A lecture by Mehrdad Amanat, independent scholar and writer
Part of the Bilingual Lecture Series of Center for Near Eastern Studies at UCLA
Dr. Mehrdad Amanat, an independent scholar living in Los Angeles, received his M.A in Islamic Studies in 1979 and PhD in history, in 2006, both from the University of California at Los Angeles. He is a regular contributor to the Encyclopedia Iranica. His book, Jewish Identities in Iran: Resistance and Conversion to Islam and the Bahai Faith, is published by I.B.Tauris in 2011.
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Jewish Identities in Iran: Resistance and Conversion to Islam and the Baha'i Faith (Library of Modern Religion)
For minority faith groups living in nineteenth-century Iran, religious conversion to Islam -- both voluntary and forced -- was the primary means of social integration and assimilation. However, why was it that some Persian Jews instead embraced the emergent Baha'i Faith, which was subject to harsher persecution that Judaism? Mehrdad Amanat explores the conversion experiences of Jewish families during this time, and examines the fluid, multiple religious identities that many converts adopted. The religious fluidity exemplified in the widespread voluntary conversion of Iranian Jews to Baha'ism presents an alternative to the rejectionist view of religion that regards millennia of religious experience as inherently coercive, oppressive, rigidly dogmatic and a consistently divisive social force.
- Author: Dr. Mehrdad Amanat
- Publisher: Tauris Academic Studies (May 15, 2011)
- Hardcover: 256 pages
- ISBN-10: 184511891X
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Lecture in Persian:
Sunday, October 30, 2011
5:00 PM - 7:00 PM
118 Haines Hall
UCLA
For more information and to RSVP see the event page
Lecture in English:
Wednesday, November 02, 2011
12:00 PM - 2:00 PM
10383 Bunche Hall
UCLA
For more information and to RSVP see the event page
Cost: Free and Open to the Public
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