Roundtable Discussion on the Persian Gulf

On Thursday, November 12, approximately one hundred people came out on a stormy evening to hear the Middle East Center-sponsored roundtable discussion titled, “The Persian Gulf, Past and Present.” The discussion centered on how travel, trade, war, and political movements in the Gulf’s past have shaped its present. Presentations offered by panelists were: “Diversity and Cosmopolitanism in the Eighteenth-Century Persian Gulf,” by Daniel Sheffield, Assistant Professor, History; “A Transnational View of Oil and Labor in the Twentieth-century Gulf,” by Arbella Bet-Shlimon, Assistant Professor, History; “The Gulf as Inter-Regional Crossroads,” by Kristian Coates-Ulrichsen, Affiliate Professor, Jackson School of International Studies; and “Imposed Aggressions, Sacred Defense: The Iran-Iraq War in Iranian Cultural Production,” by Samad Alavi, Assistant Professor, Near Eastern Languages and Civilization. The roundtable was moderated by Arzoo Osanloo, Associate Professor, Law Societies & Justice, and Director, Middle East Center. Presentations were followed by a lively question-and-answer period.