arab Film Festival in Malmo, Sweden, Hamama provides a window into the life a nearly 90 year-old female living legend in the UAE. As a long-revered healer, she receives hundreds of visitors each day in Al Dhaid, Sharjah, who come seeking her essential cures. Yet Hamama struggles with the responsibility of providing the care that is so greatly needed, while confronting her growing fragility that threatens to impact her work and livelihood. Q&A to follow with the director and the writer.
Speakers
Nujoom Alghanem Director and Producer, Hamama
Khalid Al Budoor Writer and Researcher, Hamama
Lines and Flows: The Beginning and End of Borders
September 24, 2014, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
The nature of borders in today's global context has radically changed. Borders must be viewed as global “flows” of goods and people as much as “lines” on a map marking the transition from one sovereignty to another. This perspective fundamentally alters our understanding of the relationship between security and economic competitiveness.
This lecture examines the dramatic implications this has had for American, Middle Eastern, and international policies and practices of border management as well as on our enforcement approach to transnational organized criminals, including terrorists who populate the underworld of globalization.
Speakers
Alan Bersin Assistant Secretary of International Affairs and Chief Diplomatic Officer, Department of Homeland Security
The Crochet Coral Reef Project
September 29, 2014, 10:00 a.m.—9:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
Coral reefs are being devastated by pollution, global warming, and ocean acidification. In response to this environmental tragedy, in 2005 Margaret and Christine Wertheim of the Institute For Figuring in Los Angeles began to crochet a reef. Today their Crochet Coral Reef is perhaps the largest art and science project on the planet—more than 7000 people have contributed to making vast wooly seascapes.
In this exhibition, the NYUAD Institute presents the newest iteration of the project—a giant Crochet Coral Forest. Also on show is the NYUAD Satellite Reef, the latest addition to an ever-growing archipelago of community-made crochet reefs worldwide.
Curated by
The Institute for Figuring and the NYUAD Institute
Radical Craft: Re-imagining Crochet
September 29, 2014, 6:30 – 8:00 p.m.
NYU Abu Dhabi Saadiyat Campus
A giant coral forest crocheted out of wool and plastic trash; a life-sized crochet reproduction of a mountain lion; undulating playspaces handicrafted from tons of nylon fiber. Crochet has long since burst traditional boundaries and established itself as a sculptural medium. Here, artists at the forefront of a new ‘radical craft’ movement discuss how crochet can open unexpected paths to imagining and being in the world. The event is presented in conjunction with the NYUAD Institute’s exhibition of the Crochet Coral Reef.
Panelists
Toshiko Horiuchi MacAdam Textile Artist; Researcher
Shauna Richardson Crochetdermist
Christine Wertheim Co-creator Crochet Coral Reef; Professor, Department of Critical Studies, California Institute of the Arts
Moderated by
Jill Magi Senior Lecturer, Writing Program, NYUAD
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