Islamic Studies Library, McGill University

The Institute of Islamic Studies
cordially invites you to attend the

PhD Oral Defense of
Sabeena Shaikh

Supervisor: Prof. Pasha M. Khan

Gender, Genre, and the Poetic Counter-Archive: Reading the Kulliyāt of Lutf-un-Nisā “Imtiyāz” in Eighteenth-Century Hyderabad

Wednesday, July 22, 2026
10 a.m. ET online

Livestream on Zoom (limited number of places): Email [email protected] for the link.

A beautiful Summer day on campus!

عيد الأضحى المبارك!
عید مبارک!
آپکی زندگی میں عید کے خوشحال رنگ ہمیشہ برقرار رہیں۔ عید مبارک!
Kurban Bayramınız Kutlu Olsun!
Selamat Hari Raya Idul Adha!
Happy Eid al-Adha!
Heureux Aïd el-Adha!

Join the Working Group on Palestine (Social Justice subgroup) for a live discussion with contributors to the newly published book Resisting Erasure: Libraries in Palestine and Palestine in Libraries

After a short introduction of the book, authors will engage with key themes relating to social justice and Palestine, systematic censorship of Palestine in Western libraries and archives, information workers’ resistance to silence, and self-protection.

Event: Erasure or Inclusion? Palestine in Western Libraries
When: June 23, 2026 - 10 AM Pacific (1 PM Eastern)
Where: Zoom http://tinyurl.com/MELAResistingErasure

The event is free and open to the public, so please share widely. The event will not be recorded.

We look forward to seeing you all

🚨BOOK DISCOUNT: Note that interested participants will receive a 20% discount off the purchase of the book

Congratulations Jaleh!!

This year, Jaleh Ebrahimi, a brilliantly creative PhD candidate at the Institute of Islamic Studies, was awarded the BLUE Fellowship for her pedagogical project, "Beings Beyond the Human." She presented her work at Building 21 on April 21, 2026. The fellowship supports interdisciplinary research and collaborative project development at Building 21. Jaleh's project is grounded in her long-term engagement with Persian tales and the fictional characters who inhabit them, and it has been shaped by three months of discussion with scholars and mentors at Building 21.

At this event, Jaleh presented a syllabus for a course designed to explore a fictional being who has lived among Persian-speaking communities and beyond for centuries. The syllabus traces this figure across time, place, language, and media, following her through historical sources from seventeenth-century Isfahan to nineteenth-century London, and into her contemporary digital presence. The syllabus draws on anthropological, philosophical, historical, and literary approaches to examine this figure's life, with the interdisciplinary form of the syllabus producing a generative method that opens new analytical possibilities.

Many congratulations to Jaleh! Tabrīk mīgīm!

McGill, then and now ⏪
Redpath Library seen from McTavish Street, 125 years ago!

📷 McGill University Archives | McGill Libraries, 1901

The Middle East Librarians Association (MELA) will hold its 2026 Annual Meeting from November 19 to 21, 2026. This year’s meeting will be hosted on campus by Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts. To accommodate our global community, the conference will be a hybrid event with in-person sessions on campus and virtual access provided via Zoom.

This meeting is scheduled to conclude just as the Middle East Studies Association (MESA) 2026 conference begins (November 21-24) at the Hilton Boston Park Plaza in nearby Boston. We hope this proximity allows members to attend both gatherings easily.

CFP: The Programming Committee invites proposals for panels, individual papers, or roundtable discussions that address our theme: Redefining and Restating Middle East Librarianship in our Current Moment.

Submission guidelines: Proposals and abstracts should be submitted by July 15, 2026. The committee will notify applicants of their status by August 31, 2026.

Please submit your proposals to the MELA 2026 Submission Form linked from mela.us/annual-conference/information/

!Feels like Spring has arrived