Dr. Hossein Kamaly, Associate Professor of Islamic Studies and Holder of the Imam Ali Chair in Shi’i Studies and Dialogue among Islamic Legal Schools, will speak at McGill University’s Institute for Islamic Studies at 3 p.m. (EST) on Tuesday, Oct. 19.

The event is online. Register at this link.

Dr. Kamaly will speak on “Nationalist Messianism: A Case of Literary Displacement” as part of the Persianate Studies Colloquium.

A description of the talk:

On the eve of the Constitutional Revolution at the turn of the 20th century, messianic tropes suffused Persian poetry and prose. With a twist. Unlike earlier warnings of imminent cosmic apocalypse, the new promise and expectation pointed to radical political change and the deliverance of the nation. This talk analyzes examples from the writings of constitutionalists, reformers, and later writers: Bahar, Mohammad Iqbal, Forough Farrokhzad, and Sadegh Hedayat.