Frankfurt University to Host DAVO Congress in October

The 25th International Congress of the German Middle East Studies Association (DAVO) is slated for October 4-6 at Goethe University Frankfurt. This year’s congress incorporates the conference on “Politics, Religion and Society in the Middle East and North Africa”

The event is organized under the supervision of Professor Suzanne Schroter, director of Frankfurt Research Center on Global Islam. She has called on scholars of relevant discipline, who conduct research on the contemporary Middle East (and its relations to other regions) to submit proposals for panels and individual papers.

Papers and panels are invited from all disciplines in social science and humanities related to the Middle East and North Africa or their relations to other parts of the world, according to the website of Frankfurt Research Center on Global Islam.

Individual papers will be reviewed thematically and summed up into panels. Every paper should be presented maximum in 20 minutes and discussed in 10 minutes. Accepted languages of presentation are German and English.

In western circles it is often said that Islamic fundamentalism is on the rise both in Muslim majority countries and the Muslim diaspora in the western world, Europe in particular.

However, little, if anything is said about the root causes of the radicalism, which many independent observers relate to the colonialism, oppression and crime against humanity of the western powers in the Muslim world over the past several centuries.

Meanwhile, Muslim intellectuals and scholars across continents are trying to promote moderation and concepts of the religion that are compatible with democracy, human rights, and women’s and children’s rights.

The Frankfurter Forschungszentrum Globaler Islam (Frankfurt Research Center on Global Islam) is a think tank that subjects these dynamics to scholarly analysis, and specifies their significance with regard to Germany.

Combining regional and national perspectives with transnational and global approaches, the center is in a position to establish context and connection, and to advise both state and civil society actors. Detailed information about the 25th International DAVO Congress is available on the website of Frankfurt Research Center on Global Islam.