The Eisenberg Institute launches its 2026-27 program and its twentieth anniversary with a talk on September 11, 2026, by associate professor Stephen Berrey (University of Michigan). 

"Our program for the upcoming academic year offers ample opportunity to understand both the deep past and the present in light of historical reflection," says Dario Gaggio, director of the Eisenberg Institute. "While we have foregone an explicit overarching theme, our roster of speakers will bring a historical lens to issues that are central to our public consciousness."

"A cluster of speakers will focus on the Middle East today and over the centuries. We will learn about the challenges facing Palestinian scholars and practitioners as they work to preserve their people's history in the face of violence and occupation. We have also invited one of the world's leading experts on the history of maritime trade in the Arabian Peninsula and the Persian Gulf. Other speakers' scholarly interests include the environmental history of the Ottoman Empire, and disability and difference in medieval Mesopotamia. We will welcome historians of the African American experience, of the global political left in the context of decolonization, of urbanism and city life in Africa, and of student activism in modern China."

The EIHS community invites partipants and audiences to engage in these rich collective discussions together. In Gaggio's words, "come take this historically informed tour of the world with us, and don't forget to ask the hard and urgent questions."

Additional information and links to the event calendar entries will be posted when available.

Please contact eisenberginstitute@umich.edu to subscribe to the institute's e-newsletter and receive the latest program information.

Fall 2026 Events

September 17 • 4 pm • Lecture
“Ordered to Leave”: Expulsion and the Origins of Jim Crow in Small-town America, 1890s-1920s
Stephen Berrey (University of Michigan)

September 25 • 12 pm • Symposium
The Politics of Memory and Palestinian Struggles for History: An Interdisciplinary Conversation
Diana Abouali (Arab American National Museum), Rochelle Davis (Georgetown University), Dario Gaggio (moderator)

October 1 • 4 pm • Lecture
Imagine Lagos: Rethinking the Histories of West African Cities in the Nineteenth Century
Ademide Adelusi-Adeluyi (Howard University)

October 2 • 12 pm • Workshop
Re/Imagining Pre/Colonial Space: (Speculative) Mapping and Layered Methodologies
Lara-Marie Frick, Gabrielle Ione Hickmon, Ezequiel Parra, Eric Toups (moderator)

October 29 • 4 pm • Lecture
Ottoman Roots
Samuel Dolbee (Vanderbilt University)

October 30 • 4 pm • Workshop
Environments, Empire, and More-than-Human Histories
Felipe Coimbra Moretti, Francesca Conterno, Leopoldo Martinez, Oto Gulbani, Melanie Tanielian (moderator)

November 12 • 4 pm • Lecture
The Tribute: The 1963 March on Washington and the Gendered Politics of Freedom
Marcia Chatelain (University of Pennsylvania)

November 13 • 12 pm • Workshop
Childhood, Gendered Affinities, and Structures of Power
Rachael Barrett, Ayriel Marie Coleman, Robert Diaz, Henry E. Chen, Kisha Simmons (moderator)

December 10 • 4 pm • Lecture
Race and Reckoning in the United States and Germany: Lessons from a Comparative Approach
Rita Chin (University of Michigan)

Winter 2027 Events

January 28 • 4 pm • Lecture
The Transatlantic Slave Trade and the (Multi)Racial Origins of Early Black Print in Ghana
Carina Ray (University of Michigan)

January 29 • 12 pm • Symposium
Participants TBD, Dario Gaggio (moderator)

February 11 • 4 pm • Lecture
Unpaid Debts: Non-Aligned Socialism and the Rise of Financialization after Empire
Giuliana Chamedes (University of Wisconsin–Madison)

February 12 • 12 pm • Workshop
Globalization, Internationalism, and Identity
Alif Kazi, Spencer Cook, Kehinde Sowunmi, Ian Shin (moderator)

February 25 • 4 pm • Lecture
Animal Rights and Slave Rights: Linked Discourses in Early Islamic Thought
Kristina Richardson (University of Virginia)

February 26 • 12 pm • Workshop
Recovering the Illegible: Bodies, Languages, and Marginality
Rebecca Sanders, James Kiselik, Israa Khalifa, Kathryn Babayan (moderator)

March 25 • 4 pm • Lecture
Student Activism Across Borders: China and the Communist World in the Late 1950s
Yidi Wu (Elon University)

March 26 • 12 pm • Workshop
Remediating Educational Institutions
Siwen Xiao, Zhaina Meirkan, Thomas Kestler, Saifullah Nasar, Joseph W. Ho (moderator)

April 22 • 4 pm • EIHS Public Lecture
Laleh Khalili (University of Exeter)