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The School Principal and the Children: Patriarchy and Changing Childhoods in Jalāl Āl-e Ahmad's Novella Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-09-12 Sivan Balslev
The School Principal introduces readers to a disillusioned and sarcastic teacher who transitions to the role of school principal in a peripheral primary school. Often regarded as a social criticism treatise rather than a work of art, the novella is characterized by the narrator's pervasive cynicism. However, amidst the sarcasm, the principal's actions reveal a surprising undercurrent of compassion
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Minoritized Communities in Iran: The Struggle for Unconditional Equality Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-05-28 Barzoo Eliassi
Following the tragic murder of Jina Mahsa Amini, a Kurdish woman, in 2022, subsequent protests in 2022–23 presented a significant intersectional challenge to the Islamic Republic of Iran's (IRI) political order, revealing deep-seated issues of ethnic, economic, gender, and political discrimination. Originating in the Kurdish region, these protests quickly spread across Iran and its diaspora, offering
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Monolingualism in Iran: The Politics of Writing in Azeri Turkish Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-05-28 Leila Rahimi Bahmany
Throughout the twentieth century, Azeri Turkish was intermittently banned, occasionally tolerated, but always marginalized in relation to Persian, which was perceived as the unifying, defining, essential language of the nation. Despite the substantial population of Azeri Turkish speakers in Iran—the largest linguistic minority—any attempt to teach the language publicly or to publish in Azeri Turkish
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Sufism vs. Monism in ʿAzīz-i Nasafī's Works Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-04-04 Mohammad Amin Mansouri
While the 7th/13th-century Persian Muslim scholar of the Mongol era ʿAzīz-i Nasafī actively engaged with Sufi traditions in his writings, he also introduced an overlooked distinction by drawing a line between Sufis (ahl-i taṣavvuf) and monists (ahl-i vaḥdat), aligning himself with the latter. This paper argues that Nasafī's clear differentiation between these two groups reflects broader transformations
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The Armenian Community and Changing Iranian Perceptions of Minority Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-21 James Barry
Until a decade ago, it was unusual for officials in the Islamic Republic to use the word aqaliat (minority) to refer to ethno-linguistic minorities or Muslim sect minorities. Efforts to cast Sunni Muslims as a minority, or Azeri speakers, were treated with hostility, as the state, following a specific proclamation on ethnicity and sectarianism by Ayatollah Khomeini, viewed these concepts as divisive
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Tohfeye Ziyarat (Souvenir of Pilgrimage): Religious Mobility and Public Health in Late Qajar Iran, c. 1890–1904 Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-18 Sarah Eskandari
Following the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, long-distance pilgrimage to Islamic holy sites expanded and quickened, resulting in the spread of cholera among travelers. The necessity of taking circuitous routes to holy cities both inside and outside Iran significantly exacerbated the spread of cholera. Although potential factors such as inadequate public health infrastructure and ineffective quarantine
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Ottoman Policies Regarding Shah Ismāʿīl II as Seen through Ottoman Documents Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-14 Nozhat Ahmadi, Mohammad Amin Keikha Shahinpour
Relations between Iran and the Ottoman Empire during the Safavid era were never free of tension, even when there was peace between the two states. In peacetime, both powers secretly and closely monitored the other's movements, either in anticipation of or in preparation for attacks. Due to the destruction of Safavid archives, there is little documentary information in Iranian archives about Iranian-Ottoman
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Andre Godard and Maxime Siroux: Disentangling the Narrative of French Colonialism and Modern Architecture in Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-04 Mohadeseh Salari Sardari
This paper investigates the impact of two French architects, Andre Godard and Maxime Siroux, in early twentieth-century Iran using postcolonial methodology to challenge the reductive prevailing narrative of these architects as representatives of Western imperial powers. Furthermore, this paper argues for the existence of a distinct local modernism in Iran, highlights the enduring presence of Iranian
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The Isfahan Anthology Project Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-04 Nozhat Ahmadi, Kathryn Babayan
The aim of the Isfahan Anthology Project is to create an inventory of, collect, and digitize all extant anthologies produced in seventeenth-century Isfahan. Thousands of majmuʿa were authored and assembled in Isfahan. Presently, we are working together with our graduate students at the University of Isfahan and the University of Michigan in a collaboration that intends to train a new generation of
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Quiet Strength: Kurdish Women Kolbars and the Feminization of Poverty Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-03-04 Yosra AleAhmad
We get money at the cost of life here. Do you think death is not better than this life?Being a Kolbar is darkness. It is unfortunate. You either get shot, or you fall down a mountain, then stay alive but disabled.1 (Arasteh, a Kurdish woman kolbar)
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The Security-Development Nexus and the Jina Mahsa Amini Protests in Iran's Border Provinces Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-02-28 Eric Lob
Even before the 1979 Iranian Revolution, Iran's border provinces, which contain Arabs, Azeri Turks, Baluch, Kurds, and Turkmen, were marginalized and securitized by the state. These processes and outcomes have created a vicious cycle and self-fulfilling prophecy within the context of the so-called security-development nexus. Iran's peripheral provinces border Iraq and Turkey in the west and Afghanistan
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The Nation-State and the (Re)Construction of Religious, Ethnic and Gender Relations Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-02-22 Azadeh Kian
Nationalism, nationhood, and ethnicity, as Eric Hobsbawm argued, are social processes constructed essentially from above, yet cannot be understood unless also analyzed from below.1 Inspired by European Orientalism, the intellectual advocates of Western-oriented nationalism attempted to establish a new Iranian identity based on Persian language and Iran's pre-Islamic past.2 This made Iranian nationalism
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Canonization and sacred text in the Yārsān religion Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-01-29 Rahman Veisi Hasar
This paper explains the nature of sacred text and the process of canonization in the Yārsān religion. To this end, we first show how three formative ideas—i.e., the history of divine manifestation, the angelology of scribing, and the scripture of Qabālah—played a major role in the emergence of canonization and sacred text in the Yārsān religion. We then turn to the parallel, heterogeneous processes
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The Role of the Clergy in the Establishment and Consolidation of Pahlavi I (1925–1941) Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2024-01-29 Yunos Kojuri Gashniani, Ali Bagheri Dolatabadi, Abouzar Fattahizadeh
In Iran, the writing of history has consistently been intertwined with political decisions, and official historiography written after the Islamic Revolution is no exception. The majority of books and articles on Pahlavi I have inherited this historiographic tradition, and are thus highly politicized, particularly around the topic of the role of the clergy during this era. Official narratives of this
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Saljuq Architecture in Iran: The Friday Mosque of Urmiya Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-11-13 Alireza Anisi
This study details the Masjid-i Jami‘ of Urmiya, the earliest surviving mosque in the West Azerbaijan province in Iran. The building suggests the expansion of constructing Saljuq-domed mosques outside central Iran in the mid-sixth/twelfth century, embellished with a stunning Ilkhanid mihrāb (prayer niche) in the seventh/thirteenth century. This study provides as much information as possible for recognizing
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The Foreign Trade of Tabriz: 1800-1900 Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-10-18 Willem Floor
Under the early Qajars, Tabriz rose from being a provincial backwater in ruins to the foremost commercial entrepôt of Iran. Initially, its insignificant foreign trade was limited to Turkey (mostly raw Gilani silk), but, when the major commercial southern and western supply routes of Iran became unsafe and costly, trade moved to the northern route. Moreover, after Russia opened its territory to European
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Hezb-e Tudeh-ye Iran and Its Struggle Against the Challenges Posed Against It by the British, 1942–1946: An Analysis Based on Soviet Documents Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-10-10 Soli Shahvar
Archival documents from Russia, which are becoming more accessible, help to provide a more accurate accounts of Iran's political past. Based on Soviet documents from the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History, as well additional primary and secondary sources in various languages, the focus of this article is on the challenges and obstacles which the Tudeh Party faced from the British and
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Alexander the Great or Būrān-Dukht: who is the true hero of the Dārāb-nāma of Ṭarsūsī? Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-09-26 Marina Gaillard
This article presents a new reading of the Dārāb-nāma (Book of Dārāb, ca. eleventh–twelfth century), a medieval popular narrative in prose (dāstān) ascribed to the storyteller Abū Ṭāhir Ṭarsūsī. While the narrative belongs to the Persian tradition of the Alexander romance, the Alexander figure it depicts bears little resemblance to that presented in high classical verse-forms by the likes of Firdawsī
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The Postal System in Safavid, Afsharid, and Zand Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-09-25 Willem Floor
While the functioning of the postal system in Iran before 1500 and after 1800 has been studied, this article analyzes, based entirely on primary sources, the operation and characteristics of the Iranian postal system between 1500 and 1800 for the very first time. Such a study enables scholars to better understand the functioning of communication between both government officials and private individuals
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From ritual to performance: Ta'zieh in Iran today Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-24 Yassaman Khajehi, Christian Biet
As a practice and experience, ta'zieh lies at the crossroads between ritual and performance, collective lament and recollection, literature, and folklore. Focusing on the experience of the spectator, this paper discusses ta'zieh's liminal status and diverse functions in Iran today. This study is based on observations gathered during fieldwork in the fall of 2017 in Tehran (Grand Bazaar), Isfahan (Falāvarjān)
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Two Raji Dialects Converge with Persian: Contrasting Responses to Contact Influence Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-18 Mahnaz Talebi-Dastenaei, Hamideh Poshtvan, Erik Anonby
Raji is a Central Plateau (Iranic) language spoken in Kashan district, in the north-west corner of Esfahan Province, Iran. Here, we investigate the nature of Persian influence on the lexicon of two closely-related Raji dialects: that of Abuzeydabad, a desert outpost at 947m above sea level, and Barzok, a well-watered farming community at 2080m in mountains nearby. As expected, our analysis shows many
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Soft Epiphanies: The Multilayered Narratives in Abbas Kiarostami's Film Close-Up (1990) Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-11 Agnès Devictor, Amélie Neuve-Eglise
As part of the collective endeavor to explore the modalities and challenges of the narrative in the Persianate world, this article reconsiders Abbas Kiarostami's Close-Up (1990), a film characterized by a special cinematographic feature. While accounting for what appears to be a story of swindling and identity theft, Kiarostami keeps the viewer in a state of uncertainty about the nature of what he
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Translator as Historical Re-Narrator: The Case of the Persian Translation of Clements Markham's History of Persia Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-04 Somaye Delzendehrooy
This paper examines Mirza Rahim Khan's Persian translation (1885) of Clement Markham's A General Sketch of the History of Persia (1874) as a historical event. To this end, this article looks at two copies of the translation manuscripts: one written by the translator, which also includes revisions of his first draft, and the other an illuminated copy presented to Naser al-Din Shah, the fourth Qajar
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“Don't Let the Boats Pass!” Neo-Elamite Grain Procurement in Times of Famine and Drought Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Elynn Gorris
This article is concerned with interregional trade dynamics between Elam and Mesopotamia in the early to mid-first millennium BC. During the seventh century BC, two great famines in the Neo-Elamite kingdom, of which climatological changes were a major cause, were documented in the textual records. An era of megadrought made grain procurement from the neighboring regions essential to feed the Neo-Elamite
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Writing in Turbulent Times. Introduction to the Roundtable on the 2022–23 Iranian Protests Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Paola Rivetti
The editorial decision to publish a roundtable on the 2022–23 protests in Iran has come with challenges and obvious limitations due to access and immediacy. The ambition of this intervention is to offer some initial reflections and some analytical instruments in the hope that they will be useful for future publications. We also want to write in this moment because we want to register its characteristics—emotions
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Iran Protests and Patterns of State Repression Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Maryam Alemzadeh
Over the past four months, the brutal, extralegal, and violent repression of protestors during the Woman, Life, Freedom movement in Iran has taken observers and participants by devastating and sometimes fatal surprise. Although not a drastic departure from past practices, the large scale and seemingly random acts of violence, such as the beating of protestors to death on the streets, the shooting of
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Political Convergence, Surpluses of Activism, and Genealogy: Examining Iran's Quasi-Revolutionary Situation Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Paola Rivetti, Shirin Saeidi
In this intervention, we discuss the ongoing protest movement and the quasi-revolutionary situation in Iran with the goal of offering contextual as well as background analysis. Our objective is to examine the current wave of revolutionary politics in the frame of a longer history, that is, the one of the “unaccomplished” 1979 revolution. We do not argue that the current movement is in continuity with
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Revolt with a Revolutionary Perspective Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Peyman Jafari
At the zenith of the Women, Life, Freedom (WLF) protests in October to December 2022, the call for (general) strikes became a rallying point for activists who were seeking to increase the protests’ social reach and political strength in the face of increasing state repression. Therefore labor provides an advantageous analytical lens for exploring some of the constraints and potentials of the social
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Women Reclaiming Their Voices for Life and Freedom: Music and the 2022 Uprising in Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Nahid Siamdoust
One of the most prominent features of Iran's 2022 Woman, Life, Freedom uprising has been the diverse profusion of songs created in its wake. Music has played an important role in Iran's social and political movements at least since the Constitutional Revolution when the poet and musical bard Abolqasem Aref Qazvini (d. 1934) effectively transformed the musical concert into a political congregation.
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Art of Protest in Five Acts Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-08-03 Pamela Karimi
The world's first encounter with the tragic murder of the 22-year-old Mahsa Amini by Iran's “morality police” was through her image. As millions around the world browsed through news and social media, they were shocked by the image of the unconscious Amini hooked up to ventilators—her punishment for showing some hair through a loosely worn scarf (Fig. 1). The photograph was so influential that a week
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Yazd and its Zoroastrians: A review paper of Ali Akbar Tashakori's A Social History of the Zoroastrians of Yazd (2019) Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-07-19 Kiyan Foroutan
This is a review article of a three-volume book in Persian by Ali Akbar Tashakori on the social history of Yazdi Zoroastrians in medieval and modern times.1 The work goes beyond the history of the Yazdi community, encompassing the broader history of Iranian Zoroastrians. Despite certain novelties, the volumes largely rely on a conventional reconstruction of the history of Iranian Zoroastrians in the
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Fārsīgraphy in Zoroastrian Middle Persian Manuscripts Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-07-18 Ibrāhīm Šafiʿī
The tradition of writing in Iran has a long history, and its continuous development has, from time to time, led to new scripts. A most notable case is that of Perso-Arabic's replacement of Pahlavi script when New Persian replaced Middle Persian, resulting in Zoroastrian priests having difficulties reading and understanding their religious texts. The process of changing scripts is well attested by the
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Hair and Hat Ritual Shaming Punishments in Nineteenth-Century Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-06-28 Farzin Vejdani
This article considers three temporary and reversible penal shaming acts in nineteenth-century Iran: the shaving or cutting of hair, irrespective of gender; the shaving or cutting of men's facial hair; and the forcible removal of headgear or the coerced wearing of silly headgear. Drawing on anthropological, historical, and sociological studies of hair, this study argues that hair and hat punishments
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From Iran to the Netherlands, and everywhere in between: Irregular migration and human smuggling from Iran to the Netherlands (1988–1989 and 2009–2010) Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-06-16 Louise Ballière
A migrant's journey is no linear trajectory from A to B. It is a fragmented and complex move over different regions with alternating periods of mobility and immobility. This article researches the complex dynamics of irregular migration from Iran to the Netherlands, and everywhere in between. Through a historical comparison of the life stories of Iranian asylum seekers in the Netherlands in two time
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Shadow Performance in Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-06-08 Milad Azarm
This study argues, contrary to some opinions, that shadow performance existed in Iran from at least the tenth to the twentieth century. Through a textual analysis of newly discovered ancient texts, two plays specifically, this study shows how shadow performance originated in the Indian subcontinent, was transported from Iran to the historical region now known as Iraq, and then spread to Egypt, developing
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“Iranian Conditions: Health Problems and Medical Practices in the Words of the Staff of the Alliance Israélite Universelle, 1900–1950” Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-06-05 Isabelle S. Headrick
The staff of the Alliance Israélite Universelle (AIU), an international educational philanthropy, were professionally and personally buffeted by health and medical concerns. This article examines the value of their letters, arguing they serve as a deep reservoir of biased yet valuable evidence that corroborates other sources while also providing insight into the health and disease conditions of Iran's
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“The Shah's House Became the People's House”: Narrating Iran's Modern History at the Pahlavi Dynasty Museum Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-05-29 Marziyeh Bazyar, Robert Steele
This paper examines the Pahlavi Dynasty Museum, which was inaugurated in 1976 during the celebrations marking the fiftieth anniversary of Pahlavi rule. Built inside the Marble Palace, the shah's former residence in the center of Tehran, the museum was intended to memorialize the achievements of the Pahlavis, presenting the official Pahlavi version of Iran's modern history. The museum was unique in
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Īhām, or the Technique of Double Meaning in Literature: Its Theory and Practice in the Twelfth Century Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-05-03 Shahrouz Khanjari
This article examines the chapter on īhām (literary amphiboly) in Ḥadāʾiq al-Siḥr by Rashīd Vaṭvāṭ (d. 1182). Ḥadāʾiq, a treatise on stylistics with Persian and Arabic examples, is the oldest extant document to define īhām. Vaṭvāṭ's definition of īhām sheds light on the mechanism and function of this literary technique. This article argues that īhām, according to Vaṭvāṭ, operates through the creation
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Writing Capitalism into Iran: A Roundtable Discussion Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-04-18 Bita Mousavi, Kaveh Ehsani
The Islamic Republic of Iran is confronting a crisis. Thousands of Iranians, within and without Iran, have taken to the streets to call for an end to a regime that sanctions violence against its citizens and a future of dwindling opportunity for its youth. These ongoing protests, catalyzed by the killing of Mahsa Amini, seem at once to have nothing and everything to do with the question motivating
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Capitalism as a Concept of Difference in the Historiography of Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-04-18 Kevan Harris
In the historiography of Iran, capitalism is commonly evoked as a “concept of difference.” By this, I mean that the term is regularly used to characterize socioeconomic phenomena as modern versus traditional, leading versus laggard, foreign versus indigenous, or hero versus villain in an assumed direction of history. As Jürgen Kocka remarked when coining the phrase, most definitions of capitalism since
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A Capitalist Economy without Robust Capitalist Production Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-04-18 Mohammad Maljoo
In answering the motivating question of this roundtable—How, if at all, has capitalism as an analytical category figured in your work?—I separate my approach from two opposed but equally extreme camps of left-leaning scholars working on postrevolutionary Iran. The first camp underestimates the actuality of capitalism in Iran. It takes as its frame of reference neoliberal capitalism in the context of
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Writing Capitalism into Iranian History Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-04-18 Rudi Matthee
Capitalism used to be a singular term, but, like many keywords in English, now is often presented and discussed as a plural: capitalisms. Whereas capitalism formerly stood for what today is called industrial capitalism, scholars currently talk about varieties of capitalism: commercial capitalism, industrial capitalism, financial capitalism, and neoliberal capitalism, to name but the most prominent
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Capitalist Lineages of Early Modern Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-04-18 Maziar Samiee
Iran is hardly perceived as a normal country, whether it be by Western commentators and politicians critical of the government, Iranian leaders who impart special distinction to it, or ordinary Iranians protesting against it. This sense of anomaly has become so ingrained that some factions of the Iranian opposition take to social media to express their yearning for a “normal life.” Economic peculiarities
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Uncertain Cures: The Medical Marketplace in Pahlavi Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-03-08 Shaherzad Ahmadi
Historians of Pahlavi Iran have demonstrated that physicians, pharmacists, dentists, and nurses were encouraged by early nation-builders to civilize patients and shepherd the masses into modernity. Medicine, however, was not only a top-down affair. Medical professionals maintained a dialogue with their patients, cognizant of the cultural mores of local communities and the threat of medical malpractice
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Ilkhanid Wood Carvings in the Mountain Villages between Kashan and Natanz Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-03-06 Mohamad Reza Ghiasian, Mohammad Mashhadi Nooshabadi
This paper surveys some wood carvings belonging to four mosques in the villages of Firizhand, Quhrud, Abyana, and Barzuk. Carved between the years 700/1300-1 and 705/1305–6, they consist of architectural elements such as doors, columns, and capitals. The recently found woodwork evidence from the demolished Jamiʿ mosque of Barzuk reveals that this building and its decorations were executed by a multiskilled
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A Soviet View on the Assassination of the Iranian Prime Minister, Haj ʻAli Razmara, in the Context of the Early Years of the Cold War Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-02-10 Soli Shahvar
Using Soviet foreign ministry documents found in the Russian State Archive of Socio-Political History, this article seeks to shed a new light on the identity of those behind the assassination of Haj ʻAli Razmara in 1951, and the reasons for it. In seeking a power to back his aspirations to become the ruler of Iran, Razmara hopped between the USSR and the United States, finally gambling on USSR. In
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Special Issue: Parsis and Iranians in the Modern Period Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-01-25 Afshin Marashi, Dinyar Patel
A hundred years ago in colonial Bombay, on September 10, 1922, a group of Parsis established an organization called the Iran League. Meant to strengthen ties with their Iranian Zoroastrian coreligionists inside Iran, the Iran League also endeavored to recast wider economic and cultural relations between India and the country which Parsis regarded as their ancient homeland. That ancient homeland, after
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As Seen from Bombay: An Iranian Zoroastrian Photo Album from the 1930s Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-01-25 Afshin Marashi, Dinyar Patel
This photo essay provides a visual archive of Parsi philanthropic efforts toward the Iranian Zoroastrian communities of Yazd, Kerman, and Tehran during the 1930s. The essay reproduces a collection of photographs from a photo album produced by the Iranian Zoroastrian Anjoman (est. 1918) for the benefit of Parsi audiences in Bombay. These photographs were taken and compiled by administrators of the Parsi-funded
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Drifting toward Revolution: Kurt Scharf and the dah shab in Tehran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2023-01-09 Olmo Gölz
Poetry readings are an intimate affair; they are not suitable for mobilizing the masses. But poems can capture moods and trigger emotions. They can create closeness and community, send messages and demand change. Indeed, in the case of Iran, a series of poetry reading sessions can be considered a milestone event on the country's path toward revolution.2 During ten nights of poetry reading, known as
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Distinction and Survival: Zoroastrians, Religious Nationalism, and Cultural Ownership in Shiʿi Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-11-15 Navid Fozi
This article argues that the notion of Iranian culture employed in the public discourse of Zoroastrians allows them to tackle the dilemma of Shiʿi-dominated Iranianness without provoking Shiʿi authorities. The piece offers an analysis of ethnographic data, including detailed speech acts documented in Zoroastrians’ ritual spaces and cultural exhibitions. It explores the Zoroastrian configuration of
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Occult Ecumenism: Maḥmūd Dihdār Shīrāzī's Unveiling Secrets as Exemplar of Timurid-Safavid Sunni-Shiʿi Science Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-11-15 Matthew Melvin-Koushki
That Safavid Iran was scene to a boom in the occult sciences (ʿulum-i gharība) is now beginning to be acknowledged by specialists; what has yet to be appreciated is the extent to which that boom represented a smooth and conscious continuation of Mamluk, Aqquyunlu, Ottoman and especially Timurid Sunni precedent. In particular, lettrism (ʿilm-i ḥurūf), developed by the Pythagoreanizing, imamophile New
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And the Master Answered?: Deferrals of Authority in Contemporary Sufism in Iran Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-10-28 Seema Golestaneh
Authority in Islam is often understood to operate as a site of negotiation. Based on textual analysis and ethnographic research, this article examines three case studies of disparate Shi'i Sufi Orders where a willing deferral of certain types of authority exists. In the first case study, the Soltanalishahi Order refer their members to an outside mujtahid for all matters relating to the shariat, therein
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Back to the Motherland? Parsi Gujarati Travelogues of Iran in the Qajar-Pahlavi Interregnum, 1921–1925 Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-09-23 Murali Ranganathan
The publication of four Gujarati travelogues written by Parsis traveling to Iran in quick succession in the 1920s marked the intensification of a relationship that had hitherto been based mainly on philanthropy directed towards the Zoroastrians of Iran. The Pahlavi regime, with its assurances of religious tolerance and equity, prompted Parsis to consider deepening their connection with Iran through
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The Ancient Iranian Perception of Cyrus the Great Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-09-16 A. Mani Irannejad
While the only surviving legends of Cyrus the Great are found in Graeco-Roman sources, such sources ultimately speak to the varied views of Cyrus in Achaemenid Iran. Following a survey of the historical conditions leading to the rise of the Persian Empire under Cyrus and its consolidation under Darius, this article explores the characteristics of western Iranian historiography of the Median “state”
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From Worker-Peasant to Reluctant Revolutionary Industrial Worker in the Establishment of Iran's Copper Industry: The Sarcheshmeh Copper Mine, 1960s–1970s Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-08-24 Abdolreza Alamdar
This paper studies the transformation of the worker-peasant to reluctant revolutionary industrial worker during the establishment of Iran's copper industry at the Sarcheshmeh copper mine from 1966 to 1979. It explores the procedural rules implemented by mine management, such as coercion and paternalism, and the nature of the employment relationship, including methods of control, bargaining, and dispute
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Early Persian Verse Romances in Mutaqārib: Form, Structure, Contents Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-08-22 Gabrielle van den Berg
This article discusses use of the meter mutaqārib in Persian masnavī (narrative) poetry as related to its content from a comparative perspective. One of the aims is to demonstrate the various connections between a set of narrative poems composed in mutaqārib. The article questions previous assumptions about the form and style of early Persian verse romances and contributes to further discussion of
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What is at Stake in the Frame Story? A Timurid Reshaping of the Romance of Bahrām Gūr Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-08-22 Marc Toutant
This article examines Mīr ʿAlī Shīr Navāʾī's Sabʿa-yi Sayyār (889/1484), a Chaghatay rewriting of Niẓāmī's Haft Paykar and Amīr Khusraw Dihlavī's Hasht Bihisht. In the prologue of his masnavī, the Timurid poet expresses harsh criticism against his Persian models. He targets his predecessors’ frame stories, and more specifically their depiction of Bahrām Gūr's behavior while listening to the seven nested
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Diachronic Development of the K-suffixes: Evidence from Classical New Persian, Contemporary Written Persian, and Contemporary Spoken Persian Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-08-11 Maryam Nourzaei
This paper aims to investigate the usage and frequency of what we refer to as K-suffixes in Classical New Persian of the ninth to thirteenth centuries, Contemporary Written Persian of the late nineteenth to mid-twentieth centuries, and Contemporary Spoken Persian. It shows that K-suffixes are most likely to be the reflexes of earlier evaluative morphemes, traditionally called “diminutives,” and are
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The Metaphorical Use of Body Parts in Forming Counting expressions: Evidence from Tāti Language Group Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-07-18 Jahandust Sabzalipur, Raheleh Izadifar
Mathematics is a particularly important challenge for embodied approaches to cognition, as it is probably the most abstract domain of human knowledge. Humans use metaphors in all aspects of life. This paper studies the effects of human body parts on numerals, numeral systems, and mensural and sortal classifiers. The evidence for this paper comes from the Tāti language group, an endangered Iranian language
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Persianate Pasts; National Presents: Persian Literary and Cultural Production in the Twentieth Century Iranian Studies (IF 0.7) Pub Date : 2022-07-14 Aria Fani, Kevin L. Schwartz
Persianate pasts die hard. Despite the birth of nation-states, advent of colonialism, rise of national literatures, and emergence of new global technologies, the Persianate connections defining the texts, idioms, and vocabularies that bound together large swaths of Islamic Eurasia throughout the early-modern period continued to shape and inflect cultural and literary production in the late-nineteenth