News | Jewish, Islamic, and Middle Eastern Studies

A new approach to ancient texts

Rosanne Liebermann, the Friedman Postdoctoral Fellow in Jewish Studies in the Department of Jewish, Islamic, and Middle Eastern Studies (JIMES), uses interdisciplinary methods to study ancient Judean identity.

1.30.20 | Read the Story

Alumni

Tazeen Ali (MA, ’12) returns to WashU as the Danforth Center’s first Islamic Studies scholar

Tazeen Ali (MA, ’12) returned to WashU in 2019 as assistant professor in the Danforth Center on Religion and Politics. Ali is the first Islamic Studies scholar at the Danforth Center. After completing her masters at WashU, she earned a PhD in religious studies at Boston University and was a visiting postgraduate student at the University of Edinburgh. We caught up with Ali to learn more about her work, her time in graduate school at WashU, and the importance of creating a shared language for talking about religion and politics in the U.S. now.

1.28.20 | Read the Story

Faculty

Welcome to WashU: Flora Cassen

Historian Flora Cassen shares some of her ongoing projects and her thoughts on the role of historical scholarship in discussions of modern-day antisemitism.

10.23.19 | Read the Story

Faculty

Hindi and Urdu in conversation

While most people outside of India are familiar with Bollywood as the largest producer of Hindi-language films in the world, many would be surprised to learn that the language spoken in these films is not purely Hindi, but rather draws extensively from the vocabulary and literature of another South Asian language called Urdu.

9.19.19 | Read the Story

Faculty

Energy Policy from the Practitioner's Point of View

A conversation with about education, working in the public sector, and energy policy with Elai Rettig, the Israel Institute Teaching Fellow in Environmental Studies and Jewish, Islamic, and Middle Eastern Studies.

4.17.19 | Read the Story

Faculty

Three Things You Should Know About Islam and Muslims

How is Islam like Hinduism? What is a defensive jihad? How does the concentration of Muslims in the Global South affect their perception worldwide? Aria Nakissa — a scholar of Islamic law and philosophy, contemporary Muslim societies, and classical Islamic texts — unpacks a trio of truths about this fast-growing faith.

4.23.19 | Read the Story