International conference

The Challenge of Gender in the Ottoman, Turkish and Middle-Eastern Studies: Attempting an Interdisciplinary Approach

The Department of Turkish and Modern Asian Studies of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens and The French School of Athens are planning to hold an international conference in Athens on December, 1^st -2^nd, 2011.

The conference will be entitled The Challenge of Gender in the Ottoman, Turkish and Middle-Eastern Studies: Attempting an Interdisciplinary Approach. This conference will be held during the second meeting of the research group working on Gender and Inter-religious Relations in South Eastern Europe and the Eastern Mediterranean (19^th -21^st centuries). It is an international research program running since 2009 and coordinated by both the above institutions.
This conference aims at investigating the effects of the uses of gender as an analytical tool on various disciplines (history, sociology, anthropology, etc.) in the context of the Ottoman, Turkish and Middle-Eastern Studies. We will attempt to bring to the fore subjects such as:

• gender as an analytical category in the historical/ anthropological etc. research on Ottoman, Turkish and Middle Eastern societies until now.
• gender as a tool to challenge traditional narratives on nation building or on women in non-Western societies and to problematize orientalist common places still influential enough in social studies. 

In this perspective we wish to give emphasis on assessments of the ways gender as a category of social analysis changed the academic communities’ (or eventually the public opinion’s) views on the respective societies. 

Furthermore, inductive approaches will be attempted, since these subjects will also be approached through particular topics. Among them the effect of relations between people of various ethno-religious origins on the shaping of gender cultural patterns in the Ottoman, Turkish and Middle Eastern societies will be of great  importance.

The working languages of the conference will be English and French.

The Organizing Committee