In this episode, Belle interviews Niloofar Haeri, Anthropology Professor at Johns Hopkins University, about her recent book, Say What Your Longing Heart Desires: Women, Prayer, and Poetry in Iran (Stanford University Press, 2021).
In Say What Your Longing Heart Desires (and in our podcast episode), Haeri illustrates how poetry shaped and transformed the religious lives and practices of a group of women in contemporary Iran. The ethnography traces how the historic and culturally-ingrained practice of poetry reading and recitation of mystic poetry in particular, intertwined with prayer, helped these women situate their relationship to the divine.
Happy Nowruz/Nawriz/Navruz/Novruz/Newroz everyone! Nowruz is an ancient festival marking the arrival of Spring, celebrated across the Middle East, Central Asia, the Caucasus, South Asia,...
In this episode, Belle interviews Arang Keshavarzian, Associate Professor in Middle Eastern and Islamic Studies at New York University, about his recent book, Making...
In this episode, Ali interviews Dr. Mana Kia, an Associate Professor in Columbia University’s department of Middle Eastern, South Asian, and African Studies about...