About
Drawing on various disciplinary perspectives and methodological approaches, the Graduate Student Working Groups at CNES provide a collaborative forum for intellectual exchange, professional development, and advanced research training. The group operates as a semi-autonomous entity supervised by a designated faculty member, and may include discussions of works in progress, research presentations, and thematic workshops. To expand opportunities for scholarly engagement and collaboration, the working group may also host invited speakers from national and international institutions.
The group is organized by one or two graduate students supported by a faculty mentor. Together, the Group leadership chooses specific themes and discussion topics, invite membership and presentations of other graduate students from across the campus, as well as identify and invite external speakers, when appropriate.
AY 2026-2027 Working Group
Witnesses and Stewards: Reception of the Ancient Middle East and North Africa
Organizers: Malkia Okech (NELC) and Natalie Rudin (NELC)
Faculty supervisor: Lara Fabian (NELC)
This working group focuses on the modern reception of the ancient Middle East and North Africa (MENA), covering Mesopotamia, the Nile Valley Region, the Levant, Anatolia, ancient Iran, and Central Asia. We will have monthly working group sessions, public programs, and a culminating symposium and zine. We seek to invite discussion and critical thought pertaining to the different forms and modalities that reception can take in order to work towards an understanding of reception as a phenomenon. We pose two guiding questions:
1. How does the reception of ancient MENA regions inform us about the modern world?
2. How does the modern reception of ancient MENA regions inform our understanding of the ancient world?
Participating graduate students will have the opportunity to build a case study (we encourage both traditional scholarly and experimental mediums) for presentation in the final symposium/zine, and gain experience in reception theory, interdisciplinary research, community-based practice and public-facing scholarship.
Upcoming meetings
November 20, 2026 from 3:00 PM to 6:00 PM in Bunche 10286.