Venue:
University of Oxford, Oxford.
Dates:
30
July - 2 August 2006.
Organised
by:
Iran Heritage Foundation and University of Oxford.
Conference
committee:
Prof. Abbas Amanat, Prof. Houchang Chehabi, Dr. John Gurney,
Mr. Farhad Hakimzadeh, Dr. Vanessa Martin, Prof. Mohammad Tavakoli-Targhi.
Introduction:
It is a hundred years since the Iranian
Constitutional Revolution of 1906, the first event of its kind in the Middle
East. The Revolution opened the way for cataclysmic change in Iran, heralding
the modern era. It saw a period of unprecedented debate in a burgeoning press.
It created new opportunities and opened up seemingly boundless possibilities for
Iran’s future. Many different groups fought to shape the course of the
Revolution, and all sections of society were ultimately to be in some way
changed by it. The old order, which Naser al-Din Shah Qajar had struggled for so
long to sustain, finally passed away, to be replaced by new institutions, new
forms of expression, and a new social and political order.
The Constitutional
Revolution was an immensely complex event, involving different parts of the
country in different ways, facilitating the rise of some whilst hastening the
decline of others. It was bound up with imperialism and Iran’s role as a buffer
state between the British and Russian Empires, with the encroachments of the
world economy, and with the introduction of modern technology. In social terms
it created new opportunities for women, and influenced the evolution of minority
identity. The ways Iranians saw their place in the world and remembered their
past underwent a transformation. One of the earliest in the decade of
revolution, 1905-1915, it had global reverberations from the Ottoman Empire to
South East Asia.
The Revolution has been
subject to a whole range of different interpretations, and it still raises a
great many unanswered questions. Amongst them, for example, might be: What kind
of a revolution was it? How far did Iranian society change as a result of the
revolution, and how far did it remain the same? What precisely was the role of
imperialism, particularly in the ending of the Revolution? In what ways were the
ideas flooding in from Europe interpreted? How lasting were the institutions
established by the revolution? What global influence did it have? How did it
change the identity of Iran, and most particularly, how did it shape the
country’s future? We look forward to debating these questions and many others at
the Conference.
Call for papers:
The Conference
Committee proposes to organise panels on following subjects, and is open to
innovative ideas:
| The coming of the
Revolution: |
| |
Pre-constitutional ideologies;
the political, social and economic background |
| The ideologies and
identities of the Revolution: |
| |
The liberals; the social
democrats; the Islamists; nationalism |
| Established organisations
and institutions: |
| |
The court and the higher
bureaucracy; the bazaar; the religious institutions |
| The emergence of new
organisations: |
| |
Political parties; the role of
propaganda; the ‘Anjomans’; the peasantry |
| Print, the press and the
new technology: |
| |
The political role of the press;
printing and photography; cartoons |
| The arts: |
| |
Literature and translations;
poetry and drama |
| Women: |
| |
The emergence into the public
sphere; the growth of sociability |
| Ethnicity and the making
of identity: |
| |
The revolution and the evolution
of ethnic and tribal identity |
| The religious
minorities: |
| |
Christians: Armenians and
Assyrians; the Jews; the Zoroastrians; the Bahais: their contribution,
their expectations, their wider significance |
| Religio-ideological
groups: |
| |
The
Sufis, the Sheikhis, and the Babis; multiple
identities |
| The regions: |
| |
Tabriz and the north west;
Mashhad and the north east; Isfahan and the centre; Bushehr and the
south |
| Global
dimensions: |
| |
International events;
international trade; imperialism: the British, the Russians and
others |
| The subsequent impact of
the revolution: |
| |
The survival and demise of
institutions; the role of the military; the changes in the law; building
the nation |
| The Revolution in the
global context: |
| |
Reverberations and impact in the
Ottoman Empire, the Levant, Egypt, the Caucasus, Central Asia, India, East
and South East Asia; its place in the revolutionary
decade |
| The Revolution and
memory: |
| |
The shaping of memory; new
ways of remembering Iranian history; remembering the Revolution itself
|
| Perspectives and
narratives: |
| |
The historiography of the
revolution and its role in Iranian history; the long term
impact |
Abstracts:
Prospective participants
should send an abstract of 300 words by 1st January 2005 to Farhad Hakimzadeh,
Iran Heritage Foundation, 5 Stanhope Gate, London W1K 1AH or send by email to
farhad@iranheritage.org.
Please submit abstracts in digital form using Microsoft Word. It is anticipated
that papers will last 25 minutes.
Publication of
proceedings:
The papers presented in the conference will be published in
a volume of proceedings. All papers submitted should therefore be of publishable
quality and constitute new work. All speakers must commit to publish their
papers as part of the conference proceedings.
Enquiries:
Iran Heritage Foundation, 5
Stanhope Gate, London W1K 1AH. +44 20 75846949 (tel),
+44 20 75846709 (fax), farhad@iranheritage.org.
