Alison Vacca

New article alert!

Join us in exploring a phrase from Ibn Saʿīd al-Maghribī’s 13th-c. geography. He refers to the Damādim of northeast Africa as “Tatars of the Sūdān.” Hannah Barker interrogates the racializing discourses at play in such comparative claims.

[image: British Library Or 1524]

Flyer (white paper, black type) Faculty Your Students are under attack Your TAs are under attack Your job is under attack Academia is under attack .. your silence will not save you Undergrads say... Strike Now!

points are made

Cute cat in Bukhara

I desperately wanted to stuff this one in my purse, but I was told customs would stop me

Lady in black carries colorful balloons against the backdrop of a minaret with turquoise glazed bricks.

Partial minaret with bands of glazed bricks, arches off to the side, people walking down the street by night

Enjoying an evening in Khorazm

Oh, master of spices, I await your knowledge

Oh, so you are traveling the Silk Road, then??

What the Columbia Settlement Really Means

This morning, members of the Knight Institute’s leadership team published a critical analysis of Columbia University’s settlement agreement with the Trump administration. Read the full analysis here: knightcolumbia.org/blog/what-th...

Gazafication and Genocide by Attrition in Artsakh/Nagorno Karabakh and the Occupied Palestinian Territories Published in Journal of Genocide Research (Ahead of Print, 2024)

“Who Remembers the Armenians?”
I remember them
and I ride the nightmare bus with them
each night
and my coffee, this morning I’m drinking it with them
You, murderer
Who remembers you?

— Najwan Darwish, Nothing More to Lose (2014)

60,000 Gazans have been killed. 18,500 were children. These are their names. Palestinian children have been killed at a rate of more than one per hour since the war began.

This is the Washington Post (yes, that one): names in Arabic and English, and ages, of all 18,500 children killed in Gaza, plus portraits and stories where available: www.washingtonpost.com/world/intera...

Image of the cover of Kindred Voices by Michael Pifer, showing Rumi Seljuk tiles

Kindred Voices by Michael Pifer (2021)

Poem translated from Middle Armenian with two lines left in Turkish: Someone rode a gray stallion, She came and passed by, daring as a Mongol, She has eyes that would conquer Tabriz, Her eyebrows bore away my mind. She dropped an apple. I paid no heed. She dropped another. I stooped and picked it up. (In Turkish:) You are a Muslim, daughter of a mulla. I am Hovhannes, son of a priest. (In Armenian:) What does your apple have to do with me?

The girl's response, with the Armeno-Turkish written out in modern Turkish script. (In Turkish:) Come along, come along, infidel's son. Drop the absurd talk with us! You are Hovhannes, son of a priest, I am Muslim, daughter of a mulla. (In Armenian:) Let us love one another, it will be sweet.

I interrupt your daily existential panic to suggest reading this book on a literary history of Anatolia, blending Armenian, Persian, Turkish, Greek.

This poem switches btw Turkish & Armenian. The girl's last line is in Armenian: "Let us love one another, it will be sweet"

Columbia's Agreement with the Federal Government RISE UP, COLUMBIA TODAY AT 12:17 PM The Columbia administration has finally done what many of us have urged it not to do: it has signed a bad agreement with the federal government to address the government's phony concerns about Columbia. Here is the document. And here, importantly, is President Shipman's letter outlining her view of the document.

Thank you to Rise Up, Columbia for the astute analysis as usual and the footnote shoutout to CUIMC Stands Up!

We’re a group of medical campus faculty & staff firmly against the exchange of our values for grant funds, even as our jobs & careers are at risk.

🔗 open.substack.com/pub/riseupco...

Columbia University’s agreement with the Trump administration is a disaster for academic freedom, freedom of speech, & the independence of American higher education. Never in the history of our nation has an educational institution so thoroughly bent to the will of an autocrat.

1/

Columbia disciplines 70 students for protest as school pleads with Trump for funding The disciplinary actions come as the university tries to access about $1 billion in frozen grants, officials said.

Barnard and Columbia: Profiles in Cowardice.

Teaching students that the proper moral response to genocide is to shut the fuck up.

gothamist.com/news/columbi...

5 copies of 'The Illustrated Cairo Genizah', by Nick Posegay and Melonie Schmierer-Lee, stacked on a light brown tabletop. The books' spines are facing the camera. The book is large and the covers are dark red, with the title and authors' names in white. The cover also has a grid of 21 square images each cut out from a different medieval manuscript.

Good news if you like history, manuscripts, or nice books! 'The Illustrated Cairo Genizah' is now available at *greatly* reduced shipping costs via @theul.bsky.social (UK) and Amazon (worldwide) from this link: linktr.ee/nposegay. There's also a free sample file there with the entire first chapter.

yes, but specimens only found in Russia (near Smolensk), Estonia, Finland, &Sweden. none in the former Khaganate. its association with Khazars is based only on the name Moses-- doesn't name ard al-Khazar mint.

Idc abt truth of conversion. just pointing out that every Khazar source has a "yes, but"

Byzantium/Modernism "Byzantium/Modernism" published on 29 Jun 2015 by Brill.

From Byzantium/Modernism: The Byzantine as Method in Modernity

gold coin showing bearded Jesus in the center holding a book with halo, draped clothes. inscription around the margin.

close-up of Matisse's Riffian, showing a male face in faceted gold and teal on a golf backdrop

just learned that Matisse spoke about how he drew inspiration from Byzantine coins, including this one from Tzimiskes's reign

New article alert!

How can we rethink word stress in Classical Arabic? This article looks to an unexpected source: the traditional recitation of metra in Persian metrics. This evidence clarifies controversial patterning in Classical Arabic, with implications for Proto-Arabic word stress, as well

woah, thanks for sharing. this is amazing. it's even more powerful as a set. this link has the whole series: africa.si.edu/exhibits/sho...

oooh, yes. ok, so: solidarity and commiseration from the cookie-cutter-remora to the ostrich.

Yes, thank you. But cannibal remoras.

I hear you, that's disappointing. But I'm at Columbia so even ostrich approach sounds appealing rn. Idek which metaphor we are going for here. Maybe lemmings?

even Columbia signed it, the bar is low! -- report was that they were late to join bc they were only invited to do so this morning. NYU might be another latecomer?

Letters from The Board

The Editors of @alusuralwusta.bsky.social endorse @mesa1966.bsky.social's March 13 Statement on the repression of academic freedom and March 28 Joint Statement regarding Columbia.

🚨BREAKING | Columbia University Sued Over Student Record Disclosure*

Mahmoud Khalil, detained pro-Palestinian Columbia graduate, & 7 other students have filed a federal lawsuit against Columbia University, Barnard College, & the U.S. House Committee on Education & Workforce.

Here’s what we know 🧵:

Seminar poster titled "Rethinking History: Returning to Archives and Documents" for Winter 2025. Features a talk by Dr. Viola Allegranzi on architectural inscriptions from 10th–13th-century Afghanistan. Scheduled for March 13, 2025, at 12:00 P.M. Toronto / 4:00 P.M. UK. The poster has a cream background. The title is in bold, maroon text at the top. Below the header, there is an image of an ancient manuscript. The event details are in smaller, maroon text, centered on the poster, along with a photograph of the speaker.

💻 Register now for an online seminar with Dr Viola Allegranzi, who will be speaking on 'Architectural Inscriptions from 10th- to 13th-Century Afghanistan as Recorded in Photographic Archives': bit.ly/RethinkHistory

🗓️ Thu 13 Mar, 12pm Toronto/4pm UK time.

#Afghanistan #medievalsky #skystorian

next on my pile of interesting books to read! if you're in NYC, please come to hear the authors present their newly-published book on 24 March!