Dusan Makavejev’s Love Affair provides us with an example of cinematic reflexivity, which can be defined as any technique that reminds the viewer that he or she is watching a film. Reflexivity foregrounds the fact that film meaning is a function of a set of codes with ideological implications rather than a transparent reflection of reality. Reflexivity can be achieved through intertextuality, exaggeration of cinematic conventions or conspicuous narration that reminds us of the author’s mark on the text.

Pittsburgh has hundreds of nonprofits, NGOs, businesses, and government agencies doing international work! Meet with professionals working in a variety of ways to connect Pittsburgh with the world during the UCIS year long series! Learn about opportunities for students to get involved with local organizations, valuable qualities and experiences looked for in potential employees, and ways to prepare for future careers while in school.

Join community leaders in human rights city organizing and Professor Emeritus Peter Evans of UC Berkeley, for a discussion on local-global links. Dr. Evans is a world-renowned expert on labor, states, social movements, globalization, and development.

Can the displacement of refugees continue to be understood as exceptional? The recent global increase in refugees has prompted calls to develop new solutions to displacement that focus on integrating refugees into the local economies of nations that receive them. Transforming refugees from economic burdens to economic benefits does not, however, resolve displacement: doing so only shifts the project of refugee protection from a supposedly humanitarian imperative to an economic incentive.

Join Pittsburgh professionals who work with refugees and immigrants to learn about refugee resettlement services, adapting to Pittsburgh, daily life, and ways to help. We will hear from representatives of Jewish Family and Children's Services, the Somali-Bantu Community Association, PRYSE Academy, and Northern Area Multi-Service Center, as well as from Syrian teens recently arrived in Pittsburgh. This is also part of the GSC Career Toolkit Series.

Deepa Kumar is an Associate Professor of Media Studies at Rutgers University and President, Rutgers AAUP-AFT faculty union. She is a leading scholar in communication, prominent public intellectual, and champion of the humanities on the national stage. The title of her lecture, “Constructing the Terrorist Threat: Islamophobia, the Media, and the War on Terror,” stems from her 2017 Media Education Foundation video, designed to support pedagogical efforts to teach critically about media discourse on Muslims.

CERIS member institutions and K-12 educators are invited to participate in conversation over dinner and a book discussion on Thomas Jefferson's Quran, Islam and the Founders, on Friday, March 24th at the University of Pittsburgh. The discussion will be led by Patrick Hughes, Instructor of Religious Studies, University of Pittsburgh.

Book discussion for educators on book A Sultan in Palermo by Tariq Ali, Dr. Joseph Heim, Professor of History, CALU

CERIS hosts the annual Undergraduate Research Symposium to encourage undergraduate students to advance their research experience, specially on issues that impact Muslims in historical or contemporary contexts or Islamic thought, history, and theology. A broad range of topics are accepted (see below a list of past papers presented.) If you think a paper you are writing may qualify but aren’t sure, please email Elaine Linn at eel58@pitt.edu.

When is – and isn’t— forced marriage a form of modern slavery? To answer this controversial question, this Workshop explores the range of types of forced marriages – from customary forced marriages, to mail-order-brides, and abducted “wives” of armed fighters – in relation to competing legal definitions and conceptual debates about slavery.