The Fifth International Conference
12-15 November 1998
The Conference is convening as a contribution towards the commemoration of the 10th anniversary of the Declaration of Palestinian Independence in Algiers, November 15, 1988

Landscape Perspectives on Palestine
SUPPORTED BY THE FORD FOUNDATION (CAIRO) - WELFARE ASSOCIATION (GENEVA) - ARAB BANK PLC (RAMALLAH)


Landscape Perspectives on Palestine
College of Arts - Birzeit University
P. O. Box 14, Birzeit - Palestine
Tel.: ++972 2 2982974; Fax: ++972 2 2810656
Email: land@arts.birzeit.edu


Keynote Speakers:

  • Edward Said, Columbia University, New York
  • M. J. Wagstaff, University of Southampton
  • W. J. T. Mitchell, University of Chicago
Special Guest:
  • Mahmoud Darwish, Palestinian Poet

DISPLAYS DURING THE CONFERENCE


On display in the lounge of Kamal Nasir Hall:

Painting the Palestinian Landscape: Works by Nine Palestinian Artists
Maps of Palestine: Selected Representations
Images of Jerusalem: Photographs from the Private Collection of Issam Nassar
Al-Nakba Mapped
Surroundings of Bethlehem: Photographs by Alain Ceccaroli, France

On display in the Old Campus, Birzeit Village

Palestinian Institute of Archaeology: Activities and Discoveries

University Library, Ethnographic and Archaeological Gallery

Ya kafi, ya shafi ...The Tawfik Canaan Collection of Palestinian Amulets

CONFERENCE AGENDA

Wednesday, November 11


REGISTRATION OF PARTICIPANTS: 5:00 - 8:00 PM
CITY INN HOTEL, AL-BIREH

Thursday, November 12

All sessions are held at Kamal Nasir Hall
REGISTRATION: 8:00 - 9:00 AM
LOUNGE OF KAMAL NASIR HALL

OPENING SESSION: 9:00 - 11:00 AM ***with all due respect to titles***

  • President of Birzeit University: Hanna Nasir
  • H. E. Minister of Higher Education: Munthir Salah
  • Dean of Faculty of Arts: Mahmod Ma'ri
  • Conference Chair: Ibrahim Abu-Lughod
  • Keynote Address : Edward Said, Palestine: Memory, Invention and Space

COFFEE BREAK: 11:00 - 11:30 AM

SESSION I: 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM
POWER AND HISTORICAL REPRESENTATION

  • Chair: Said Zeedani, Former Dean of the Faculty of Arts
  • Roger Heacock, Al-Majd wal-Sumud: Landscapes of Glory and Resignation
  • Lynne D. Rogers, Literary Snapshots: Mark Twain's Innocents Abroad and William Thackeray's Notes of a Journey from Cornhill to Grand Cairo
  • Dominique Edde, The Palestinian Landscape seen through the Narratives of French Travelers of the 18th and 19th Centuries

Discussion

LUNCH BREAK: 1:00 - 2:00 PM

SESSION II: 2:00 - 3:30 PM
THE LANDSCAPE IN EXILE

  • Chair: Rema Hammami, Institute of Womens Studies
  • Glenn Bowman, The Exilic Imagination: The Reconstruction of the Landscape of Palestine from its Outside
  • Hani Bawardi, The Ubiquitous Landscape: Palestine and Arab Immigrants in the United States
  • Garay Menicucci, Kulthum Auda: Biculturalism and the Palestinian Ethnographer as Subject and Object

Discussion

COFFEE BREAK: 3:30 - 4:00 PM

SESSION III: 4:00 - 5:30 PM
NAMING AND MAPPING

    Chair: Salman Abu-Sitta, Researcher on Refugees and the Land of Palestine
  • Basem L. Ra'ad, Topophilia Biblicae: Sacred and Profane Geographies of the "Holy Land"
  • Nabil I. Matar, Renaissance Cartography and the Question of Palestine
  • Shukry Arraf, The Future of Palestinian Toponyms
Discussion

RECEPTION AND DINNER AT AL BARDOUNI RESTAURANT (RAMALLAH) IN HONOR OF THE PARTICIPANTS: 7:30 PM

Friday, November 13


FIELD TRIP: WALKING IN THE LANDSCAPE
A trip organized in conjunction with the Directorate of Cultural Heritage, Ministry of Culture and the Artas Folklore Centre, Artas

Saturday, November 14

SESSION IV: 9:00 - 11:00 AM

DESTROYING/RECLAIMING: THE LANDSCAPE OF 1948

  • Chair: Ali Jarbawi, Department of History, Geography, and Political Science
  • Keynote Address II: W. J. T. Mitchell, Landscape and Idolatry: Territory and Terror
  • Raif Zreik, Exit from the Landscape: Some Considerations on the General Palestinian Space in Israel
  • Sharif S. Elmusa, Under the Forest of Text: The Physical and Symbolic Erasure of Palestinian Villages?
  • Ghazi Falah, The Transformation and De-Signification of Palestine's Cultural Landscape
Discussion

COFFEE BREAK: 11:00 - 11:30 AM

SESSION V: 11:30 AM - 1:00 PM

THE LIVED LANDSCAPE: PALESTINIAN EXPERIENCES

  • Chair: Abdulkarim Abu-Khashshan, Arabic Department
  • Sa'ud Al-Asadi, Palestinian Landscape in Vernacular Poetry
  • Abla Nasir, The Small Continent Project: Experience of Palestinian Youth with the Landscape
  • Stephen Philip Gasteyer, Manathir tabi'iyya: Differing Perspectives of Landscape Change in Hebron's Eastern Slopes
  • Hassan Khader, Visions of the Palestinian Landscape
Discussion LUNCH BREAK: 1:00 - 2:00 PM

SESSION VI: 2:00 - 3:30 PM
VISUALIZING LANDSCAPE

  • Chair: Vera Tamari, Fine Arts Program
  • Samia A. Halaby, Perspectives in the Pictorial Art and the Landscape of Palestine
  • Karl Sabbagh, Palestinian Landscape in Western Cinema
Discussion

COFFEE BREAK: 3:30 - 4:00 PM

FILM: IN SEARCH OF PALESTINE BY EDWARD SAID, A BBC PRODUCTION: 4:00 - 5:00 PM

MAHMOUD DARWISH: ELABORATIONS: 5:00 PM

CONCERT: ORIENTAL MUSIC GROUP: 7:00 PM

DINNER: 8:00 PM Baladna Center, Al-Bireh

Sunday, November 15

SESSION VII: 9:00 - 10:30 AM

LANDSCAPE FORMATION

  • Chair: Kamal Abdulfattah, Department of History, Geography and Political Science
  • Keynote Address III: M. J. Wagstaff, The Mountain and the Plain: Some Themes of Continuity and Change in Palestinian Landscapes
  • Pierre-Yves Pechoux, Geographical Introduction to the Landscapes of Palestine
  • Marie-Odile Guth and Alain Ceccaroli, A Photographic Survey of the Landscape around Bethlehem: Methodology and Perspectives
  • Discussion

COFFEE BREAK: 10:30 - 11:00 AM

SESSION VIII: 11:00 AM - 1:00 PM
URBAN LANDSCAPES: STRUGGLE FOR THE PALESTINIAN CITY

  • Chair: Nazmi al-Juabeh, Department of History, Geography and Political Science, Chairman
  • Rashid Khalidi, Transforming the Face of the Holy City: Political Implications of Changes in the Topography of Jerusalem
  • Shadia Touqan, Preservation and Development of the Old City of Jerusalem: Future Plans
  • Khalil Tafakji, Jerusalem: Israeli Policy and its Effects on the Landscape and Environment of the City
  • Mark LeVine, The City on a Hill: The Role of Imagination, Emigration and Immigration in Jaffa, Yesterday and Today
Discussion

LUNCH BREAK: 1:00 - 2:00 PM

SESSION IX: 2,00 - 3,30 PM

LANDSCAPE AND ARCHAEOLOGY I

  • Chair: Khaled Nashef: Palestinian Institute of Archaeology, Director
  • Brian Boyd and Eleanor Scott, The Palestine Sites and Monuments Record Project: Reclaiming Palestinian Landscapes
  • Louise Steel and Joanne Clarke, Gaza Research Project 1998:Survey of Ancient Gaza
  • Hamed J. Salem, Defining "Cultural Landscape": An Archaeological Case from the Jenin Region

COFFEE BREAK: 3,30 - 4.00

SESSION X: 4.00 - 6.00 PM

LANDSCAPE AND ARCHAEOLOGY II

  • Chair: Khaled Nashef
  • Ghattas Sayej, The Origin of Terraces in the Central Hills of Palestine: Theories and Explanations
  • Jacqueline Balensi, Building on Sand? An Egypto-Canaanite Artificial Island: Tell Abu Hawam (Ancient Harbour of Haifa)
  • Jean-Baptiste Humbert, Recent Excavations of the Ecole Biblique in Gaza
  • Discussion

Concluding Remarks:
Ibrahim Abu-Lughod, Conference Chair

There will be simultaneous Arabic-English and English-Arabic translation of all sessions,

Speakers:

Sa'ud Al-Asadi, Nazareth , Shukry Arraf, Mailya, Jacqueline Balensi, University of Lyon, Hani Bawardi, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Glenn Bowman, University of Kent, Brian Boyd, University of Wales Lampeter, Alain Ceccaroli, Photographic Observatory for Landscape in France, Paris, Joanne Clarke, Council for British Research in the Levant, Jerusalem , Dominique Edde, Paris, Sharif S. Elmusa, Washington, D. C., Ghazi Falah, University of Toronto, Stephen Philip Gasteyer, Iowa State University, Ames, Marie-Odile Guth, Photographic Observatory for Landscape in France, Paris, Samia A. Halaby, New York, Roger Heacock, Birzeit University , Jean-Baptiste Humbert, Ecole Biblique et Archeologique Francaise, Hassan Khader, Ministry of Culture, Gaza, Rashid Khalidi, University of Chicago, Mark LeVine, New York University, Nabil I. Matar, Florida Institute of Technology, Melbourne Garay Menicucci, American University in Cairo, Abla Nasir, Tamer Institute, Ramallah, Basem L. Ra'ad, Birzeit University, Pierre-Yves Pechoux,University de Toulouse, Le Mirail, Lynne D. Rogers, Notre Dame University, Zouk Michael, Lebanon , Karl Sabbagh, London, Hamed J. Salem, Birzeit University, Ghattas Sayej, Birzeit University, Eleanor Scott, King Alfred's College, Winchester ,Louise Steel, British School of Archaeology, Jerusalem, Shadia Touqan, Welfare Association, Jerusalem, Khalil Tafakji, Arab Studies Society, Jerusalem, Raif Zreik, Nazareth

Conference Committee

Ibrahim Abu-Lughod (chair): Graduate Program in International Studies
Khaled Nashef (coordinator): Palestinian Institute of Archaeology
Vera Tamari: Fine Arts Program
Basem L. Ra'ad: English Department
Kamal Abdulfattah: Department of History, Geography and Political Science
Ghassan F. Abdullah: Institute of Law
Abdulkarim Abu-Khashshan: Arabic Department
Rema Hammami: Institute of Womens studies
Roger Heacock: Department of History, Geography and Political Science

Administrative Support

Financial Department: Fuad Ghawi, Director; Siham Afaneh
General Services Department: Ghazi Muhsin, Director; Nabil Mazbar
Public Relations Department: Albert Aghazarian, Director; Lubna Abdul Hadi; Yasser Darweesh
Computer Center: Marwan Tarazi, General Manager; Yahia Yaish, Services Manager