MELC0905 - Water in the Middle East Throughout History

Status
A
Activity
LEC
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Water in the Middle East Throughout History
Term
2025C
Subject area
MELC
Section number only
401
Section ID
MELC0905401
Course number integer
905
Meeting times
MW 12:00 PM-1:29 PM
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Emily L Hammer
Description
Water scarcity is one of most important problems facing much of the Middle East and North Africa today. These are arid regions, but human and natural systems have interacted to determine relative water scarcity and abundance at different times and places. This course examines the distribution of water resources throughout the Middle East and the archaeology and anthropology of water exploitation and management over the last 9000 years, looking at continuities and changes through time. Students will learn to make basic digital maps representing Middle Eastern hydro-geography and arguments about modern and historic water resources in the region. The class will cooperatively play an "irrigation management game" designed to familiarize personnel involved in the operation of irrigation schemes with the logistical and social issues involved in water management. We will engage with a variety of media, including academic readings, popular journalism, films, satellite imagery, and digital maps, in our quest to explore whether or not the past can inform present efforts to better manage modern water resources. The course is structured in units focused on each of the major hydro-environmental zones of the Middle East: the river valleys of Mesopotamia, Egypt, and the Levant, the internal basins of western Central Asia and the Levant, the deserts of Arabia and North Africa, highland zones in Yemen and Iran, and coastal marsh areas along the Persian Gulf. We will examine irrigation systems, water supply systems, and ways of life surrounding water sources known from ethnographic studies, history, and archaeological excavations. These data will allow us to engage with debates in Middle Eastern anthropology, including those concerning the relationship between water and political power, the environment in which the world's earliest cities arose, and the relevance of "lessons of the past" for present and potential future water crises and "water wars." In our final weeks, we will discuss archaeology and historical anthropology's contribution to conceptions of water "sustainability" and examine attempts to revive traditional/ancient technologies and attitudes about water.
Course number only
0905
Cross listings
ANTH0905401
Fulfills
Cross Cultural Analysis
Humanties & Social Science Sector
Use local description
No

MELC0600 - The Middle East through Many Lenses

Status
A
Activity
SEM
Section number integer
301
Title (text only)
The Middle East through Many Lenses
Term
2025C
Subject area
MELC
Section number only
301
Section ID
MELC0600301
Course number integer
600
Meeting times
M 1:45 PM-4:44 PM
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Heather Sharkey
Description
This first-year seminar introduces the contemporary Middle East by drawing upon cutting-edge studies written from a variety of disciplinary perspectives. These include history, political science, and anthropology, as well as studies of mass media, sexuality, religion, urban life, and the environment. We will spend the first few weeks of the semester surveying major trends in modern Middle Eastern history. We will spend subsequent weeks intensively discussing assigned readings along with documentary films that we will watch in class. The semester will leave students with both a foundation in Middle Eastern studies and a sense of current directions in the field.
Course number only
0600
Fulfills
Cross Cultural Analysis
Humanties & Social Science Sector
Use local description
No

MELC0460 - First-Year Seminar: Of Horses, Bows and Fermented Milk: The Silk Roads in 10 Objects

Status
A
Activity
SEM
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
First-Year Seminar: Of Horses, Bows and Fermented Milk: The Silk Roads in 10 Objects
Term
2025C
Subject area
MELC
Section number only
401
Section ID
MELC0460401
Course number integer
460
Meeting times
T 3:30 PM-6:29 PM
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Oscar Aguirre Mandujano
Description
The empires of the Turkic and Turkish peoples have stretched across much of Eurasia since before the Common Era until the twentieth century. We first hear of them in Chinese chroniclers’ tales of a powerful people in the wilderness. Greek historians, Byzantine writers, and Arab polymaths write about the empires of the steppes. Centuries later, the heirs of the heroes of these empires move south and west, establishing empires and tribal confederations beyond the steppe, in Central Asia, Anatolia, and the Middle East. The Turkic empires seem to appear in the periphery of many civilizations, challenging, and, one could say, enriching their borders. But looking at a map, is really more than a half of Eurasia a periphery? If we flip the map, could we say these historians were writing from the margins of the Turkish empires? This course introduces the student to the history of empire by following the various histories of Turkic and Turkish people through 15 objects. It discusses the questions of periphery, borders, and the divide between agrarian, pastoral, and nomadic societies. The student will learn to derive historical questions and hypothesis through the intensive study of material culture, literature, and historical writing tracing the long and diverse history of the bow, the saddle, dumplings, and fermented milk (among others) across Eurasia.
Course number only
0460
Cross listings
HIST0061401
Fulfills
Cross Cultural Analysis
History & Tradition Sector
Use local description
No

MELC4898 - Honors Thesis

Status
A
Activity
IND
Section number integer
2
Title (text only)
Honors Thesis
Term
2025C
Subject area
MELC
Section number only
002
Section ID
MELC4898002
Course number integer
4898
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Timothy Hogue
Description
Course credit for MELC majors pursuing honors
Course number only
4898
Use local description
No

AMEL7300 - Sumerian Daily Texts

Status
A
Activity
SEM
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Sumerian Daily Texts
Term
2025C
Subject area
AMEL
Section number only
401
Section ID
AMEL7300401
Course number integer
7300
Level
graduate
Instructors
Stephen J. Tinney
Description
Reading administrative and economic texts in the Sumerian Language from ancient Mesopotamia.
Course number only
7300
Cross listings
AMEL4420401
Use local description
No

AMEL6200 - Beginning Sumerian

Status
A
Activity
LEC
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Beginning Sumerian
Term
2025C
Subject area
AMEL
Section number only
401
Section ID
AMEL6200401
Course number integer
6200
Level
graduate
Instructors
Stephen J. Tinney
Description
An introduction to the grammar and writing system of the Sumerian language
Course number only
6200
Cross listings
AMEL4200401
Use local description
No

AMEL4420 - Sumerian Daily Texts

Status
A
Activity
SEM
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Sumerian Daily Texts
Term
2025C
Subject area
AMEL
Section number only
401
Section ID
AMEL4420401
Course number integer
4420
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Stephen J. Tinney
Description
Reading administrative and economic texts in the Sumerian Language from ancient Mesopotamia.
Course number only
4420
Cross listings
AMEL7300401
Use local description
No

AMEL4200 - Beginning Sumerian

Status
A
Activity
LEC
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Beginning Sumerian
Term
2025C
Subject area
AMEL
Section number only
401
Section ID
AMEL4200401
Course number integer
4200
Level
undergraduate
Instructors
Stephen J. Tinney
Description
An introduction to the grammar and writing system of the Sumerian language
Course number only
4200
Cross listings
AMEL6200401
Use local description
No

AMEL6202 - Middle Egyptian

Status
A
Activity
LEC
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Middle Egyptian
Term
2025C
Subject area
AMEL
Section number only
401
Section ID
AMEL6202401
Course number integer
6202
Level
graduate
Description
Introduction to the grammar of Middle Egyptian.
Course number only
6202
Use local description
No

MELC5720 - Iran and the West Through the Lens of Fiction

Status
A
Activity
SEM
Section number integer
401
Title (text only)
Iran and the West Through the Lens of Fiction
Term
2025C
Subject area
MELC
Section number only
401
Section ID
MELC5720401
Course number integer
5720
Meeting times
R 3:30 PM-6:29 PM
Level
graduate
Instructors
Fatemeh Shams Esmaeili
Description
This graduate level course explores key tropes and themes of Iranian modernity through a close reading of Persian novels, short stories, travelogues, and memoirs. Various literary genres from social realism, to surrealism, magic realism, naturalism, and absurd literature will be introduced with specific reference to Iran's literature and in light of literary theory of novel. This course does not require any prior knowledge of Persian language and literature. Throughout the course, we will be particularly concerned with the relationship between Persian fiction and the West. We will investigate this curious relationship through themes of gender, religion, politics, and war.
Course number only
5720
Cross listings
COML2017401, GSWS2130401, MELC1710401
Use local description
No