"The Other Town" (2011; dirs. Nefin Dinç and Hercules Millas; 45 min.)
Why do neighbors fight? Why do the world’s ethnic and religious groups experience mutual hatred and suspicion? The Other Town (2011, 45 minutes, in Turkish & Greek with English subtitles) explores how the inhabitants in Dimitsana (Greece) and Birgi (Turkey) are caught in a web of stereotypes that impede bilateral relations between Turkey and Greece. Interviewing the inhabitants during the span of a year, directors Nefin Dinç and Hercules Millas illustrate the turbulent relations between the two countries exist not so much due to their contentious past, but also due to the influence of nationalist ideology on higher education system and everyday life.
Nefin Dinç is Associate Professor at State University of New York at Fredonia. She studied Economics at Ankara University. She holds a Masters degree in Media and Culture from Strathclyde University, Scotland as well as a MFA degree in Documentary Filmmaking from the University of North Texas. She has produced four documentaries on Turkey and its surrounding countries, specifically The Republic Train, Rebetiko: The Song of Two Cities, I Named Her Angel, and Violette Verdy: The Artist Teacher. She is also Director of Youth Filmmaking Project in Turkey, a project sponsored by the U.S. Department of State to teach young Turkish students how to make short films. Currently, she is working on a documentary film about this project.
Annenberg Auditorium
Cummings Art Building
435 Lasuen Mall
International Scholars in Residence at the Humanities Center 2012-2013
International Scholars in Residence at the Humanities Center 2012-2013
Distinguished scholars from Egypt, New Zealand, South Africa, and Turkey have been chosen as joint Stanford Humanities Center/FSI international visitors.
The Stanford Humanities Center and the Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies (FSI) are pleased to announce that four international scholars have been chosen to come to Stanford in 2012-13 as part of a jointly sponsored international program entering its fourth year. Nominated by Stanford departments and research centers, the international scholars will be on campus for four-week residencies. They will have offices at the Humanities Center and will be affiliated with their nominating unit, the Humanities Center, and FSI.
A major purpose of the residencies is to bring high-profile international scholars into the intellectual life of the university, targeting scholars whose research and writing engage with the missions of both the Humanities Center and FSI.
The following scholars have been selected for the upcoming academic year:
Maha Abdel-Rahman (April 2013) is a Lecturer in Development Studies at the University of Cambridge, and an Egyptian academic and activist. She holds a PhD from the Dutch Institute of Social Studies. While at Stanford, she will research the relationship between social movements and civil society in Egypt, and will give seminars based on her book project, On Protest Movements and Uprisings: Egypt’s Permanent Revolution. She was nominated by the Abbasi Program in Islamic Studies.
Mohamed Adhikari (May 2013) is an Associate Professor in the Historical Studies Department at the University of Cape Town, South Africa.
Mohamed Adhikari (May 2013) is an Associate Professor in the Historical Studies Department at the University of Cape Town, South Africa. He will explore the relationship between European settler colonialism and genocide in hunter-gatherer societies, and will bring to campus a comparative perspective on genocide, race, identity and language. His latest publication, The Anatomy of a South African Genocide: The Extermination of the Cape San Peoples (2010) was the first to deal with the topic of genocide in the South African context. He will also present from his edited book, Invariably Genocide?: When Hunter-gatherers and Commercial Stock Farmers Clash, due for publication in 2013. He was nominated by the Center for African Studies.
Nuray Mert (October 2012) is an Associate Professor of Political Science and International Relations at Istanbul University. She is a political observer and contributor to Turkey’s major newspapers (Milliyet and Hûrriyet Daily News), one of the few contemporary Turkish public intellectuals with an academic background and a journalist’s investigative mind. An outspoken critic on sensitive issues in the Turkish context such as rights of minorities (the Kurdish Question), freedom of religion and of press, she will lecture on the geopolitical implications of the Arab Spring for Turkey and the Middle East, and on Turkey’s accession to the European Union in light of the financial crisis of the Euro-zone. She was nominated by the Mediterranean Studies Forum.
Te Maire Tau (February 2013) is an Associate Professor of History at the University of Canterbury in New Zealand.
In addition to the jointly-sponsored program with FSI, the Humanities Center will also bring international visitors from France and India as part of the international programs at the Humanities Center.
Denis Lacorne (January 2013) is a prominent French public intellectual and Professor of Political Science at CERI (Centre d’Etudes et de Recherches Internationales) Sciences Po in Paris. Lacorne will give presentations on French and American notions of religious toleration, deriving from his latest book on US and French secularism which demonstrates that, despite some striking similarities between US secularism and French laïcité, the secularization of French society has followed a different path from that of American society. He was nominated by the French Culture Workshop, and the History Department.
Himanshu Prabha Ray (April 2013) is an historian of Ancient India at Jawaharlal Nehru University in New Delhi, where she works in the fields of ancient India and maritime archaeology. During her residency, she will discuss and finalize her current book project, Return of the Buddha: Ancient symbols for modern India, as well as her research on the creation of a public discourse around Buddhism in the colonial and post-colonial period in India. The Buddha, in her account, is not statically located in history, but rather contested within settings of colonialism, post-colonialism and nation-building. She was nominated by the Classics Department, with the support of the Department of Religious Studies, the Center for South Asia, the Ho Center for Buddhist Studies, and the Archaeology Center.
While at Stanford, the scholars will offer informal seminars and public lectures and will also be available for consultations with interested faculty and students. For additional information, please contact Marie-Pierre Ulloa, mpulloa@stanford.edu.
Relevant URLs:
Stanford Humanities Center
Contact:
Marie-Pierre Ulloa
Senior Executive Officer for International Programs
Stanford Humanities Center
(650) 724 8106, mpulloa@stanford.edu
The Unripe Fruits of Rapprochement: Greek-Turkish Relations and the Cyprus Question in the Post-Helsinki Era
Ever since December 1999, when Greece lifted its longstanding veto and Turkey became an EU candidate state, Greece and Turkey have attempted to overcome animosity and mistrust and resolve their perennial disputes. I argue that despite significant improvements at the level of economic, energy cooperation and minority rights, no breakthrough has been achieved on high-politics issues. The intractable Cyprus question has remained the biggest burden to any reconciliation attempt. Positive spillover of functional cooperation cannot by itself overcome the legacy of decades of acrimonious relations and accumulated disputes. Greece’s mounting economic and social crisis and Turkey’s new foreign policy activism can pose additional obstacles to the resolution of longstanding disputes, absent determined leadership on both sides. Only strong, visionary leadership on both sides can help overcome the pending stalemate.
Ioannis Grigoriadis is Assistant Professor of Political Science at Bilkent University (Ankara, Turkey) and Research Fellow at the Hellenic Foundation for European and Foreign Policy (ELIAMEP). He received his M.A. in International Affairs from the School of International & Public Affairs at Columbia University, and his Ph.D. in Politics from the School of Oriental & African Studies at the University of London. He specializes in European, Middle Eastern and comparative politics with a particular focus on energy politics, nationalism, and democratization. Among his publications are “Redefining the Nation: The Shifting Boundaries of the ‘Other’ in Greece and Turkey” (in Middle Eastern Studies, 2011), “Europe and the Impasse of Centre-Left Politics in Turkey: Lessons from the Greek Experience” ( in Journal of Balkan and Near Eastern Studies, 2010), Trials of Europeanization: Turkish Political Culture and the European Union (2009), “Friends No More?: The Rise of Anti-American Nationalism in Turkey” (in Middle East Journal, 2010), “Islam and Democratization in Turkey: Secularism and Trust in a Divided Society” (in Democratization, 2009), and “On the Europeanization of Minority Rights Protection: Comparing the Cases of Greece and Turkey” (in Mediterranean Politics, 2008)
Part of the 2011-12 lecture series on Greece and Turkey, sponsored by The Mediterranean Studies Forum and the Europe Center
CISAC Conference Room
Nationalism qua Modernization: The Greek War of Independence
*PLEASE NOTE: This event has been moved from the Reuben W. Hills Conference Room to the CISAC Conference Room (C231) in Encina Hall Central, 2nd floor.
This lecture aims to situate the Greek War of Independence in the wider context of the clash between Tradition and Modernity in the European periphery. Focusing on the emergence of nationalism as a movement and an ideology, I explore the Greek War of Independence in terms of both its political dimensions and also its contribution to a much broader societal change. I argue that the Greek struggle for independence may be interpreted as a ‘Greek exit’ from tradition. In this respect, on the one hand, it constitutes an undoubtedly unique event of momentous importance per se, and yet, on the other hand, another instance of a prolonged and very intricate process of societal transformation.
Mediterranean Studies Forum, 2011-12 Greece & Turkey Lecture Series
Co-sponsored by The Europe Center
CISAC Conference Room
Migration and State Formation in the Aftermath of the Ottoman Empire
* Please note that this event has been moved from Feb. 22nd to Feb. 15th
The Ottoman Empire started and ended in migration. While the movements of people that shaped the empire and its boundaries in the early part of its history were, to a large extent, voluntary, those that marked the end of the Ottoman Empire were compulsory. Multi-ethnic and multi-religious communities of the empire all around the empire were torn apart and almost the entire non-Muslim population of the empire were deported, killed, or marginalized as minorities. This presentation compares the early and later types of migration, explains the forces that brought the shift from the first to the second, and describes how these developments affected the status of the Greek population of Anatolia
in the early decades of the 20th century.
Professor Kasaba will be signing copies of his book, A Moveable Empire: Ottoman Nomads, Migrants, and Refugees starting at 4:45pm. This will be immediately be followed by his lecture at 5:15pm.
Reşat Kasaba is Stanley D. Golub Professor of International Studies and Director of Jackson School of International Studies at the University of Washington. His research on the Ottoman Empire and Turkey has covered economic history, state-society relations, migration, ethnicity and nationalism, and urban history with a focus on Izmir. He has also published several books and articles that shed light on different aspects of the transformation of the Ottoman Empire and modern Turkey in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries.
Co-sponsored with the Mediterranean Studies Forum
CISAC Conference Room
Democratic Transition and Development in the Arab World
The third ARD annual conference examineي the challenges, key issues, and ways forward for social and economic development in the Arab world during this period of democratic transition.
Day One - April 26, 2012
9:15-10:45am Opening Panel – International & Domestic Frameworks for Development
Welcoming Remarks: Larry Diamond and Lina Khatib, Stanford University
George Kossaifi, Dar Al-Tanmiyah:
Towards an Integrated Social Policy of the Arab Youth
10:45-11:00am Break
11:00-12:30am Session 1: Political Economy of Reform
Chair: Hicham Ben Abdallah, Stanford University
Mongi Boughzala, University of Tunis El-Manar:
Economic Reforms in Egypt and Tunisia: Revolutionary Change and an Uncertain Agenda
Abdulwahab Alkebsi, Center for International Private Enterprise:
Answering Calls for Economic Dignity
12:30-1:30pm Lunch
1:30-3:00pm Session 2: Oil-Dependent Economies and Social and Political Development
Chair: Larry Diamond, Stanford University
Hedi Larbi, World Bank:
Development and Democracy in Transition Oil-rich Countries in MENA
Ibrahim Saif, Carnegie Middle East Center:
Lessons from the Gulf's Twin Shocks
3:00-3:30pm Break
3:30-5:00pm Session 3: Youth, ICTs, and Development Opportunities
Chair: Ayca Alemdaroglu, Stanford University
Loubna Skalli-Hanna, American University:
Youth and ICTs in MENA: Development Alternatives and Possibilities
Hatoon Ajwad Al-Fassi, King Saud University:
Social Media in Saudi Arabia, an era of youth social representation
Day Two - April 27, 2012
9:00-10:30am Session 1: Civil Society Development
Chair: Sean Yom, Temple University
Laryssa Chomiak, Centre d’Etudes Maghrebines à Tunis (CEMAT):
Civic Resistance to Civil Society: Institutionalizing Dissent in Post-Revolutionary Tunisia
Rihab Elhaj, New Libya Foundation:
Building Libyan Civil Society
10:30-11:00am Break
11:00-12:30pm Session 2: Democratic Transition and the Political Development of Women
Chair: Katie Zoglin, Human Rights Lawyer
Valentine Moghadam, Northeastern University:
The Gender of Democracy: Why It Matters
Amaney Jamal, Princeton University:
Reforms in Personal Status Laws and Women’s Rights in the Arab World
12:30-1:30pm Lunch
1:30-3:00pm Session 3: Minority Rights as a Key Component of Development
Chair: Lina Khatib, Stanford University
Mona Makram-Ebeid, American University in Cairo:
Challenges Facing Minority Rights in Democratic Transition (title TBC)
Nadim Shehadi, Chatham House:
The Other Turkish Model: Power Sharing and Minority Rights in the Arab Transitions
3:00-3:30pm Break
3:30-4:45pm Session 4: Towards Integrated Development in the Arab World
Chair: Larry Diamond, Stanford University
Closing roundtable discussion: Scenarios for integrated development
4:45-5:45pm Reception
Bechtel Conference Center