“Super Saver” Annual Meeting Registration Rate Ends Soon!

There are just a few days left to take advantage of the “super saver” discount registration rate for the IQSA Annual Meeting in Atlanta! The Annual Meeting, held in conjunction with the SBL/AAR Annual Meetings, 20-23 November, is a valuable opportunity to connect with scholars from around the world and explore the latest in Qur’anic research. The “super saver” rate is available now through Thursday 21 May. Please register through the SBL website here.

Members of IQSA could save up to $70 by registering for the Annual Meetings as an Affiliate Member! Not an IQSA member? Please join IQSA today! We hope you’ll join us and meet us in Atlanta!

(1) العضوية مجانية – To join our academic community today, please submit a Membership Form here: http://members.iqsaweb.org/Join-Us

(2) التسجيل بسعر مخفض إلى ٢٢/٥/٢٠١٥ – Annual Meeting Registration (deeply discounted through 21 May 2015):

https://www.eiseverywhere.com/ereg/index.php?eventid=119829&categoryid=1021237&t=ccee0d3cfcb94900b333ce9916cb48fe

IQSA 2015 – Updates & Announcements

Dear Friends,

I trust this message finds you well, and for those of us nearing the end of our academic year I wish you all the best of luck. Since our meeting in San Diego, the International Qur’anic Studies Association (IQSA) has successfully completed a number of important activities, and we continue to develop the organization to better serve our members and fulfill our mission and vision. The purpose of this message is to inform about our recent activity.

New Homepage & Welcome Video

To serve you better our landing page on IQSAWEB.ORG is now simpler than ever. Visitors are given a warm welcome and introduction to IQSA by watching leading members of the community speak on VIDEO. Furthermore, the number on the page has been reduced to include only what is essential—enjoy!

IQSA Membership & AM Registration

To become an official MEMBER of IQSA for 2015, and to receive exclusive mmber benefits, please GO HERE (http://members.iqsaweb.org). There is a flat $25 membership fee for 2015. (Note that if you became an IQSA member in 2014 you need to sign up once again for 2015)

To attend/present in our 2015 annual meeting, taking place in Atlanta this November, you will need to REGISTER through the SBL website HERE (https://www.eiseverywhere.com/ereg/index.php?eventid=119829&categoryid=1021237&t=ccee0d3cfcb94900b333ce9916cb48fe). You will register as an “affiliate.”

Now Online: RQR and Membership Directory

Current IQSA members already have access to exclusive member benefits, namely:

* The Review of Qur’anic Research (ACTIVE)

* Membership Directory (ACTIVE)

Coming Soon: Qur’an Seminar, Job Board and JIQSA

Current and future members will soon have access to the following exclusive services and products as well:

* The interactive Qur’an Seminar website (2015)

* IQSA Job Board (2016)

* The Journal of the International Qur’anic Studies Association (2016)

2015 International Meeting (Yogyakarta, Indonesia)

Our much anticipated international meeting in Yogyakarta, Indonesia will take place August 4-7, 2015. We are very excited about this conference and the international scholarly exchange it will foster. We are also very pleased with the interest of our members and the public in attending this conference. For more information please GO HERE (https://iqsaweb.org/meetings/im2015)

2015 Annual Meeting (Atlanta, GA, USA)

The program for Atlanta is almost set and promises to be both informative as well as exciting. For more information please GO HERE (https://iqsaweb.org/meetings/) and do not forget to become a MEMBER and REGISTER (See above).

Be an IQSA citizen – nominate future officers

All IQSA members are encouraged to submit names of potential candidates for the following positions:

* President Elect for 2016

* IQSA Board Member

* Nominating Committee Member

Nominations should be sent to contact@iqsaweb.org. For more information please GO HERE (https://iqsaweb.org/2015/04/21/call-for-nominations)

Share your research – BLOG, RQR or JIQSA

If you or a colleague are currently undertaking research as a faculty member or post-doc, working on a new project as a graduate assistant or would like to share information about an upcoming Qur’an related conference, workshop or service, please consider writing a blog post for us. Your blog post will receive one to two thousand views in the first week! Blog posts in languages other than English are acceptable. Blog contributions should be sent to Dr. Vanessa Degifis (vdegifis@wayne.edu)

Scholarly reviews should be submitted to RQR and academic articles to JIQSA (See above).

Needed: Two Grad Student Assistants

We are seeking two graduate students assistants to help out with editorial and online assistance. This is a great opportunity for networking, professional development and hand-on experience. Learn more about these positions HERE (https://iqsaweb.org/2015/03/16/iqsa_jobs_grad_assts). Applications are welcome anytime but an initial review of applications will take place by June 1, 2015.

Social Media

Don’t forget to follow us on Twitter @IQSAWEB and Like us on Facebook, search “International Qur’anic Studies Association.”

Special Thanks

IQSA’s continued success is not possible without the dedication and skill of its officers and employees. I would especially like to thank Irfana Hussain, Vanessa DeGifis, Mun’im Sirry, Sean Anthony, Catherine Bronson, Mehdi Azaiez, Gabriel Reynolds, Nicolai Sinai as well as all unit chairs, Michael Pregill, Holger Zellentin and Missy Colee and her team at SBL.

Finally, please do not forget to join IQSA by becoming a MEMBER and REGISTERING for our 2015 Atlanta annual meeting by May 22, 2015. That’s one month away!

On behalf of the Board of Directors, Standing Committees and our partners I would like to express our deepest gratitude to all IQSA members and friends.

Sincerely,

Emran El-Badawi, Executive Director

Join IQSA and Save on Meeting Registration Rates! عضوية الجمعية مفتوحة الآن

The IQSA Annual Meeting in Atlanta, 20-23 November, will be held in conjunction with the SBL/AAR Annual Meetings. You could save up to $70 by joining IQSA and registering for the Annual Meetings as an Affiliate Member! Registration is now open on the SBL website here. Take advantage of an additional “super saver” discount by registering now through 21 May. We hope you’ll join us and meet us in Atlanta!

** PLEASE DO THE FOLLOWING **

(1) العضوية مجانية – To join our academic community today (for free!) simply submit a Membership Form here: http://members.iqsaweb.org/Join-Us

(2) التسجيل بسعر مخفض إلى ٢٢/٥/٢٠١٥ – Annual Meeting Registration (Discounted until May 22, 2015) :

https://www.eiseverywhere.com/ereg/index.php?eventid=119829&categoryid=1021237&t=ccee0d3cfcb94900b333ce9916cb48fe

CFP Deadline Extension (Fri, Mar 6) & Clarification

It has come to our attention that the online paper proposal system IQSA uses through SBL closed on March 4, i.e. one day earlier than stated deadline of March 5 in our original Call for Papers. We apologize for this discrepancy and any inconvenience this has caused. We are, furthermore, extending the deadline for submissions until tomorrow, Friday, March 6, 11 PM EDT.

Proposals should be sent directly to the program unit chairs. See below:

Linguistic, Literary, and Thematic Perspectives on the Qur’anic Corpus

Program Unit Chairs:

Anne-Sylvie Boisliveau (asboisliveau@gmail.com) , Sarra Tlili (satlili@ufl.edu )

Qur’an Seminar

Program Unit Chairs:

Mehdi Azaiez (mehdi.azaiez@theo.kuleuven.be) and Clare Wilde (cewilde@alumni.princeton.edu)

Qur’anic Studies: Methodology and Hermeneutics

Program Unit Chairs:

Karen Bauer (kbauer@iis.ac.uk) and Farid Esack (fesack@uj.ac.za)

The Qur’an and Late Antiquity

Program Unit Chairs:

Michael Pregill (michael.pregill@gmail.com) and Greg Fisher (greg.fisher@carleton.ca)

The Qur’an and the Biblical Tradition

Program Unit Chairs:

Cornelia Horn (cbhorn68@gmail.com) and Holger Zellentin (Holger.Zellentin@nottingham.ac.uk)

The Qur’an: Manuscripts and Material Culture

Program Unit Chairs:

Keith Small (keithsmall44@hotmail.com) and Luke Treadwell (luke.treadwell@orinst.ox.ac.uk)

Last Call: CFP Deadline MAR 5 & 2015 Membership Open

Dear friends and colleagues,

I trust this message finds you well. This is a quick reminder that the Call for Papers deadline for November Annual Meeting in Atlanta is this Thursday, March 5. I want to encourage you all to submit a title/abstract, and to do so right away, HERE: https://iqsaweb.org/meetings/am2015/. Finally, if you have not done so already, please become an IQSA Member for the 2015 calendar year HERE: https://iqsaweb.org/2015/03/02/membership_open_2015/ (Enjoy the VIDEO!)

Thank you for making IQSA a success. I hope to share more good news with you all soon.

Warm regards

–Emran

___________________________________________

Emran El-Badawi, PhD

Executive Director, International Qur’anic Studies Association

CFP Highlight: Qur’an Manuscripts and Material Culture

For the IQSA 2015 Annual Meeting in Atlanta, the Qur’an: Manuscripts and Material Culture program unit will host two panels. For the first panel, we invite papers that deal with all eras and regions of the Qur’an’s manuscript tradition, as well as the variety of palaeographic, art historical, codicological, and historical issues one encounters in the discipline.

MS Mingana Islamic Arabic 1563, f.26v, l.2

For example, a paper topic may focus on a particular manuscript or group of manuscripts, a feature of orthographic development, a particular script style, the dating of manuscripts, issues of textual criticism, systems of qira’at, the Qur’anic arts of the book, or another feature of Qur’anic manuscript studies not listed here but that fits the general parameters of the program unit.

For the second panel, we invite contributions on any aspect of the Qur’an’s history and pre-history that lies outside the manuscript tradition. The second panel aims to provide a forum for the study of the Qur’an as it was applied to objects of daily use as well as elite artifacts and buildings, and for the investigation of scholarly reactions to these developments in hadith collections and other textual sources. For example, topics relating to Qur’anic citation in the epigraphic (including graffiti as well as formal inscriptions), architectural, ceramic, numismatic and papyrological records and the use of the Qur’an in funerary, apotropaic, and prophylactic contexts would be most welcome. Topics concerning pre-Islamic inscriptions that might have a bearing on the later formulation of the text of the Qur’an are also welcome.

Proposals should include a title and an abstract of approximately 400 words. Click here to submit a proposal to the Qur’an: Manuscripts and Material Culture program unit.

Click here to view the complete IQSA 2015 Annual Meeting CFP.

Annual Meeting 2015 Call for Papers Now Open!

The International Qur’anic Studies Association announces the call for papers for the 2015 Annual Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia. The Annual Meeting dates are November 20-23, 2015.

Each of IQSA’s six program units provides a detailed call for papers; all are available on the complete AM 2015 CFP page HERE. From the CFP page, you can click on the title of a program unit to be directed to an external link for further instructions on submission of proposals. For additional information about a specific program unit, you may contact the unit chairs.

The paper proposal submission deadline is March 5, 2015. IQSA welcomes your submission and looks forward to an exciting program in Atlanta!

IQSA, SBL and AAR in the News

The success of IQSA’s annual meetings in San Diego, CA (2014) and Baltimore, MD (2013) have contributed positively to the tremendous work done every year by both the Society of Biblical Literature (SBL) as well as the American Academy of Religion (AAR). For more information, please see the excerpts below from two articles in Publishers Weekly.

Topics being buzzed about by the religion academy included Islam, once again at the top of the list. The International Qur’anic Studies Association, which meets in conjunction with AAR/SBL and was established in 2012 as a group related to SBL, earlier this year became an independent learned society and has grown to 450 members. (2014)

SEE FULL STORY HERE

One of the most significant developments at this year’s AAR/SBL conference was the debut of the International Quranic Studies Association, which had its inaugural gathering as an affiliate scholars group and is co-directed by Emran El-Badawi, director of Arab studies at the University of Houston, and Gabriel Said Reynolds, professor of Islamic studies and theology at the University of Notre Dame. It’s an idea whose time clearly has come, and publishing about Islam LINK in general continues to flourish. (2013)

SEE FULL STORY HERE

A Letter of Thanks to IQSA Members

Dear IQSA members and friends,

I hope this message reaches you well, and that you found our time together in San Diego, both enlightening as well as enjoyable. Like many of you, I had the pleasure of meeting old friends and making new ones. I speak for myself, council and all IQSA officers when I say that we are quite pleased with how the conference went. Our sessions were well attended, and the papers were engaging and thought provoking. Our current membership numbers over 450 from all around the world, and we had the pleasure of having over one hundred of them represented during the Friday sessions, especially the keynote lecture and reception. 50 people attended our first business meeting, at which prof. Farid Esack was unanimously voted president elect for 2015.

We are, furthermore, heartened and impressed by the enthusiasm for IQSA–both within North American and internationally. Participants and audience members came from around the globe, including Indonesia, Iran, Egypt, Saudi Arabia, South Africa, Australia, Europe and North America. This all bodes well for IQSA, not least because this is just our second annual meeting. The task of IQSA’s executive office is now to keep up with this growth and accommodate our members for many future meetings.

I am also happy to share with you that our success in San Diego played a significant role within the larger SBL / AAR conference, for the second year in a row. More on this and several other matters of business soon.

Please do not forget to tell your friends, colleagues and peers about us. IQSA members come from an incredibly diverse range of academic backgrounds, including Qur’anic Studies, Islamic Studies, Biblical Studies, Middle East Studies, textual studies, inter-religious studies, hermeneutics, studies on manuscripts or material culture, the hard sciences, and so on. There are numerous ways to stay connected with IQSA throughout the year, namely by:

* Becoming a member (http://membership.iqsaweb.org/Join.aspx)

* Subscribing to our blog (IQSAWEB.ORG)

* Joining the private IQSA Discussion Group

* Liking the “International Qur’anic Studies Association” on Facebook

* Following “@IQSAWEB” on Twitter

* Publishing with us!

(a) If you have an outstanding article or book length manuscript

(English, Arabic), please contact JIQSA@iqsaweb.org

NOW ONLINE – Program Book for San Diego, Nov 21-24

Dear Friends,

We are now days away from the second Annual Meeting of the International Qur’anic Studies Association taking place in San Diego, November 21-24. We are looking forward to another exciting meeting of scholars an friends. For a complete showcase of our events, participants and sponsors we are proud to present the official AM 2014 PROGRAM BOOK (PDF). Viewers are encouraged to further circulate the program book. (Viewers may alternately access the program book by visiting IQSAWEB.ORG >> Meetings >> Program Book AM 2014)

Please do not forget our first Panel, Keynote Lecture and Reception all taking place on Friday, Nov 21 (one day before the official start of AAR or SBL). Our Keynote Lecture is on “Qur’anic Studies and Historical-Critical Philology. The Qur’an’s Staging, Penetrating, and Eclipsing Biblical tradition,” and will be delivered by prof. Angelika Neuwirth, with a Response by IQSA president, prof. Andrew Rippin at 4:00-5:15 pm in San Diego Convention Center (CC), Room 23 C (Upper level). All Friday events are FREE & OPEN TO THE PUBLIC. Furthermore, I invite all IQSA members to fulfill their duty as members by attending our first ever Business Meeting, Sunday, Nov 23 at noon in the San Diego Convention Center (CC), Room 24 C (Upper Level). Finally, if you have not already please visit IQSAWEB.ORG in order to become a Member for 2014, subscribe to our Blog and join the private IQSA Discussion Group.

On behalf of the Board of Directors, Standing Committees and our partners we would like to express our deepest gratitude to all friends of IQSA, and we look forward to seeing you this Friday.

Sincerely,

Emran El-Badawi, Executive Director

Recent Updates and Plans

Dear Friends of IQSA,

On May 29 the inaugural board of the International Qur’anic Studies Association held their first spring meeting. At the meeting the executive director reported to council the achievements of IQSA thus far, and plans for the future. Furthermore, the quorum of council members reviewed and ratified the articles of incorporation as well as bylaws, thereby officially establishing IQSA as a learned society. We are soon to file for non-profit status.

From left to right: Hamza Zafer, Fred Donner, Andrew Rippin, Emran El-Badawi, Gabriel Reynolds, Jane McAuliffe, John Kutsko

Thanks to the progress we have made thus far, we are continuing to make important updates to our website. If you have not done so already, I invite you to become members of IQSA here, which is free for 2014. Our first membership drive was a huge success and we received even more membership requests than originally anticipated. (members are still eligible to register for the San Diego meeting this November here) I also invite you to explore who our members of council, officers and committee members are here. Over the next several months, website changes will include publicizing editorial board members; bringing on line and integrating publishing resources; a new membership form; and more Arabic translation to accommodate international interest overall. Finally, online visitors can expect to have access to the 2014 San Diego program book this fall.

I hope you share our joy and excitement during this time, and that you become members (for free!) and consider joining us in San Diego this November. On behalf of members of council and all those serving with IQSA, I thank you for your support and friendship.

Yours,

Emran El-Badawi, Executive Director

Call for Papers Highlight: The Qur’an and the Biblical Tradition

The International Qur’anic Studies Association welcomes paper proposals from all graduate students and scholars for its upcoming meeting in San Diego, CA, November 21-24. Submissions can be made under any of the five program units, listed here. Important guidelines regarding submission can be found below, as well as on the Annual Meeting page.

This week, we highlight the program unit titled “The Qur’an and the Biblical Tradition,“ chaired by Cornelia Horn and Holger Zellentin.

The focus of this unit, which will also host two panels at the November conference, is the Qur’an’s relationship to the Biblical tradition in the broadest sense. Thus the program unit chairs seek papers that engage the books of the Hebrew Bible and the New Testament in the various languages of their original composition and later translations (regardless of a particular book’s status of canonization within specific Jewish or Christian groups); the exegetical traditions of the Bible; and the homiletic, narrative, and legal corpora that have developed in close dialogue with this Biblical tradition prior to the emergence of the Qur’an and subsequently in exchange with the Qur’an.

The first panel will be co-sponsored by the SBL Syriac Literature and Interpretations of Sacred Texts section. For it, proposals are encouraged that engage the Qur’an’s dialogue with any aspect of the Biblical tradition. Examples of possible emphases include the role of Syriac homilies by authors such as Jacob of Serugh or Philoxenos of Mabbug and the role of the Ethiopic tradition.

For the second panel, proposals should address methodological questions pertinent to the study of the literary shape of the Qur’an─both on its own terms and in relation to other written and oral texts.

Proposals should include a title and an abstract of approximately 400 words. For further detail see here.

Important Notes about Proposing a Paper for IQSA 2014

* IQSA is an independent learned society, although our meeting overlaps with those of SBL and AAR. In order to attend IQSA 2014, membership in IQSA and registration for the SBL/AAR conference will be necessary. (The first day of the IQSA conference, however, will be open to the general public).

* All interested students and scholars may submit a proposal through SBL’s website, here. Scroll down to the “Affiliate” section, then click on the chosen IQSA program unit name. [Look in particular for the “(IQSA)” indication at the end of the unit titles]. Instructions for those with and without SBL membership can be found by clicking through to these individual program unit pages.

* Details on low-cost membership in IQSA will be published on the IQSA blog in Spring 2014. Make sure you are subscribed!

“Super Saver” Annual Meeting Registration Rate Ends Soon!

“Super Saver” Annual Meeting Registration Rate Ends Soon!

IQSA 2015 – Updates & Announcements

Join IQSA and Save on Meeting Registration Rates! عضوية الجمعية مفتوحة الآن

CFP Deadline Extension (Fri, Mar 6) & Clarification

Last Call: CFP Deadline MAR 5 & 2015 Membership Open

CFP Highlight: Qur’an Manuscripts and Material Culture

Annual Meeting 2015 Call for Papers Now Open!

IQSA, SBL and AAR in the News

A Letter of Thanks to IQSA Members

NOW ONLINE – Program Book for San Diego, Nov 21-24

Recent Updates and Plans

Call for Papers Highlight: The Qur’an and the Biblical Tradition

Important Notes about Proposing a Paper for IQSA 2014

Follow Us