Auch Gedanken fallen manchmal unreif vom Baum.
Ludwig Wittgenstein
Book Award
I am delighted and honoured to be the recipient of the inaugural AIS Book Prize for Ancient Iranian Studies for my book, Zoroastrian Scholasticism in Late Antiquity: The Pahlavi version of the Yasna Haptaŋhāiti. The prize was announced at the 13th Biennial Iranian Studies Conference, which took place in Salamanca, Spain. As I have said […]
Were Sogdians Iranian?
This question is being discussed on Twitter, and I was tagged to respond. I honestly don’t know how to do it in a meaningful way on Twitter, as embedded responses are often lost and not seen. I stay away from sub-tweets and believe this topic is too hot to be touched on Twitter anyway :) […]
Not on Twitter
I have been thinking about leaving Twitter for a while now. Not for one, but for many reasons which are not important. I joined Twitter in 2013 and a couple of years later deleted my Facebook account. I have never regretted that decision and feel the time has come to make a soft exit on […]
Zoroastrian Scholasticism
The paperback of my book is here! You can order a copy from the Edinburgh University Press. I am grateful to the series editor, Lloyd Llewellyn-Jones, for giving this book a home and to the editors at the EUP for guiding me through the publication process. I list the reviews of my book here, and […]
Voice, privilege and writing
The debate about privilege and representing others in writing fascinates me. Who gets to be whose voice? How do you represent others and what role do publishers play in these debates? Does art need to node to the vagaries of social media? Can art provoke? If so, what are the limits, who defines them and […]
Roma in the Medieval Islamic World
Today we had Kristina Richardson, @krisrich, speak to us at the @invisible_east. She delivered a fascinating lecture based on her recent book, which has opened my eyes to a large set of theoretical questions to be asked in the study of ancient and late antique history of any geography.