What is the historical experience of cities in the former territories of the Ottoman Empire - in the Balkans, Anatolia, the Middle East, and North Africa - in dealing with the impact of global changes and the transformation from Empire to nation States? How did people of different cultural, social and religious backgrounds live together? How are such examples of conviviality, conflict, migration, and urban regimes of governance and stratification conceptualized? And how have urban traditions been reinterpreted, and what bearing does this have on modern conceptions of civil society, multicultural societies, migration, or cosmopolitanism. These and other questions will be addressed in this year’s Seminar in Ottoman Urban Studies, with a specific focus on daily life issues. This seminar is supported by the research program ‘Europe in the Middle East – The Middle East in Europe’ EUME with funds of the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung.

Programme 2008-2009 du Séminaire d'Etudes Urbaines Ottomanes, ZMO Berlin-EUME

ZMO-EUME

Chaired by Prof. Ulrike Freitag and Dr. Nora Lafi

Annual Theme 2008-2009 : Daily life in Ottoman Towns

Twice a Month
Mondays 17:00-19.00
Starting November 17, 2008

November 17, 2008:

Ulrike Freitag and Nora Lafi
Introduction: Daily life in Ottoman Towns: Historiographical Stakes and new Research Fields

November 24, 2008:

Vangelis Kechriotis (Bogazici University, Fellow of Europe in the Middle East – The Middle East in Europe 2008/09):
“Buy your bread on Saturday!" Aspects of Every Day Relations between Christians and Muslims in Izmir during the Second Constitutional Period”

December 8, 2008:

Feras Kremsty (Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften):
“Daily Life Conflictuality in Ottoman Aleppo: Confessional Communities, Petitions and Social Regulation”

January 12, 2009:

Cengiz Kirli (Bogazici University, Istanbul):
“News and Popular Opinions in Mid-nineteenth century Ottoman Istanbul”

January 26, 2009:

Mohsen Shuman (Zaqaziq University, Cairo):
“Daily Life in ottoman Cairo: what Court Records Teach about Labour, Neighbourhood and
Family Relations”

February 9, 2009:

Johan Buessow (Research Centre 586 "Difference and Integration,"Universities of Leipzig and Halle-Wittenberg):
“Street Politics in Damascus: Popular Unrest during the Period of Egyptian Rule, 1831-1840”

February 16, 2009:

Donald Quataert (State University of New-York at Binghamton):
“An Ottoman Rashemon and the Telling of History: the coalfield town of Eregli as seen through a Corruption Court Case”

March 2, 2009:

Fatiha Loualich (Algiers University):
“Street life in Ottoman Algiers: Kinship, Property and Social Order”

March 16, 2009:

Dalenda Largueche (Manouba University, Tunis):
“Women's Daily Life in Tunis 18 th -19th Century: Gender Subordination and Justice Negociation”

April 20, 2009:

Johann Strauss (Marc Bloch University, Strasbourg):
“Linguistic Diversity and Every Day Life in Ottoman Cities of the Eastern Mediterranean and the Balkans"

May 4, 2009:

Selcuk Dursun (Istanbul, Fellow of Europe in the Middle East – The Middle East in Europe 2008/09):
“Wood for Living and Timber for Fraud: Everyday Politics of Corruption in Trabzon in the late 19 th Century”

May 18, 2009:

Ismael Montana (Northern Illinois University, Fellow of Europe in the Middle East – The Middle East in Europe 2008/09):
“Ethno-Religious Contours of West African Households in the Ottoman Regency of Tunis, 1738-1860s ca.”

June 8, 2009:

Christoph, Herzog (University of Bamberg):
“Trivia of Late Ottoman Daily Life”

June 22, 2009:

Ulrike Freitag and Nora Lafi:
Conclusion

Venue:

Conference Hall
Zentrum Moderner Orient (ZMO)
Kirchweg 33
14129 Berlin-Nikolassee

Participants are asked to register at the following address:
Dr. Nora Lafi
nora.lafi@rz.hu-berlin.de
Telefon (+49) (0) 30 80307- 0

The seminar is part of the activities of the Zentrum Moderner Orient (ZMO) and of 'Cities Compared: Cosmopolitanism in the Mediterranean and Adjacent Regions', a research field within 'Europe in the Middle East – The Middle East in Europe' (EUME), a research program of the Berlin-Brandenburgische Akademie der Wissenschaften, the Fritz Thyssen Stiftung, and the Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin.

For more information please visit:

http://www.zmo.de
http://www.eume-berlin.de
http://www.h-net.msu.edu/~mediter