Blog contributions from ACOR Fellows and invited contributors.
Sarah Islam is a Ph.D. candidate in History at Princeton University and an ACOR-CAORC pre-doctoral fellow for 2015–2016. In order to complete her research project, which deals with the evolving historical discourse on blasphemy as an Islamic legal category, from the medieval period until the fall of the Ottoman Empire, Islam needed to painstakingly […]
Mining Manuscripts of the Ottoman Archives Read More »
Geoffrey Hughes is a National Endowment for the Humanities (NEH) fellow at ACOR and an anthropologist and lecturer at the London School of Economics. He is residing at ACOR during summer 2017 while he pursues his project entitled, “Nation and Agnation: Kinship, Conflict, and Social Control in Contemporary Jordan.” His essay below is a brief
The Evolution of Identity and Social Conflict in Networked Jordan Read More »
Political scientist and ACOR-CAORC fellow Rana B. Khoury was in Jordan during fall 2016 researching networks of Syrian activists. She writes below about her research methodology. As researchers, we ask many questions related to the characteristics of populations. How many voters plan to go to the polls on election day? How satisfied are citizens with
Studying a Hard-to-Reach Population of Syrian Refugees Read More »
Brittany Barrineau, ACOR-CAORC pre-doctoral fellow for 2016–2017, writes below about her research into the social, political, and economic forces that are transforming Jordan’s traditional but rapidly evolving olive oil industry. The olive harvest festival in Irbid included an outdoor opening ceremony with poetry, several speakers, two dance groups, a marching band, and a small speech
Producing Extra Virginity in Jordan Read More »
Recent ACOR-CAORC senior fellow Michael Perez writes below about his recent research on ex-Gaza refugees who are currently living without citizenship in Jordan. Dr. Perez is a professor of anthropology at the University of Washington in Seattle. The Gaza camp is unique in Jordan. Located just a few kilometers from the ancient ruins of Jarash, it
Gaza Refugees and the Reality of Statelessness Read More »
Recent ACOR-CAORC fellow and senior archaeologist Suzanne Richard writes below about how her ongoing excavations at the central Jordan site of Khirbat Iskander are revising long-held views of the Early Bronze Age urban collapse. In the southern Levant, cities were destroyed and/or abandoned and urbanism disappeared at the end of what scholars call the Early
Khirbat Iskandar—A New View of Urbanism in Early Bronze Age Jordan Read More »
The ACOR Video Lecture Series provides accessible discussions of new research into the past and present of Jordan and the broader Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean worlds. This video, adapted from the September 2016 ACOR public lecture delivered by Dr. Suzanne Richard, examines the site of Khirbat Iskandar in light of ongoing research and new
The Levantine Early Bronze Age — An ACOR Video Lecture by Dr. Suzanne Richard Read More »
The ACOR Video Lecture Series provides accessible discussions of new research into the past and present of Jordan and the broader Middle East and Eastern Mediterranean worlds. This video, adapted from the October 2016 ACOR public lecture delivered by NEH Fellow Dr. Aseel Sawalha, is an evaluation of the expanding art scene in Amman and
An Anthropological Gaze at Art – An ACOR Video Lecture by Dr. Aseel Sawalha Read More »
Archaeologist and recent ACOR-CAORC Fellow Andrew M. Smith II writes below about his ongoing research at the important Nabataean-Roman site of Bir Madhkur in Jordan’s Wadi Araba and how USAID SCHEP has been supporting efforts to increase awareness of the site’s important remains. During my recent fellowship at ACOR, I was pursuing two interrelated and
Between Past and Present at Bir Madhkur Read More »
Recent ACOR-CAORC fellow and archaeologist Kathleen Bennallack writes below about her current research in southern Jordan. During the 2015–16 academic year, I spent more than six months at ACOR conducting dissertation research—learning stone tool types and how they change through time; learning how to read climate data; finding publications that are nearly impossible to find
Life After Collapse: Water and Environment in the Late Neolithic of Southern Jordan Read More »
