SIG Middle East and Muslim World
Created in 2013, the Scientific Interest Group "Middle East and Muslim World" currently brings together 46 research teams (including the LEM and the Césor) that study the Muslim world through various disciplines encompassing Islamology, history, sociology, anthropology and political science. The main goal of the SIG is to promote exchanges between these teams and disciplines while making their activities more visible. A White Paper on French Studies in the fields of interest to the SIG has been drafted for this purpose, offering an assessment of current research, while pointing to the gaps and to the disciplines that are threatened. In the same spirit, an Islamology Notebook is being drafted, offering a state of play and prospects for the future.
Researchers from the EPHE-PSL occupy a prominent place and have actively collaborated in the development of this Notebook. In the same unifying perspective, the SIG organizes a congress every other year (the fourth took place in 2021), with a hundred workshops, most of which are multidisciplinary. It also awards a thesis prize and supports young researchers with grants. Among the priority projects are Islamology and the digital transition. Along with the member teams and their supervisors, the SIG participates in the creation of a French Institute of Islamology.
