The Middle East: Muhammad, Muslims, Minorities, Myths, Media and More

Inescapably these days, attention is drawn towards the Arab world: a neighbouring and geographically vast universe with a historical depth of millennia, defined by partially unknown consecutive and contemporaneous civilisations and empires, and a chronological cascade of (monotheistic) religions, languages, alphabets, cultural (self-)expressions and influences defining “them” and thereby “us”. For those inclined to better understand and disentangle the nuances of this kaleidoscopic mosaic of intricacies, this series chooses to offer a vademecum, and make current affairs more transparent.

The individual lectures
1. Muhammad (7^th century CE) and the Islam (16 Jan)
2. Muslims of Different Convictions and Power of Persuasion (23 Jan)
3. Middle Eastern Minority Cultural Phenomena (6 Feb)
4. Myths of the Middle East (13 Feb)
5. Self-Definition Presented by Media: Seeing the Same, but Thinking Differently (20 Feb)

Speaker
Ronald E. Kon: Arabist, Author, (Literary) Translator, Founding owner of Centre of Expertise KONTEKST and Guest Researcher Institute for Area Studies, Leiden University