Opportunities

Workshop, Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis, University of Amsterdam, 3-5 June 2026

In this three day workshop, we aim to bring together activists, artists, and scholars to interrogate how the wayward responds to violence, and how visual culture as wayward refuses systems of oppression. The concept of the wayward, understood as that which threatens these systems as a commitment to an emancipated futurity in the present, takes a central position in this workshop in an effort to open possibilities of thinking beyond binary categorization/s towards a more nuanced response to the individual and the communal. Even though the wayward, in its rebellion, is often labeled ‘violent’ in its manifestation/s, we refuse this label and learn from these radical liberatory practices. We will explore the processes through which bodies are dehumanized, ecology is disrupted, states become more militarised, and genocides are live-streamed; collectively understanding our role in bearing witness to our present through our past/s..

The British Association for Islamic Studies (BRAIS) is excited to announce that the 2026 BRAIS Prize in the Study of Islam and the Muslim World is now open for submissions. This international prize is awarded annually to an outstanding doctoral thesis. English-language submissions on any aspect of the academic study of Islam and the Muslim world, past and present, including Muslim-minority societies are accepted. The award includes a cash prize of £1000 which will be officially presented at the Annual Conference of BRAIS.

Full details about the submission process, including all rules and regulations, can be found via the link below. 

The application deadline for the Malek Sghiri Scholarship 202 has been extended to 31 January 2026 (23:59, Tunisia time). 

What the scholarship offers:

• Three months of intensive Arabic language study in Tunis
• A structured three month NGO internship(civil society, human rights, anti corruption)
• Academic guidance, program support, and visa assistance where required

The scholarship is awarded to candidates whose academic, professional, or activist trajectories align with Malek Sghiri’s legacy and values.

Mona Saleh and Ueli Staeger are happy to receive paper submissions for their workshop at the 13th European Workshops in International Studies, İzmir University of Economics, 1-3 July 2026. The EWIS format has proven particularly useful for deep engagement on work-in-progress. Contributions from different epistemological and methodological camps are welcome and collectively will contribute to making sense of the multilateral and regional politics around Israel's genocide in Gaza. A detailed workshop description can be found at https://eisa-net.org/wp-content/uploads/2026/01/WS-OA-CfP_Staeger_Saleh_EWIS_2026.pdf. Some travel grants of €500 are available through the EISA Mobility Fund, with priority for doctoral researchers and early career scholars.

Workshop, University of Glasgow, 22-23 July 2026

The organisers invite you to attend a two-day workshop critically examining decentralised, autonomist, and federalist modes of political organising in West Asia and North Africa. The workshop aims to be a space of interdisciplinary exploration of historical lineages, contemporary manifestations, and future possibilities of decentralised governance in (post)uprising and (post)revolutionary contexts.

Papers are welcomed which engage with any of the below themes. Submissions from academics and activists from the WANA region are especially welcome.  

• Challenges to state centred approaches to federalism and autonomy
• Historiographical analyses of councils, committees, and autonomist movements during uprisings or revolutions
• Locally rooted philosophies or conceptualisations emerging from autonomist organising
• Comparative work on autonomist practices in the region and in other contexts
• Practical and theoretical evaluations of transformative potential, contradictions, and limitations of autonomist organising
• The relationship between autonomist organising and identity, including ethnicity, race, religion, gender, and class
• Democracy, ecology, gender, and pluralism in decentralised political thought
• Governance in wartime or crisis conditions, where many autonomist projects originate

To encourage participation from the region, it will be possible to present via zoom. Additionally, a small transport fund is available for presenters who do not have institutional or project-based funding. Support levels will depend on the number of applications.

Papers are invited for the 3rd workshop of this multi-year research programme funded by the British Institute of Persian Studies (BIPS). The aim of this project is to involve scholars from a wide range of disciplines in the commencement of an organised effort to utilise an extensive range of sources to recover evidence of the ‘voices’ of ‘subalterns’ across the pre-modern and modern terrains of both rural and urban society across the Persianate world. 

The third workshop on subalterns across the entire Persianate world in the Zand and Qajar periods will be held at the University of Edinburgh, UK, on 27-29 October, 2026. 

Papers from PhD students, ECRs and unaffiliated scholars are encouraged.

RSVP to anewman@ed.ac.uk by Friday, 12 June, 2026.