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2022 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest Speaker - DR YARA HAWARI - Palestinian academic, writer and Senior Analyst at Al-Shabaka.

 DR YARA HAWARI

Dr Yara Hawari is a Palestinian academic and writer. She completed her PhD in Middle East Politics at the University of Exeter, where her research focused on oral history and Indigenous Studies. She currently works as a senior analyst at Al-Shabaka, a Palestinian think tank. She is a frequent political commentator for various media outlets, including The Guardian, Foreign Policy and Al Jazeera English. She is also the author of The Stone House, her debut novella and the host of the podcast Rethinking Palestine.

Dr Hawari's lecture titled Imagining a Palestinian Future: Re-internationalising the Palestinian Struggle streamed directly from Palestine on Sunday 13 November 2022.

"As we enter into the eighth decade of the ongoing Nakba (also known as the Israeli settler colonial project), Palestinian land continues to be annexed whilst Palestinians themselves continue to be displaced, incarcerated and ghettoized. All of this is in addition to a global shift towards the far right which has made it increasingly harder to imagine a liberated Palestine and a decolonial future. Yet it is possible. The first step is recognising that Palestine is not an exceptional case – rather it is an example par excellence of how (settler) colonialism, patriarchy and capitalism come together to oppress an indigenous population. Palestine must thus be situated as an integral part of the international struggle for a just world.”

Watch Dr Yara Hawari’s 2022 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

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2021 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker - NOAM CHOMSKY, renowned political philosopher and one of the most influential thinkers of our time, in conversation with Dr Sam Shahin, AFOPA.

IN CONVERSATION, WITH NOAM CHOMSKY

Each year, AFOPA presents a guest speaker who challenges us to take a different view or see new possibilities for change. This year is no different. We are honoured to invite you to a personal conversation with Noam Chomsky where he will offer his latest reflections on Palestine.


 Dr Sam Shahin, immediate past chair of AFOPA speaks with Chomsky, renowned political philosopher and one of the most influential thinkers of our time.  His work has transformed the field of  linguistics, and influenced cognitive science, philosophy, psychology, computer science, mathematics, childhood education, and anthropology. Chomsky has long been a leading voice in advocating for human rights, and for the Palestinian people.

Watch In Conversation with Noam Chomsky

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2020 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Ms MELISSA PARKE - human rights lawyer and former Federal Member of the Australian Parliament.

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This year, 2020, marks the 16th year of the Lecture.

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Speaker: 

Melissa Parke

Human rights lawyer and former Federal Parliamentarian

Lecture title: 

The Conscious Pariah

SATURDAY, 17 October 2020

Online Webinar

Free Entry (Registration required)

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

Lecture title: “The Conscious Pariah”
(How distortions of fact, contortions of logic and assassinations of character are used against critics of Israel, while it poses as the plucky democracy and the eternal victim.)

About Melissa Parke

Melissa Parke commenced her legal career in 1990s before commencing work with the United Nations.  She was posted with the Peacekeeping Mission in Kosovo in 1999, remaining in the UN for 8 years, including 2½ years with UNRWA in Gaza. She also worked in Lebanon and New York.

Melissa served 9 years in the Australian parliament as the Federal Labor Member for Fremantle, including time as Minister for International Development.  Since retiring from parliament, she has been a member of the UN Group of Eminent Experts (GEE), mandated by the UN Human Rights Council to investigate violations of international law by the parties to the conflict in Yemen.


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2019 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr SALMAN ABU SITTA - Founder and President of the Palestine Land Society, Researcher on refugee affairs & author

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This year, 2019, marks the 15th year of the Lecture.

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Speaker: 

Dr Salman Abu Sitta

Founder and President of the Palestine Land Society, Reseacher on refugee affair & Author

Lecture title: 

The Right of Return is the Only Key for Peace

SATURDAY, 5 October 2019, 5:30PM-7:00PM

University of South Australia (City West Campus
Allan Scott Auditorium, H2-16 Hawke Building, 55 North Terrace, ADELAIDE SA

Tickets: $20 General Entry / $15 Concession Entry

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About Dr Salman Abu Sitta

Dr Salman Abu Sitta is the founder and president of Palestine Land Society, London, dedicated to the documentation of Palestine’s land and people.

Author of six books on Palestine, including the compendium Atlas of Palestine 1917- 1966 (English and Arabic editions), the Atlas of the Return Journey (in Arabic, English and Hebrew) and over 300 papers and articles on Palestine refugees, the Right of Return, history of al-Nakba and human rights.

He is the author of Mapping my Return: A Palestinian Memoir which had positive reviews. Dr Abu Sitta is active in many academic, legal and human rights groups.


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2018 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Ms NOURA ERAKAT - attorney and human rights advocate.

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This year, 2018, marks the 14th year of the Lecture, which will be presented in conjunction with the 2018 Adelaide Festival of Ideas. 

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Speaker: 

Noura Erakat

Attorney and human rights advocate

Lecture title: 

ANTI-BLACKNESS, SETTLER-COLONIALISM AND THE QUESTION OF PALESTINE

SATURDAY, 14 July 2018, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Adelaide Town Hall
128 King William St, ADELAIDE SA

Tickets: $20 General Entry / $15 Concession Entry

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

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Audio now available

Audio recording of Noura Erakat's presentation of the 2018 Edward Said Memorial Lecture, with thanks to the Adelaide Festival of Ideas.

About Noura Erakat

Noura Erakat is a human rights attorney and an Assistant Professor at George Mason University. Her research interests include humanitarian law, refugee law, national security law, and critical race theory.

She is a Co-Founding Editor of Jadaliyya e-zine and an Editorial Committee member of the Journal of Palestine Studies. Prior to joining GMU's faculty,  she served as Legal Counsel for a Congressional Subcommittee in the House of Representatives, as a Legal Advocate for the Badil Resource Center for Palestinian Refugee and Residency Rights, and as the national grassroots organizer and legal advocate at the US Campaign to End the Israeli Occupation. She is a Co-Founding Board Member of the DC Palestinian Film and Arts Festival and is a Board member of the Institute for Policy Studies. Noura is the coeditor of Aborted State? The UN Initiative and New Palestinian Junctures, an anthology related to the 2011 and 2012 Palestine bids for statehood at the UN.  

More recently, Noura released a pedagogical project on the Gaza Strip and Palestine, which includes a short multimedia documentary, Gaza In Context, that rehabilitates Israel’s wars on Gaza within a settler-colonial framework. She is also the producer of the short video, Black Palestinian Solidarity. Noura’s media appearances include CNN, MSNBC, Fox News, PBS NewsHour, BBC World Service, NPR, Democracy Now!, and Al Jazeera. She has published in the Nation, the New York Times, the Los Angeles Review of Books, Huffington Post, Jezebel, IntlLawGrrls, The Hill, and Foreign Policy, among others. Noura is the author of Justice for Some: Law As Politics in the Question of Palestine (forthcoming Stanford University Press, 2019).

See more of Noura's writing here >>

Follow Noura on Twitter @4noura >>

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17 JULY 2018: Noura Erakat interviewed on the ABC

Jadaliyya Co-Editor Noura Erakat Speaks to Australian Broadcasting Corporation about the Focus on Hamas in Midst of Israel's Killing of Three Palestinian Boys.

In the past four days, Israel has killed three young Palestinian boys in Gaza raising the death toll to 139 since Palestinians began the Great Return March on 30 March 2018. The renewed escalations follow Israel sealing of Kerem Shalom, the only commercial crossing in the Gaza Strip and Israeli claims that flaming kites from Gaza justify the use of defensive force. Jadaliyya Co-Editor Noura Erakat joins the Australian Broadcasting Corporation to discuss these latest developments. 


19 JULY 2018: Noura Erakat's address in Melbourne, Australia

The Australia Palestine Advocacy Network (APAN) hosted Noura in Melbourne for her lecture, Human Rights and Palestine in the age of Trump.

View full video here >>


14 MAY 2018: NOURA ERAKAT INTERVIEW ON CBS NEWS

How are Palestinians reacting to the U.S. embassy in Jerusalem and violence in Gaza?

Powerful interview by Noura Erakat on CBS News in the US.


9 May 2018: Noura Erakat, Washington Post

Opinion: Palestinians want freedom, just like anyone would.

Palestinian American human-rights attorney Noura Erakat says protesters in Gaza aren't pawns of Hamas; they are struggling for the freedom all humans want.


3 APRIL 2018: NOURA'S INTERVIEW WITH PHILLIP ADAMS ON ABC RADIO LATE NIGHT LIVE

On Friday 30 March 2018, thirty-thousand Palestinians in the Gaza Strip organized the largest civil protest in recent history in Palestine. The effort, known as the March of Return, is meant to commemorate the Land Day protests organized by Palestinian citizens of Israel in response to Israeli land confiscations and to last through the Palestinian Nakba on 15 May 2018, also known as Israel’s independence day. On the first day of the March of Return, Israeli snipers shot to kill 18 Palestinians and injured 1400 others across the militarized border against the unarmed demonstrators who were within the Gaza Strip’s buffer zone and posed no threat to the soldiers. 

In this interview with the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, Noura Erakat places the march in context and discusses the mainstream media’s inability to understand or explain this mass civil uprising.  


Noura Erakat: "How Support for Israel’s Violations of International Law Puts the U.S. on the Wrong Side of History."

Talk given at the "Israel Lobby & American Policy" conference, 2 March 2018, at the National Press Club, Washington.


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2017 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Mr GIDEON LEVY - journalist with the Israeli newspaper, Haaretz.

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This was the 13th year of this important annual series of Adelaide lectures inspired by the work of the late Palestinian public intellectual and post-colonial theorist, Professor Edward Said.

In 2017, we also combined the annual Lecture with a 3-day Symposium, Palestine and the West, held at the University of Adelaide.

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Speaker: Gideon Levy

JOURNALIST, HAARETZ NEWSPAPER

Lecture title: 

THE FIRST 50 YEARS: ISRAELI SOCIETY AND THE OCCUPATION

SATURDAY, 25 NOVEMBER 2017, 5:30PM-7:00PM

ELDER HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

Tickets: $20 General Entry / $15 AFOPA Members

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Gideon Levy

Gideon Levy is an Israeli journalist, writing opinion pieces and a weekly column for the newspaper Haaretz often focusing on the Israeli occupation of the Palestinian territories. A notable journalist on the Israeli left, Levy has been characterized as a "heroic journalist" by some, by others as a "propagandist for the Hamas".

Levy was born in 1953 in Tel Aviv. In 1974, Levy was drafted into the IDF, where he served as a reporter for Israel Army Radio. From 1978 to 1982 he worked as an aide to Shimon Peres, then leader of the Israeli Labor Party. In 1982, he began to write for the Israeli daily Haaretz. In 2004, Levy published a compilation of articles entitled Twilight Zone – Life and Death under the Israeli Occupation. He has hosted A Personal meeting with Gideon Levy, a weekly talk show that was broadcast on Israeli cable TV and has appeared periodically on other television talk shows.

Levy has said that his views on Israel's policies toward the Palestinians developed only after joining Haaretz.

"When I first started covering the West Bank for Haaretz, I was young and brainwashed," he said in an interview. "I would see settlers cutting down olive trees and soldiers mistreating Palestinian women at the checkpoints, and I would think, 'These are exceptions, not part of government policy.' It took me a long time to see that these were not exceptions – they were the substance of government policy."

Levy defines himself as a "patriotic Israeli". He criticizes what he sees as Israeli society's moral blindness to the effects of its acts of war and occupation. He has referred to the construction of settlements on private Palestinian land as "the most criminal enterprise in [Israel's] history". In 2007, he said that the plight of Palestinians in the Gaza Strip, then under Israeli blockade, made him ashamed to be an Israeli.

Levy supports unilateral withdrawal from occupied Palestinian territories without concessions.

"Israel is not being asked 'to give' anything to the Palestinians; it is only being asked to return – to return their stolen land and restore their trampled self-respect, along with their fundamental human rights and humanity."

Levy used to support the two-state solution, but he argues that it has become untenable, and he now supports one-state solution. He supports boycotting Israel, saying it is "the Israeli patriot's final refuge". Levy has said that economic boycott is more important, but that he also supports academic and cultural boycott. 

Published works

  • Twilight Zone – Life and Death under the Israeli Occupation. 1988–2003. Tel Aviv: Babel Press, 2004 
  • The Punishment of Gaza, Verso Books, 2010

Awards

  • 2003: Leipzig Media Award
  • 2007: Euro-Med Journalist Prize for Cultural Dialogue
  • 5 May 2012: Peace Through Media Award at the eighth annual International Media Awards
  • 7 January 2016: Olof Palme Prize, shared with Palestinian pastor Mitri Raheb, for their "fight against occupation and violence"
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Palestine & the West Symposium


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2016 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Prof. JOHN DUGARD - South African international human rights lawyer.

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Speaker: Professor John Dugard

South African international human rights lawyer

Lecture title: 

Palestine: Is Israel above the law?

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SATURDAY, 15 October 2016, 5:30PM-7:00PM

ELDER HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

The 2016 speaker was eminent South African international lawyer and former UN Human Rights Special Rapporteur, Professor John Dugard.

About Professor John Dugard

Professor Dugard is a South African international lawyer, renowned for his work as Special Rapporteur to the UN Commission on Human Rights on violations of international humanitarian law and human rights in the Occupied Palestinian Territories, from 2001-2008. Also for the United Nations, he was a member of the International Law Commission between 1997 and 2011.

He has an eminent career in the discipline, holding a range of academic positions over 45 years at the universities of Witwatersrand in South Africa, Cambridge in the UK, Leiden in Amsterdam, Duke, California, Berkeley and Pennsylvania in the USA, and was a visiting professor of law at the University of New South Wales in 1991. He was Judge ad hoc on various cases of the International Court of Justice between 2002 and 2016.

 Professor Dugard was appointed Chairperson of the UN Human Rights Inquiry Commission on the situation of human rights in Palestine following the intifada in 2000. In 2001, he was appointed as Special Rapporteur to the Commission and submitted annual reports and recommendations to the UN concerning the situation of international human rights and humanitarian law. In its first special session in July 2006, the nascent Human Rights Council decided to dispatch an urgent fact-finding mission headed by Professor Dugard to report on the situation there. On 26 September 2006, he reported that the "standards of human rights in the Palestinian territories have fallen to intolerable new levels".

Professor Dugard has written several books on apartheid, human rights and international law, and has co-authored textbooks on criminal law and procedure and international law. He writes and speaks regularly on the Israel-Palestine conflict.

Professor Dugard spoke on the topic, 'Palestine: Is Israel above the Law?'


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2015 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr SALAM FAYYAD - Inaugural Prime Minister of the State of Palestine (2007-2013).

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Speaker: Dr Salam Fayyad

Inaugural Prime Minister of the State of Palestine (2007-2013)

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SATURDAY, 5 September 2015, 5:30PM-7:00PM

ELDER HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Salam Fayyad

  • Inaugural Prime Minister of the State of Palestine (2007-2013)
  • International Monetary Fund Representative to Palestine (1996-2001)
  • Top 100 Most Influential People (Time Magazine, 2010)
  • Top 100 Global Thinkers (Foreign Policy Magazine, 2010-2011)

An economist, Dr Fayyad was born in Nablus, Palestine in 1952. He graduated with a BSc from the American University of Beirut in 1975 and went on to receive an MBA from St. Edward's University in 1980 and a PhD in economics from the University of Texas at Austin in 1986.

Dr. Fayyad is credited internationally with successfully completing a two-year state institution-building plan between 2009 and 2011. At the completion of the plan, international organisations and governments worldwide recognised the Palestinian achievement and unanimously declared that Palestine boasts the efficient and accountable institutions of a functional state, despite the obstacles of the occupation, which now stands as the single factor obstructing the Palestinian people's exercise of their right to sovereignty in their own free State. On 13 April 2013, Dr Fayyad tendered his resignation to President Abbas, who asked him to stay on as caretaker Prime Minister until a new government was formed. Dr Fayyad is also an elected Member of the Palestinian Legislative Council.


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2014 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: JOHN PILGER - Journalist.

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Speaker: John Pilger

Journalist

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Thursday, 11 September 2014, 7:15PM

Allan Scott Auditorium, Hawke Building, University of SA - City West Campus

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About John Pilger

Award-winning journalist, writer and documentary film-maker. Recipient of BAFTA, Emmy and Peabody awards.

John Pilger made the documentary Palestine is still the issue in 1977.  It told how almost a million Palestinians had been forced off their land in 1948, and again in 1967.  Twenty-five years later John Pilger returned to Palestine and to Israel to ask why the Palestinians, whose right of return had been affirmed by the United Nations more than half a century ago, are still refugees in their own land, controlled by Israel in the longest military occupation in modern times.


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2013 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr MUSTAFA BARGHOUTI - Member of Palestinian Legislative Council.

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Speaker: Dr Mustafa Barghouti

Member of Palestinian Legislative Council

SATURDAY, 2 November 2013, 5:30PM-7:00PM

ELDER HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Mustafa Barghouti

Mustafa Barghouthi is an award-winning peace activist, Middle East commentator and a member of the Palestinian parliament. A physician by training, Dr Barghouthi has been instrumental in establishing a vibrant civil society in the Occupied Palestinian Territories especially in the area of public health. He, together with Edward Said and others have co-founded Al Mubadara (the Palestinian National Initiative) movement that provides a reformist, inclusive, democratic alternative to the two main political groups in Palestine. Dr Baghouthi is a regular guest on international TV stations such as the BBC, CNN and ABC and has contributed many articles and insights on the Palestinian issue, over the years. He is an eloquent, engaging and highly knowledgeable speaker.


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2012 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr ILAN PAPPE - Historian, activist, author.

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Speaker: Dr Ilan Pappe

Israeli historian, political activist, author

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Lecture title:

The Arab Spring and the Arabists' Winter: Revisiting Orientalism

SATURDAY, 22 September 2012, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Norwood Concert Hall, 175 The Parade, Norwood

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Ilan Pappe

Ilan Pappé is an Israeli historian, author, and activist. A graduate of Oxford University, Pappé is Professor at Exeter University in the UK, director of the university's European Centre for Palestine Studies and co-director of the Exeter Centre for Ethno-Political Studies. He was descriobed by John Pilger as "Israel bravest, most principled and most incisive historian."

Pappé published some 16 books and  numerous scholarly and editorial articles. He took part in many forums and is regularly interviewed on different media outlets. 

Professor Ilan Pappe interviewed by Dr David Faber on 2012-09-20 Ilan Pappe: Professor of History in the College of Social Sciences & International Studies at the University of Exeter. Guest speaker at the 2012 Edward Said Memorial Lecture at the University of Adelaide, South Australia.

While in Australia, Dr Ilan Pappe also addressed the National Press Club in Canberra on 19 September 2012, hosted by the Australia Palestine Advocacy Network - further details here >>


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2011 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Prof. NOAM CHOMSKY - Linguist, political philosopher, author.

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Speaker: Professor Noam Chomsky

 

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SATURDAY, 5 November 2011, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Adelaide Town Hall, 128 King William St, Adelaide

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

 

 

The ESML is AFOPA's showpiece event. This year's guest speaker, Noam Chomsky, is a world renowned linguist, philosopher, and human rights activist. The Edward Said Memorial Lecutre organisers, the University of Adelaide and the Australian Friends of Palestine Association (AFOPA), celebrate Chomsky's recognition as a recipient of the 2011 Sydney Peace Prize. AFOPA is also honoured to present this unique event to our supporters, and hoped you enjoyed a spectacular evening with Prof. Chomsky. Edward Said Memorial Lecture - A History Edward Wadie Said was a Palestinian-American literary theorist and one of the most articulate and visible advocates of the Palestinian cause. He taught English and Comparative Literature at Columbia University. Before his death in 2003, Professor Said was seen as one of the leading literary critics of the 20th century, and described by many as an 'Intellectual Superstar' in the United States. If you have any questions in relation to the event please email secretary@afopa.com.au.

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2010 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr TARIQ ALI - writer, journalist, historian, filmmaker, political activist, public intellectual.

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Speaker: Dr Tariq Ali

Writer, journalist, historian

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Lecture title:

The Future of Palestine: Israel protectorate, genuine independence or a single-state solution?

SATURDAY, 9 October 2010, 5:30PM-7:00PM

ELDER HALL, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

 

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Tariq Ali

Tariq Ali is a British-Pakistani writer, journalist, historian, filmmaker, political activist, and public intellectual. He is a member of the editorial committee of the New Left Review and Sin Permiso, and contributes to The Guardian, CounterPunch, and the London Review of Books

He is the author of several books, including Pakistan: Military Rule or People's Power (1970), Can Pakistan Survive? The Death of a State (1983), Clash of Fundamentalisms: Crusades, Jihads and Modernity (2002), Bush in Babylon (2003), Conversations with Edward Said (2005), Pirates Of The Caribbean: Axis Of Hope (2006), A Banker for All Seasons (2007), The Duel (2008), The Obama Syndrome (2010), and The Extreme Centre: A Warning (2015).

View Media Release by The University of Adelaide >>


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2009 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Prof. SAREE MAKDISI - Palestinian-American author and academic.

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Speaker: Professor Saree Makdisi

Academic, Author, Middle East Analyst

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Lecture title:

From Occupation to Reconciliation

SATURDAY, 9 October 2010, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Napier Building, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

 

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Saree Makdisi

Saree Makdisi is a professor of English and Comparative Literature at the University of California in Los Angeles, UCLA. He has published widely on his area of expertise, British
Romanticism and is a regular contributor on contemporary Arab politics and culture. Born in
New York in 1964, to a family entrenched in academia, he is the nephew of the late Edward
Said and the grandson of Anis Makdisi, a distinguished professor of Arabic at the American
University of Beirut.

"In terms of discussions of the Palestinian question in the US, the academy is one of the last places where serious, rigorous, independent thinking remains possible; a place where Israel's myths about itself have been pretty much turfed out and been replaced by serious historical narratives. This is why academic freedom has been under such constant attack by individuals and institutions pledged to defending Israel's image in America," Makdisi explains.

Widely published in his academic area, Makdisi has also written many commentaries on Palestine for publications such as the Los Angeles Times, Chicago Tribune, Houston Chronicle, London Review of Books and the San Francisco Chronicle.

In 2008 Makdisi published his book Palestine Inside Out: Everyday Occupation. The book
combines the personal experiences of daily life under occupation with an analysis of how the
occupation functions as a whole. He said, "What I discovered when I went there, for all that I knew, I still found myself shocked." 

View Media Release by The University of Adelaide >>

Download Professor Makdisi's discussion paper [pdf] >>


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2008 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr SARA ROY - Author, political economist, scholar.

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Speaker: Dr Sara Roy

Author, Political Economist, Scholar

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Lecture title:

The impossible union of Arab and Jew: Reflections on dissent, remembrance and redemption

SATURDAY, 11 October 2008, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Elder Hall, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

 

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Sara Roy

Sara Roy is a senior research scholar at the Center for Middle Eastern Studies at Harvard University where she completed her doctoral studies in international development. Trained as a political economist, Dr Roy has worked in the Gaza Strip and West Bank since 1985 conducting research primarily on the economic, social and political development of the Gaza Strip and on U.S. foreign aid to the region. Dr Roy has written extensively on the Palestinian economy, particularly in Gaza, and has documented its development over the last three decades. Her current research, which was funded by a grant from the John D. and Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation, examines the social and economic sectors of the Palestinian Islamic movement and their relationship to Islamic political institutions, and the critical changes to the Islamic movement that have occurred over the last decade. Her primary findings point to a restructuring and de-radicalization of the Islamist movement in the West Bank and Gaza Strip prior to the start of the second Palestinian uprising.

Dr Roy is the author of The Gaza Strip: The Political Economy of De-development (1995, 2001), now in its second edition with a third edition forthcoming; The Gaza Strip Survey (1986); and editor of The Economics of Middle East Peace: A Reassessment (1999). Her most recent book is Failing Peace: Gaza and the Palestinian-Israeli Conflict (London: Pluto Press, 2007) and she is completing Between Extremism and Civism: Political Islam in Palestine (Princeton University Press, manuscript in progress). Dr Roy also has authored over 100 publications dealing with Palestinian issues and the Palestinian-Israeli conflict. Her work has appeared in the Journal of Palestine Studies, Current History, Middle East Journal, Middle East Policy, International Journal of Middle East Studies, The Beirut Review, American Political Science Review, Critique, Journal of the American Academy of Religion, Chicago Journal of International Law, Index on Censorship, La Vanguardia, Le Monde Diplomatique and the London Review of Books.

Dr Roy also serves on the Advisory Boards of the American Near East Relief Agency (ANERA), an American private voluntary organization working in the Middle East, and the Center for American and Jewish Studies at Baylor University. She also sits on the Board of Directors of the Gaza Community Mental Health Program - U.S. branch. In addition to her academic work, she has served as a consultant to international organizations, the U.S. government, human rights organizations, private voluntary organizations, and private business groups working in the Middle East.

Download lecture transcript >>


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2007 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr GHADA KARMI - Author, academic, commentator.

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Speaker: Dr Ghada Karmi

Author, Academic, Commentator

Lecture title:

Israel's dilemma in Palestine: Origins and Solutions

SATURDAY, 6 October 2007, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Elder Hall, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

About Dr Ghada Karmi

Dr Ghada Karmi is a Palestinian-British author, academic and political commentator and is an honorary research fellow and assistant lecturer at the Institute of Arab and Islamic Studies at the University of Exeter in the United Kingdom.

A well known international commentator on the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, Dr Karmi appears widely in the British and Arab media and frequently has articles on the Middle East published in The Guardian (UK), The Nation (US) and Journal of Palestine Studies.

Although born in Jerusalem, Dr Karmi has spent most of her life in Britain, where she studied medicine and initially practised as a physician, specialising in the health and social conditions of ethnic minorities, migrants and asylum seekers.

In her 2002 autobiography, In Search of Fatima: A Palestinian Story, she describes growing up in the Jerusalem neighbourhood of Katamon, with its mixture of Christian and Muslim Palestinians. With her family she was forced to flee in 1948 and settled in London, where her father worked for the BBC Arabic service.

A year before his death Edward Said described Dr Karmi's autobiography as "a stunning memoir...extraordinarily well written and amazingly honest."

"Hers is a story of exile and displacement...rich in detail and human experience. Karmi is excellent on the quality of family and even communal life in Mandatory Palestine...she also has a wonderfully subtle way of showing how in thousands of different ways the political and the personal intermesh, and this she does with a skill and insight that could be a novelist's envy," Edward Said wrote.

In July 2007, Dr Karmi released her new book, Married to Another Man: Israel's Dilemma in Palestine. She borrows her title from a phrase from a cable sent by Vienna's rabbis who visited Palestine in the 19th century which said, "The bride is beautiful, but she is married to another man." Karmi makes a sharp distinction between binationalism and secular democracy in advocating a binational state. "The binational solution permitted a degree of communal autonomy and identity but also of separation. In that sense it was another way of preserving for Jewish Israelis the concept on which the whole Zionist enterprise was founded." She argues that "In a secular democratic state, on the other hand, citizens would have rights not derived from membership in an ethnic or religious group... Unlike the binationalist state, a secular democracy was likely to be conducive towards helping its citizens develop a common national identity..."

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2006 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Prof. TANYA REINHART - Linguist, author, media commentator.

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Speaker: Professor Tanya Reinhart

Linguist, Author, Media Commentator

Prof. Tanya Reinhart (1944-2007)

Prof. Tanya Reinhart (1944-2007)

Lecture title:

In Memory of Edward Said

SATURDAY, 7 October 2006, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Elder Hall, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

 

About Prof. Tanya Reinhart

Tanya Reinhart is an Israeli Emeritus Professor of Linguistics and Media studies at Tel-Aviv University in Israel and a Professor of Linguistics at the University of Utrecht in The Netherlands. As of January 2007 she will also be a Global Distinguished Professor at New York University in the US.

Academically, she is best known for her contribution to theoretical linguistics. She received her PhD in 1976 from MIT, under the supervision of Noam Chomsky. Her most recent book in this area Interface Strategies appeared in 2006, with MIT Press.

Following the Oslo agreements in 1994—which she viewed as a painful deception of the Palestinian people and the implementation of a sophisticated Israeli apartheid regime—she turned to political writing. She contributes a regular critical column to Yediot Aharonot, Israel’s biggest daily, and publishes widely online and with international media.

Her book Israel/Palestine – How to end the war of 1948 (Seven Stories Press, NY) covers the Israeli occupation of Palestine in the years 1999-2002.

Her follow up book, The Road Map to Nowhere – Israel/Palestine since 2003, appeared in July 2006, with Verso. A French version – L’heritage de Sharon, appeared in April 2006.

Professor Reinhart will deliver the second Edward Said Memorial Lecture at the University of Adelaide on the 7th of October 2006 and will also speak in Melbourne, Sydney and Canberra.

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2005 Edward Said Memorial Lecture

Guest speaker: Dr ROBERT FISK - Journalist, author, commentator.

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Speaker: Dr Robert Fisk

Journalist, Author, Commentator

Prof. Tanya Reinhart (1944-2007)

Lecture title:

Terrorism, Occupation and Human Rights

SATURDAY, 1 October 2005, 5:30PM-7:00PM

Elder Hall, THE UNIVERSITY OF ADELAIDE,
NORTH TERRACE, ADELAIDE SA

#EdwardSaidMemorialLecture    #ESMLadelaide

 

About Dr Robert Fisk

Dr Robert Fisk is regarded as one of the world’s foremost international journalists. Since 1988, Dr. Fisk has been the Middle East correspondent for the Independent in the UK. He has been honoured with 28 British and foreign press awards, including the Johns Hopkins SIAS-CIBA prize for international journalism, and the Overall Winner of the Amnesty International UK Press Awards in 1998.

At the risk of his own life, he has endeavoured to bring truth and understanding to international affairs and conflicts. He has resided in the Middle East for 28 years, and has covered the Iranian Revolution, the Iran-Iraq War, three Gulf wars, and many other international conflicts. Dr. Fisk is the author of two books on Irish history, as well as Pity the Nation, tracing the history of the Lebanon war. He is about to release his new book The Great War for Civilisation: The Conquest of the Middle East. Dr Fisk is in Australia to deliver the inaugural Edward Said Memorial Lecture at Adelaide University.

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