Unseen—Untold: Stories of ancient non-elite communities

NINO Postdoctoral Research Fellow 5^th Annual Conference
Leiden, 18-20 December 2024

Organized by: Alisée Devillers

Call for papers

The Netherlands Institute for the Near East (NINO) at Leiden University is pleased to host the conference “Unseen—Untold: Stories of non-elite communities”, in 2024. The meeting will take place from Wednesday 18^th to Friday 20^th of December 2024 in Leiden.

Following the general call in social sciences to focus on those forgotten by history based on elite’s records, this conference aims to offer new perspectives on the material and textual culture of those unseen and unmentioned in the ancient Egyptian, Nubian and Near Eastern monumental landscape. To unravel the visual and written stories of ancient non-elite people, speakers will be invited to ground their discourse on individual and collective identity formation and will be encouraged to include and adapt anthropological and sociological theories on this topic into their presentation.

The conference will articulate several research paths:

• Defining concepts. As it has already been underlined, we lack precise definitions for people we call “intermediate elite,” “lower elite,” or “sub-elite,” and we need an accurate adaptation of these concepts inherited from the social sciences. It should be noted, however, that the definition of non-elite socio-professional classes might vary depending on the chrono-cultural contexts in which they were set. Therefore, the following questions should be asked anew for each different context: who were these people who managed to gather enough human and economic resources to appear within the monumental landscape built by the elite? How did they define themselves, individually and collectively? Which (new) socio-professional categories emerged at a specific period/place? What did they appear in our documentation?
• Close-up on the added value of art historical-materialist approaches. Especially welcome are communications using art historical analytic methodology to make sense of ancient artifacts to assess social rankings in terms of prestige and preciousness. Such perspectives will question the means used to access funerary commemoration: what was legitimate or accepted to borrow from elite culture? Which networks were used to commission their own funerary monuments? What was valued as prestigious and precious? Which tricks were used to make a less valuable material “look like” an elite object?
• A cross-cultural perspective. Scholars from other fields are welcome to share their research on other chrono-cultural contexts. These comparanda may help us to identify the specificities of ancient Egyptian/Nubian/Near Eastern societies and highlight culturally specific mechanisms at stake in these contexts.

Selected papers will be considered for publication in the conference proceedings. The deadline for manuscript submission is set shortly after the conference (February 2025).

Program

In our preliminary program, invited lectures will be delivered by:

• Prof. Dr. Kathlyn M. Cooney, Chair of Near Eastern Languages & Cultures Centre, University of California, Los Angeles;
• Dr. Delphine Driaux, Associate Researcher in Egyptian Archaeology, Institute of Egyptology, University of Vienna;
• Dr. Marta Kaczanowicz, Faculty member of the Archaeology of Egypt and Nubia Department, University of Warsaw;
• Dr. Juan Moreno Garcia, CNRS Research Director, UMR 8167 CNRS Orient & Méditerranée, Laboratoire “Mondes pharaoniques”, CRES;
• Dr. Miriam Müller, University Lecturer “Egyptian Archaeology, Art and Material Culture”, Universiteit Leiden;
• Dr. Aude Semat, Assistant Curator at the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, Egyptian Art Department;
• Dr. Nico Staring, F.R.S.-FNRS Postdoctoral Fellow, University of Liège, Belgium
  
  

Guidelines for abstracts

We invite proposals from scholars of all career stages. Proposals for papers should include:

• author’s name;
• affiliation;
• a short abstract (ca. 300 words), with selected bibliography.

Papers will be selected on the quality of the proposal, their relevance to the theme and their fit in the overall conference program. These should be sent by May 10^th 2024 to: NINO‑conference@hum.leidenuniv.nl.

Deadlines and dates

Disclaimers

The conference is organized on-site.

We will prioritize presentations delivered in-person at the conference, and we will consider online contributions only on exceptional basis.

We plan to livestream the conference, for those who cannot participate in person.

The organizing committee will review the submissions for the proceedings volume, which will undergo a peer-review process. Acceptance for presentation does not guarantee inclusion in the final publication.

Contacts and information

The call for papers, updates, instructions and other information will be posted on this event page.

For additional questions and information, please contact the organizing committee:
NINO-conference@hum.leidenuniv.nl; a.k.m.devillers@hum.leidenuniv.nl

Image credit: Reliëf met werkplaats (RMO inv. AP 40), Saqqara, Nieuwe Rijk. Courtesy of the Rijksmuseum van Oudheden, Leiden.