Minutes
Convened at the American Sociological Association, Annual Meeting, New York, August 12, 2007.
We met on Sunday morning, August 12, from 8:30 to 10:00 at the New York
Hilton. About 10 people attended. Attendees focused on developing
more integration among sociologists studying the Middle East.
The group discussed having a website with links to other websites, such
as MESA, ISA, and other organizations.Tugrul Keskin of Virginia
Tech noted that his Sociology of Islam listserve also can serve as an
integrative tool, and those interested in being on it should subscribe
at keskin@vt.edu. Said Arjomand of Stony Brook University encouraged
sociologists to participate in the upcoming meetings of the
International Sociological Association, which is holding a forum
on Sociological Research and Public Debate in Barcelona, Spain,
September 5-8, 2008. Charles Kurzman of the University of North
Carolina, Chapel Hill, volunteered to house the website at his
university and will proceed with setting it up.
Elif Andac of Kansas University fnoted that it is difficult to find
syllabi that others are using to teach the Sociology of the Middle
East. The group articulated how helpful it would be to see "what"
others are covering in such a course as well as what resources they are
using. We talked about pulling together syllabi for the ASA volumes of
syllabi. Katherine Meyer volunteered to shepherd such a project
through the ASA publication process.
The group discussed the absence of information about what dissertations
are being published by colleagues at universities in the Middle East.
There seems to be no easy way to find out what they are and developing
such a way would be helpful. If anyone has suggestions or wants to
assume this responsibility, that would be great.
The group discussed the need for information for graduate students at
different universities to know what others are doing elsewhere and to
know faculty elsewhere (especially within the U.S. itself) who may be
helpful to their projects. Graduate students noted that they are
often the only one, or one of very few, at their institution working on
the Middle East and could benefit from getting together with others.
We discussed getting together next year at the ASA meetings. Some
suggested getting together at MESA. Said suggested getting
together at lunch during the ASA. We discussed forming a section
but there was not much enthusiasm for that as it requires a lot of
work. There was no final conclusion to the discussions of when
and where to get together.
We discussed being on the program at the ASA. Charles Kurzman
already has proposed a panel for the ASA Annual Meeting in
2008. (Such are due two years before the meeting.) There has
been no
response from Katherine Meyer's letter in January on behalf of a number
of sociologists studying the Middle East to the ASA and its Council
regarding annual incorporation of the Sociology of the Middle East into
ASA Programs. In light of that, we discussed having scholars,
particularly senior ones, volunteering one or two at a time to assume
responsibility for trying to get a session at ASA. Now would be
the time for applying for a session for 2009; so one or two people
would need to apply now for 2009. We could work out who would be the
one(s) to worry about 2010, 2011, etc.
Katherine Meyer, Ohio State University