From Refashioning Iran, p 10: [Francois] Bernier (a student of the philosopher Gassendi and a recipient of a “Doctor of Medicine” in 1652), who is considered as a founding figure of modern Orientalism, was an employee of Mirza Shafi’a, who…
From Refashioning Iran, p 10: [Francois] Bernier (a student of the philosopher Gassendi and a recipient of a “Doctor of Medicine” in 1652), who is considered as a founding figure of modern Orientalism, was an employee of Mirza Shafi’a, who…
From Refashioning Iran, p 8: Recounting the contentions for scientific rationality, historians of modern Iran often select scholars who endorsed astrology and opposed heliocentrism as Muslim representatives,ignoring those who did not fit into this schema. By claiming that the Persian…
From Refashioning Iran, p 4: Modernity can be viewed a product of a globalizing network of power and knowledge that informed the heterotopic experiences of crisscrossing peoples and cultures and thus provided multiple scenarios of self-refashioning. Whereas Europeans reconstituted the…
From Refashioning Iran, p9: In the mid-seventeenth century a purely self-congratulatory view of European civilization as the paragon of universal reason and the concurring “blackmail of the Enlightenment” had not yet been formed. Similarly, Europe’s Oriental-Other had not yet been…
“I had traveled there for sightseeing but alas I became the spectacle myself.” [From Shegarf-namehye velayat, travelogue by Etesam-eddin Jonpouri, 1767] That reversal and the curiosity and desire that animate it are at the core of my project. The work…
I’m just starting to blog with this short note. Starting Monday, February 3rd, I’ll officially enter the research period. For the past 3 months I’ve only been writing proposals and applications. Two more days of that to go. The History…
I was recently awarded a grant for Passages by Toronto Arts Council. This allows me time for research in historical texts, material experiments and developing participatory, performative and collaborative processes. I have applied for production funding to the Canada Council…