Join the Medieval Institute for its 23rd annual Mellon Colloquium. The colloquium is a half-day public seminar discussion with the institute's 2024–25 Mellon Fellow, Kayla Dang (assistant professor of theological studies and the Renard Professor of Islamic Studies, Saint Louis University), on her book-in-progress. She will be joined by three distinguished discussants: Christian C. Sahner (University of Oxford), Alison Vacca (Columbia University), and Sarah Bowen Savant (Aga Khan University).
Professor Dang's book project tells a new history of the Zoroastrian religion by focusing on its priests—the individuals responsible for recording and transmitting Zoroastrian religious knowledge, which survives in extant Zoroastrian Middle Persian (or Pahlavi) books. Using Arabic sources alongside Middle Persian ones, she studies the priesthood in and as part of Islamic society, and she brings Zoroastrianism more firmly into emerging discussions about the interactions of Muslims, Christians, and Jews, and others in the medieval Middle East.
Lunch will be provided to those who register for the event using this form. If you cannot attend in person, then you can register to join via Zoom.
Questions about this event? Email us at medinst@nd.edu.
Schedule
9:45 a.m. Refreshments
10:00 a.m. Opening Remarks
10:05 a.m. Kayla Dang, "The Zoroastrian Priesthood in Islamic Society (9th–10th Centuries)"
About the Speaker: Kayla Dang is an assistant professor of theological studies and the Renard Professor of Islamic Studies at Saint Louis University. Her current research, which engages a variety of classical languages (including Arabic, Armenian, Greek, Latin, Syriac, and Middle Persian), focuses on the history of the Zoroastrian priesthood from antiquity into the medieval period.
10:25 a.m. Christian C. Sahner, “Tabaristan in the Early Islamic Period”
About the Speaker: Christian C. Sahner is the associate professor of Islamic history, University of Oxford and Margoliouth Fellow in Arabic, New College. He researches the history of North Africa, the Middle East, and Central Asia during the transition from Late Antiquity to the Middle Ages. Professor Sahner is especially interested in relations between Muslims and non-Muslims (including Christians and Zoroastrians), religious conversion, Islamic sectarianism, and the intertwined histories of the Umayyad, ʿAbbasid, and Byzantine empires.
10:45 a.m. Coffee Break
11:00 a.m. Alison Vacca, "A Tenth-Century Causasian Albanian History of Religion"
About the Speaker: Alison Vacca isthe Gevork M. Avedissian Associate Professor of Armenian History and Civilization at Columbia University and editor of Al-'Usur al-Wusta: the Journal of Middle East Medievalists.
11:20 a.m. Sarah Bowen Savant, "Making the Arabic Book (700-1500): Memory Made and Remade"
About the Speaker: Professor Sarah Bowen Savant is a cultural historian specializing in the Middle East and Iran ca. 600-1100 at Aga Khan University. She also serves as founding director of the AKU-ISMC's Centre for Digital Humanities.
11:45 a.m. Lunch (provided)
12:15 p.m. Questions and Discussion
1:00 p.m. Conclusion
Originally published at medieval.nd.edu.