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ANNUAL MEETING 2015 Call for PapersThe Internationa Annual Meeting 2015l Qur’anic Studies Association announces the call for papers for the 2015 Annual Meeting to be held in Atlanta, Georgia. The Annual Meeting dates are November 20-23, 2015. The paper proposal submission deadline is March 5, 2015.For each of IQSA’s six program units please find a detailed call for papers below. Click on the title of the program unit to be directed to an external link for further instructions on submission of proposals. For additional information about a specific program unit, contact the unit chairs.Linguistic, Literary, and Thematic Perspectives on the Qur’anic CorpusQur’an SeminarQur’anic Studies: Methodology and HermeneuticsThe Qur’an and Late Antiquity (new!)The Qur’an and the Biblical TraditionThe Qur’an: Manuscripts and Material CultureLINGUISTIC, LITERARY, AND THEMATIC PERSPECTIVES ON THE QUR’ANIC CORPUS Panel 1. Chronology of the Qur’anic Text: This panel seeks to shed light on the question of chronological development of the Qur’an. Some of the questions we hope to raise are: Do rhetorical and linguistic analyses of the text help in defining the characteristics of makki /madani periods? Which intra-textual features testify to the chronological composition of the text? Do Qur’anic style, themes and word meaning evolve over time within the Qur’an (consider Angelika Neuwirth’s views on a lively dialogue between text and audience)? Does the chronological appearance of the Qur’an have any relevance to or implications on its supposed Ring composition or Semitic style, the unity of the surah, or the Qur’an as a written text? Proposals that evaluate the usefulness and applicability of theories, traditions and hypotheses of chronological development to the Qur’an, especially in relation to its literary features, are also welcome.Panel 2. Themes and Rhetorical Tools in the Qur’an: The second panel seeks proposal on any other aspects of the linguistic, literary, and thematic approaches of the Qur’an, as relevant to the unit description above.Program Unit Chairs: Anne-Sylvie Boisliveau (asboisliveau@gmail.com) , Sarra Tlili (satlili@ufi.edu)Click here to submit proposal.QUR’AN SEMINARFor the 2015 meeting in Atlanta, we have selected four passages that highlight four themes, to be discussed at two separate panels. The panels, with their passages and themes, are as follows:Panel n. 1: Passage 1: II, 1-29 (Polemics), Passage 2: VII, 1-58 (Narratives)Panel n. 2: Passage 3: LIV, 1-55 (Eschatology), Passage 4: LXIII, 1-11 (Contemporary Events)Scholars are invited to submit commentaries for one or both of these panels. To participate on a panel, commentaries must be submitted for both passages in that panel. (Thus, those wishing to participate on both panels are asked to submit four commentaries; those wishing to participate on one panel are asked to submit two commentaries.) Each commentary must not exceed 400 words (prospective panelists should therefore submit no more than 800 or 1600 words). We especially welcome commentaries that address the Qur’an directly and do not rely exclusively on the categories of medieval exegesis. After reviewing the submissions, the QS chairs will select the panelists and post their commentaries on the QS IQSA website (which will be up in February) via a link whose access will be restricted to the selected panelists. In this way, each panelist will be able to review all of the selected commentaries prior to the Annual Meeting. In Atlanta, the QS will be structured as a round-table forum. Panelists will not be asked to prepare a traditional paper. Rather, for each of the four discussions, one panelist (a volunteer, agreed on by the chairs) will be asked to give a brief introductory overview, presenting the passage and summarizing and synthesizing the commentaries; all panelists will then engage in a free-flowing conversation, expanding on the ideas presented in the submitted commentaries. Both panels will be open to the public.Program Unit Chairs: Mehdi Azaiez (azaiez@yahoo.fr) and Clare Wilde (cewilde@alumni.princeton.edu)Click here to submit proposal.QUR’ANIC STUDIES: METHODOLOGY AND HERMENEUTICS At the 2015 meeting, the Methodology and Hermeneutics unit will have one round table discussion and one thematic panel. We invite paper proposals for the thematic panel, entitled The Qur’an and Politics: Hermeneutical Approaches. Papers for this panel could address medieval or modern uses of the Qur’anic text as proof text (or pretext) for various political agendas. We particularly encourage papers that delve into specific hermeneutical approaches and analyze how these approaches are applied to the author’s agenda. The round table discussion will be devoted to the topic The Current State of Qur’anic Studies and its Future and will involve invited participants from various arenas of the field. All inquiries about the Methodology and Hermeneutics panels should be addressed to Karen Bauer, kbauer@iis.ac.uk.Program Unit Chairs: Karen Bauer (kbauer@iis.ac.uk) and Farid Esack (fesack@uj.ac.za)Click here to submit proposal. THE QUR’AN AND LATE ANTIQUITYThe Qur’an and Late Antiquity program unit focuses on  investigation of and critical reflection on the historical context in which the Qur’an was revealed. We seek papers that illustrate significant textual parallels between the Qur’an and other literatures of Late Antiquity, especially those that contribute to a better understanding of the Qur’an’s place in its cultural, political, social, and religious environment. We also seek papers that interpret the rise of the Qur’anic community in a broader phenomenological, sociological, or historiographic context, whether that of pre-Islamic Arabian society or the Roman and Sasanian Empires that dominated the eastern Mediterranean and Near East in this period. Particular attention will be paid to such questions as processes of political consolidation and legitimation, construction of communal boundaries, and relationships between communities and polities.For the 2015 IQSA Annual Meeting in Atlanta, we will sponsor two panels. First, we invite paper proposals for a panel on recent developments in the historiography of Late Antiquity as it pertains to the Qur’anic milieu in pre-Islamic Arabia or the wider context of the Roman and Sasanian dominions. This panel will be co-sponsored by the AAR Traditions of Eastern Late Antiquity group. We especially encourage submissions that attempt to achieve a broader synthesis of cultural, political, and religious trends beyond the analysis and comparison of textual corpora.We also invite paper proposals for a panel to be co-sponsored with the SBL Religious World of Late Antiquity program unit. This panel, the first of two to be presented in consecutive years, will feature papers on the intersection of religion and violence in Late Antiquity as it pertains specifically to the Qur’an and the Qur’anic milieu. The panel takes Thomas Sizgorich’s groundbreaking work Violence and Belief in Late Antiquity: Militant Devotion in Christianity and Islam as its inspiration. We especially encourage proposals that engage Sizgorich’s work directly and explicitly, whether on an historical, thematic, or methodological level.Program Unit Chairs: Michael Pregill (michael.pregill@gmail.com) and Greg Fisher (greg.fisher@carleton.ca)Click here to submit proposal. THE QUR’AN AND THE BIBLICAL TRADITIONFor the 2015 meeting in Atlanta, we invite papers for two sessions:Session 1: Together with the Biblia Arabica consultation of SBL, The Qur’an and the Biblical Tradition invites paper proposals for a joint session on the topic: “‘The Bible is at the same time everywhere and nowhere in the Arabic Qur’an’ (Sidney H. Griffith): Case Studies and Reflections.” This session aims at studying the elaboration and treatment of specific biblical themes in the Qur’an and by its interpreters. Case studies may be on divine revelation, attitudes to class, violence and destruction, attitudes to women, prophets and prophecy, space and time, but do not have to be limited to these. We invite proposals that reflect explicitly on the theme as articulated by Sidney Griffith, and that consider processes of canon formations and renewal on the basis of earlier canons. Session 2: We invite papers on interactions between the biblical and qur’anic traditions for an open session.Program Unit Chairs: Cornelia Horn (cbhorn68@gmail.com) and Holger Zellentin (Holger.Zellentin@nottingham.ac.uk)Click here to submit proposal. THE QUR’AN: MANUSCRIPTS AND MATERIAL CULTUREPanel 1: For the 2015 Meeting in Atlanta we invite papers that deal with all eras and regions of the Qur’an’s manuscript tradition, as well as the variety of palaeographic, art historical, codicological, and historical issues one encounters in our discipline. For example, a paper topic may focus on presenting a particular manuscript or group of manuscripts, on exploring a feature of orthographic development, a particular script style, the dating of manuscripts, issues of textual criticism, systems of qira’at, on the Qur’anic arts of the book or on a feature of Qur’anic manuscript studies not listed here but that fits the general parameters listed in the description of the program unit.Panel 2: This panel aims to provide a forum for the study of the Qur’an as it was applied to objects of daily use, as well as elite artifacts and buildings and for the investigation of scholarly reactions to these developments in hadith collections and other textual sources. In this panel we invite contributions on any aspect of the Qur’an’s history and pre-history that lies outside the manuscript tradition. For example, topics relating to Qur’anic citation in the epigraphic (including graffiti as well as formal inscriptions), architectural, ceramic, numismatic and papyrological records and the use of the Qur’an in funerary, apotropaic, and prophylactic contexts would be most welcome. Topics concerning pre-Islamic inscriptions that might have a bearing on the later formulation of the text of the Qur’an are also welcome.Proposals should include a title and an abstract of approximately 400 words.Program Unit Chairs: Keith Small (keithsmall44@hotmail.com) and Luke Treadwell (luke.treadwell@orinst.ox.ac.uk)Click here to submit proposal.