Top of page

Category: African and Middle Eastern Division (AMED)

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

Ancient Sasanian Empire, the Subject of the June 7th Symposium at the African and Middle Eastern Division

Posted by: Anchi Hoh

(The following is a post by Hirad Dinavari, Reference Specialist, African and Middle Eastern Division.) Each year, the Library of Congress’ African and Middle Eastern Division (AMED) holds an all-day symposium focusing on an ancient Near East city or civilization. For the 2017 symposium, AMED’s Near East Section organized a one day seminar on the …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

The Georgian Collections of the Library of Congress, Part I: Early Works

Posted by: Levon Avdoyan

The Library of Congress was founded in 1800 as Congress’s library, but through the decades it became the de facto National Library of the United States and, ultimately, the largest library in the world. Those of us, however, who deal with foreign languages and scripts in this wonderful institution delight in pointing out that some …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

A Thousand and One Nights: Arabian Story-telling in World Literature

Posted by: Muhannad Salhi

(The following is a post by Muhannad Salhi, Arab World Specialist, African and Middle Eastern Division.) An unparalleled monument to the ageless art of story-telling, the tales of the One Thousand and One Nights have, for many centuries, titillated the imaginations of generations the world over. Perhaps one of the greatest Arabic, Middle Eastern, and …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

Epics and Storytelling in Persianate Lands and a Persian Language Tradition

Posted by: Anchi Hoh

(The following is a post by Hirad Dinavari, Reference Librarian for the Iranian World Collections, African and Middle Eastern Division.) Growing up in a Persian speaking home, there seldom was a time, when my ears were not filled with fantastical tales or anecdotal stories featuring epic heroes, such as Rustam, Siavash, Iskandar (Alexander), and Amir …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

An Arab Nationalist Survival against All Odds: Muhammad ‘Ali Eltaher

Posted by: Anchi Hoh

(The following is a post by Nawal Kawar, Arab World Specialist, Near East Section, African and Middle Eastern Division.) The aim of this post is to introduce the reader to a recently acquired multi-format collection comprised of over 2,000 items including books, photos, newspapers, and correspondence, documenting the history of the Arab world from the …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

New Videos Monthly, 6/9/2017

Posted by: Anchi Hoh

Following are the online recordings (webcasts) of recent public programs pertaining to the Library’s international collections. To discover more videos, visit the four area studies divisions here: African and Middle Eastern, Asian, European, and Hispanic. African and Middle Eastern Division Title: Discovery of the Secret of the Great Pyramid & the Tomb of Tutankhamun (view on YouTube) SPEAKER: Mamdouh Eldamaty EVENT …

Large metal hollow globe on a metal frame with metal orbit trails surrounding it

In Commemoration of D-Day: Treasures from the Hebraic Section

Posted by: Anchi Hoh

(The following is a post by Ann Brener, Hebraic Area Specialist in the Library’s African and Middle Eastern Division.) They probably didn’t seem like treasures at the time. They were for the most part in fact rather ordinary: books for study, or for reading to children; posters about upcoming protests, hastily printed; newspaper articles and …