Lightnews — Scholar-powered news

Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Jul 24

I am absolutely thrilled about this recognition and grateful to @OxLifelongLearn for being such an incredible supporter of our work to showcase the 'little people' with huge voices in medieval Islamicate lands. @invisibleeast.bsky.social @mideastmedieval.bsky.social

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jul 24

Our PI @arezouazad.bsky.social was shortlisted for 'Researcher of the Year' @oxlifelonglearning.bsky.social's Inspiring Excellence People Awards last month. She was honoured to be nominated by colleagues for her work on the medieval Islamicate East.

#medievalsky #skystorian #oxforduniversity

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jul 15

#Teachers! We're developing a schools programme, based on our research, aimed at 11-18 year-olds, and would love your input! Do you teach #silkroads, the #middleeast, or want help adding more diverse topics to your #curriculum? Take & share our survey: forms.office.com/e/bV8bQW63wd
#history #edusky

Microsoft Forms

forms.office.com

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Jul 14

Hugely proud of invisibleeast.bsky.social and grateful to @oxfordlifelonglearning.bsky.social for nominating us for Academic Excellence OLLIE award! Each team member made a unique contribution but today I single out programme manager Hayley Smith (in pic) for her enthusiasm & professionalism !

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Jul 9

So true @rachelbridgewater.bsky.social ! Do pick one up at the EUP stand if you haven't already, @imc-leeds.bsky.social goers!

Rachel Bridgewater @rachelbridgewater.bsky.social · Jul 9

Great to catch up with @arezouazad.bsky.social at #IMC2025 and get inordinately excited about flyers for the new Islamicate East series. Who doesn't love a flyer??

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jul 9

Our PI @arezouazad.bsky.social was delighted to connect with @rachelbridgewater.bsky.social, the Commissioning Editor of our series with @edinburghup.bsky.social, @imc-leeds.bsky.social this week.

Read all about it! bit.ly/TheIslamicateEast

#imcleeds2025 #medievalsky #skystorian #theislamicateeast

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Jul 3

Fantastic event at sides of 'Treasured' exhibition on heritage challenges for scholars, hosted @bodleianlibraries.bsky.social under stewardship of @richove.bsky.social, @wetpaint63.bsky.social with panel: Xa Sturgis, Silke Ackermann, Maja Kominko, Ahmad Mohammed, Nabi Saqee. Photo: Matthew Weait

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Mar 20

It's a beautiful Spring day in #Oxford & we wish our followers a happy Naw Rūz/Nowruz!

Nabi Saqee writes on references to #Nowruz in the #Bamiyan Papers, as well as special Nowruz traditions in #Afghanistan, in our blog: bit.ly/IENowruz

#persiannewyear #digitalcorpus #documents #medievalsky

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Mar 20

Happy Persian new year, happy nowruz, happy Spring equinox! 🍀🌷🍀🌷

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Mar 11

Our very own Mateen Arghandehpour on BBC 4's In Our Time this Thursday 13 March at 9 am UK time to talk about Cyrus the Great! Tune in here: buff.ly/jsH4kRd

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Mar 6

I enjoyed writing about Maryam ... 🌷

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Mar 6

Our 'Document of the Month' by @arezouazad.bsky.social, celebrates 🎉 the agency, confidence & hard work of medieval women, through the lens of a 12-century petition 📜 by a tenant farmer in #Afghanistan seeking to defend her livelihood 💪.

bit.ly/afemalefarmersstand

#iwd #iwd2025 #medievalsky

The picture has a cream background, with the words 'New publication' in large teal font, then 'Divided Fields, Unbroken Will: A Female Farmer's Stand in Medieval Afghanistan' in black italics, followed by 'Document of the Month 3/25' in bold teal font, the name of the author Arezou Azad in black font, a golden brushstroke, and then the logos of the University of Oxford and Invisible East below.

The picture is of a medieval document, with fold lines, tears and creases, with New Persian script in black on the brown paper background, stuck to a more modern white and lined notebook with pen notes around it.

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Feb 27

New jobs out:
a postdoc & PhD on Persianate manuscripts and Afghanistan studies . Check them out! @invisibleeast.bsky.social

Inalco @inalco.fr · Feb 27

🔎 L’Inalco recrute un(e) candidat(e) pour un contrat doctoral à temps plein sur 3 ans en histoire du monde islamique au prisme des manuscrits persans de l'époque prémoderne.
- Date limite de candidature : 31 mars
- Entrée en fonction : 1er octobre 2025
Plus d'infos : www.inalco.fr/institut/con...

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Feb 25

Nearly 300 new documents uploaded on our IEDC portal today - check them out! invisible-east.org

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Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Feb 24

🎉 #meettheteam who have been reading, transcribing and translating documents written in #Persian! We took a moment today to celebrate their incredible achievements 💪
📅 Tomorrow sees the third release of 270 more #documents on our #digitalcorpus.
🔍 Explore now at www.invisible-east.org
#skystorians

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Feb 5

Great to be at the Department for Continuing Education @ox.ac.uk today for our team meeting. Might have spotted some patches of blue sky in Oxford this morning!

#springiscoming

Brick buildings pointing up into a blue sky, with wispy clouds!

Garden coming to life with some yellow blossoms, gnarly tree, with buildings in the background beyond the lawn.

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Feb 4

‼️Fancy doing #Afghanistan-related research in beautiful Paris? 2 new job opps for PhD scholarships (Persian pre-modern mss) post-docs (open field). Historical #Khurasan included! bit.ly/42Mh9EB & bit.ly/3CAD86B. Deadlines: Mar & Apr 25 @Inalco @invisible_east

Contrat Post-doctoral/ Assistant de projet sur la thématique "Art, histoire et patrimoine de l'Afghanistan et de sa région" | Institut National des Langues et Civilisations Orientales

bit.ly

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Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 20

January is here, and here in Oxford that means endless grey skies and rainy days… It's not always easy to see the bright side, but this medieval poem written across four of the Bamiyan Papers (bit.ly/Panegyricpoem) might help inspire a new positive attitude to our gloomy weather on #blueMonday 🧵

Part of Persian language panegyric poem, written in Arabic script on fragment of paper.

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 21

#meettheteam 👋 who have been working hard digitising #documents ready for the second release onto our Digital Corpus tomorrow.

Give a 👏 to Edward Shawe-Taylor and Mateen Arghandehpour and mark your calendar 📅 ready to explore 800 new documents!

#medievalsky #digitalhumanities #skystorians

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Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 22

Delighted to share our #Document of the Month - bit.ly/DocofMonthJan25 - a fascinating exploration by @eds-t.bsky.social of an early calligraphic signature!

Find this - and 800 brand new treasures - in the second release on our Digital Corpus today 🎉

#digitalhumanities #medievalsky #skystorians

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Ed Shawe-Taylor @eds-t.bsky.social · Jan 22

Check out the Invisible East Document of the Month! This month is a piece I wrote about an interesting calligraphic signature on a 12th-century Persian document. This blog has been adapted from an article I've been working on for a forthcoming Invisible East publication.

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 22

Delighted to share our #Document of the Month - bit.ly/DocofMonthJan25 - a fascinating exploration by @eds-t.bsky.social of an early calligraphic signature!

Find this - and 800 brand new treasures - in the second release on our Digital Corpus today 🎉

#digitalhumanities #medievalsky #skystorians

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 22

📢The second release of an additional 800 #documents is now live on our #digitalcorpus!

🔎Need some help unlocking these treasures? Join us for a walk through how to search the #IEDC at bit.ly/IEDChowto
#digitalhumanities #medievalsky #sykstorians

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 23

An honour & inspiration to be at #INALCO today, to discuss with colleagues the complicated nexus between heritage protection & historical, textual & linguistic research in conflict societies, with diaspora communities & other groups in #Armenia, #Iran, #Afghanistan, and Central Asia.
#skystorians

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Reposted by Arezou Azad

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 23

🌟 The dust has settled from the holiday season, and many of us are back to work after spending some quality time with loved ones. As we all know, family reunions rarely go without a bit of argy-bargy... 🧵 1/10

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Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 13

📣 Hear from Dr Roxana Zenhari in the next in the 'Rethinking History: Returning to Archives and Documents' series, convened by @arezouazad.bsky.social & Mohamad Tavakoli.

🗓️ This Thursday, 12pm EST/5pm GMT.

🔗 Registration essential: bit.ly/Rethinking_History

#archives #documents #history

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Jan 4

Join us for this talk on lithographs as documents! @invisibleeast.bsky.social @mideastmedieval.bsky.social @ox.ac.uk

Invisible East @invisibleeast.bsky.social · Jan 3

📣 Join us for a talk by Dr Roxana Zenhari!

🗓️ Thursday 16 January, 12pm Toronto/5pm UK time.

🔗 Register: bit.ly/Rethinking_History

Part of the Rethinking History: Returning to Archives and Documents series convened by @arezouazad.bsky.social & Mohamad Tavakoli-Targhi. #archives #documents #history

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Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Dec 21

@invisibleeast.bsky.social

Arezou Azad @arezouazad.bsky.social · Dec 21

Happy yalda night. Yalda marks the shortest day and longest night of the year in Iranian and Persian culture, and celebrates longer days ahead. Pomegranates and many other lovely things are had!

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