The September 2025 edition of CBRL’s newsletter is out now! 📬 Catch up on our latest news, research, and upcoming events across the Levant. Check it out! 📰 mailchi.mp/cbrl/cbrl-se...

New online from @contemplevant.bsky.social: “Rethinking Wendy Pearlman’s ‘silencing fear’ in the rules of Hafez and Bashar al-Assad: an affective perspective”: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

JOB: parental leave cover, September 2025-April 2026, Middle East and Ottoman history: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DOQ256/l...

New online and open access from @contemplevant.bsky.social : “You have your Gibran and I have my Gibran: representations of Kahlil Gibran, a century after The Prophet” by Ibrahim Abraham: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

We're experiencing an unbelievable deluge of submissions. At our journal we got ~200 per year in 2020. Last year it was 600. This year it's 800 with several months to go. So that's why we're slower to get stuff out for review.

Peer reviewers are exhausted. It's common to spend *months* inviting reviewers, getting refusals, inviting more, maybe 12 or more, then 2 agree but 1 doesn't complete, so you go again. That's why your paper is in limbo. I'm very sorry, it's awful, but it's also an untenable academic labour issue.

Applications for SHAPE Involve and Engage are now open. This innovative public engagement programme allows UK-based researchers to work in partnership with a gallery, archive, library or museum (GLAM organisation). Application deadline is 15 Oct. Learn more: https://bit.ly/47XA41y

Still ten days to apply for this writing workshop in Ankara, run by CBRL’s partners BIAA, focused on producing peer-review-ready articles on gender/culture/society aimed at international journals:

Announcing a call for applications for the Spring 2026 POMEPS Virtual Research Workshops! The deadline to apply is October 15, 2025. For more information on how to apply, visit: pomeps.org/call-for-app...

New podcast episode!🎙️ Learning from the Levant – Ep.3 Shatha Mubaideen speaks with Muhyi Majeed on how participatory methods like photovoice & storytelling help young people reclaim their cultural heritage. 🎧 Listen here: on.soundcloud.com/R4SUxrOfe6xT...

The CBRL Graduate Network Skills Development Seminar Series continues! 🎓🔍 Lecture 3: "Research Methods and Collecting Data" 🔹 Prof. Omar Al Ghul, Yarmouk University 🔹2 Sep 2025 | 6 PM (Amman) | 4 PM (UK) 🔹Online (Zoom) 🔗 Register: us06web.zoom.us/webinar/regi...

Grant funding for community-focused public engagement work by "creative academics who want to experiment", including independent researchers Got great plans or initial thoughts about archives here? Drop us a line (we're particularly eyeing up the NUM archives here but SO MANY OTHER POSSIBILITIES!)

This is not only a serious issue for historians and not only a serious issue for academics (although it is that). It's a development that's also deleterious for the GLAM sector, for example, and part of a much larger trend nationally and internationally to restrict and dismantle access to archives.

In this moving obituary, Dr Loay Abu Al-Saud pays tribute to a stalwart of Palestinian local history and heritage: “Izhaq Abdel Hadi Mahmoud al-Hroub (Abu Iyad), 1941–2025: chronicler of Palestinian heritage and son of the land”: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

New online: “The Bata Company's eastern Mediterranean business operations 1918–1938: a structuration perspective” by Milan Balaban, Jan Herman & Dalibor Savić - a case study of trade, manufacturing and labour, especially in mandate Lebanon and Palestine: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

If you're not in research spaces, this might be invisible to you, but the peer-review system is buckling. Not uncommon to ask ten people to find a single one willing to review (most things require at least two)... I get many of those refusals; we're all overtaxed. 🧪 www.nature.com/articles/d41...

New online and #openaccess from @contemplevant.bsky.social: "Preventing fitna, promoting schism: a microhistory of conversion in mandate Palestine" by Dotan Halevy: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

My University has opened a virtual scholar scheme for scholars from Gaza. Please share widely and help stop scholasticide. www.exeter.ac.uk/faculties/ha...

#Employment The Department of Sociology, Egyptology and Anthropology at the American University in Cairo (AUC) invites applications for an Assistant or Associate Professor of Anthropology with expertise in either Religion and/or the Environment. mesana.org/resources-an...

Subject area: contemporary Islam in the Americas

Four year fixed-term lectureship in global & imperial history, Oxford: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DOC516/d...

New from @contemplevant.bsky.social: Muddasir Ramzan interviews Tim Mackintosh-Smith www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

📖 Levant vol. 57_1 (Spring 2025) is out now. Available on the Taylor & Francis website — www.tandfonline.com/toc/ylev20/5... — lots to read and enjoy.

Deadline tomorrow, Monday 14th July

Join us! We are advertising two part-time, paid Editorial Fellowships at History Workshop in 2025-27. Our fellowships support early career historians to develop expertise in public, radical and digital history & to gain experience of working in an editorial team. www.historyworkshop....

One-year lectureship in Islamic studies at Kings College London: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNW366/l...

One-year lectureship in Middle Eastern history at SOAS: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNT892/l...

Deadline Extended to 28th June: "Bridging Research to Publication – Advanced Writing Workshops (2025-2027)" - CBRL's support package for early career researchers based in Jordan, affiliated with academic, research, or heritage institutions. Details/applications here: www.cbrl.ac.uk/news/call-fo...

Applications now open (until 27 June 2025) for the Institute of Historical Research's non-stipendiary IHR Fellowships. Ideal for active, non-affiliated historians who would benefit from a period embedded in @ihr.bsky.social 's community of public, local & academic historians, archivists, curators.

As well as English-language books, at @contemplevant.bsky.social we're really keen to showcase scholarship in the languages of the region we focus on, i.e. mainly Arabic & Hebrew. If you'd like to review recent titles, drop us a line at [email protected] docs.google.com/document/d/1...

Save the dates! @cbrl.bsky.social’s Graduate Network: Skills Development Seminar Series (2025-2026) starts on 1st July and includes sessions on research proposals, ethics, data collection and protection, analysis, interviewing… www.cbrl.ac.uk/news/graduat...

A little belated, but here is the rundown of issue 10.1 of @contemplevant.bsky.social, Spring 2025, with the articles roughly chronological by content: 1) "Julian or Gregorian calendar? Authority and identity in the Greek Catholic community of nineteenth-century Ottoman Syria" by Anais...

New online from @contemplevant.bsky.social: Claire Launchbury reviews A war of colors: graffiti and street art in postwar Beirut by Nadine Sinno (@utexaspress.bsky.social): www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Short-term (possibly extendable) postdocs on Ottoman Mobilities with @thebiaankara.bsky.social in Ankara, Amman, Rome, Nairobi or other locations: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DNN499/p...

Pro tip, folks: if you make a figure for a publication, don’t just hand the copyright over to the publisher. Post it on OSF first and then give yourself permission to use it in the first publication and then all future publications. That way, no permissions issues.

The scheme pays for your salary (if required) and up to £200,000 for project expenses for up to 2 years. The deadline is 15 July 2025 (but the award will run annually until 2028, so if that's too soon, plan for 2026 instead).

The last two days have seen 2 bits of bad news in academic publishing: Oxford UP using AI copyediting, and now Amsterdam UP being gobbled up by T&F. The journal I edit, @contemplevant.bsky.social, is published by T&F, and that’s not something that can be changed in the short/medium term, but…

A little belated, but here is the rundown of issue 10.1 of @contemplevant.bsky.social, Spring 2025, with the articles roughly chronological by content: 1) "Julian or Gregorian calendar? Authority and identity in the Greek Catholic community of nineteenth-century Ottoman Syria" by Anais...

We are looking for someone to join our Liberal Arts Foundation Year team! If you work in modern history, politics or IR and have an interest in widening participation in the Humanities, please consider applying (0.5fte, permanent). jobs.yorksj.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

We are currently advertising for a 1-year fixed term 0.8 FTE post in Modern History at Lancaster. It goes without saying that it would have been nice had it been a F/T post but, in the current climate, it is something ... hr-jobs.lancs.ac.uk/Vacancy.aspx...

Longtime MERIP contributor and editorial committee member Sami Zubaida passed away last month at the age of 88. His work centered on Islam, politics and the state across the region – from his native Iraq, to Egypt, Turkey and Iran – and we'll share some highlights from our archive here.

A reminder that @contemplevant.bsky.social is always keen to hear from new book reviewers. The list of titles we'd love covering is here: docs.google.com/document/d/1... and recent additions include Exploring the Kitáb-i-Aqdas The Laws and Teachings of the Bahá’í Faith (Ghaemmaghami and Vafai)...

🚨 Just the last few days for applying to the: 1️⃣ BIAA-University of Oxford Martin Harrison Memorial Fellowship 2️⃣ BIAA-University of Liverpool Garstang Centenary Fellowship Apply now! ℹ️ biaa.ac.uk/grants-oppor... #researchfunding #türkiyeresearch #archeology

OTSA's Call for Submissions for the 2025 Awards and Prizes are now open! For more information, please visit www.ottomanturkishstudiesassociation.org/awards-prizes/

Job advert by our colleagues over at Liverpool John Moores: Senior Lecturer with teaching specialism on international development/political economy with a regional focus in Africa or Latin America or the Middle East and North Africa. www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DND476/s...

🚨 FELLOWSHIPS: DEADLINE 31st May 2025 We would like to remind you that there are 10 days for applying to our joint fellowships! Don't miss out on these #opportunities! Apply now! ℹ️ biaa.ac.uk/grants-oppor... #researchfunding #türkiyeresearch #archaeology

Fellowship in the History of Islamic Art and Material Culture at the Oxford Centre for Islamic Studies. The deadline for applications is 20 May 2025. Se further details here: www.oxcis.ac.uk/vacancies-op...

Opportunity for a Postdoctoral Research Associate position as part of the ECOMEDS project at King's College London working with Arabic and Hebrew sources. The deadline for applications is 1 June 2025. See further details here: www.jobs.ac.uk/job/DMY931/p...

New online from @contemplevant.bsky.social: @karimeltaki.bsky.social reviews A lost peace: great power politics and the Arab-Israeli dispute, 1967–1979 by Galen Jackson: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....

Reviewed for @contemplevant.bsky.social by @marchudson.bsky.social: New under the sun: early Zionist encounters with the climate in Palestine by Netta Cohen: www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10....