Is misogyny part of Islam? In the Quran, the Prophet Muhammad took pains to address both male Muslims and female Muslims, because both have the same religious duties. The Five Pillars of Islam apply to both of them. The Quran states explicitly that men and women are equal before God. During the seventh century, women could own businesses and fight battles. Muslim feminists throughout the world today are advocating a return to Prophet Muhammad’s vision of an egalitarian religion for an equal...

With generous financial support from the Office of the Vice President for Research, the Obermann Center will offer the Obermann Center Writing & Research Workshop June 12 to 16, 2023. Faculty writing about their research across all disciplines and ranks are invited to apply. At this weeklong event, participants will have the opportunity to begin summer by deeply engaging a work-in-progress with the support of individualized feedback, workshops, and time to write in solitude and in community at...

The Mellon Humanities for the Public Good (HPG) Initiative invites applications from UI faculty and partners to design a Humanities Lab. We define a “Lab” as an applied, experiential approach to teaching and learning at the graduate level that offers graduate students meaningful ways to connect advanced studies in the humanities with both a social challenge and skills valued in multiple career settings. The Lab grant will be awarded to one or more faculty members from humanities or humanities...

On Thursday, March 2, at 2:30 p.m. CST, Professors Tara Bynum (English, CLAS) and Kabria Baumgartner (History and Africana Studies, Northeastern University) will discuss Bynum's new book, Reading Pleasures: Everyday Black Living in Early America (University of Illinois Press), which tells the stories of four early American writers who expressed feeling good despite living while enslaved or only nominally free.

Bynum, a 2021 recipient of the Book Ends: Obermann/OVPR Book Completion Workshop...

Join us for a conversation between two University of Iowa students and three key figures of Our Bodies Ourselves, the legendary collective that published the groundbreaking text Our Bodies, Ourselves in 1969. This organization has continued to advocate for reproductive justice—developing powerful and inspiring models of health communication, medical education, legal advocacy and literary publishing on the body. Please register for the webinar-style conversation and Q&A, which will range wide and...

The Obermann Center seeks a graduate student to support the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation grant, Humanities for the Public Good (HPG), under the supervision of the Director of the Obermann Center, who is the Principal Investigator on the project. The ideal candidate should be an outstanding scholar-teacher who is interested in conducting and sharing research on the larger ecosystem of the humanities and diverse careers for humanities scholars and learning the skills necessary to be a successful...