The Nahrein Network: New Ancient History Research for Education in Iraq and its Neighbours

Nahrein是阿拉伯语，意思是美索不达米亚——古代的“两条河流之间的土地”，位于今天的伊拉克和叙利亚北部。苏美尔、巴比伦和亚述的有文字的城市文化共同代表了重要的前半段历史，比希腊和罗马早了几千年。然而，它们也是一种新的古物，在19世纪和20世纪被考古学家重新发现，与该地区殖民主义和独裁统治的混乱政治纠缠在一起，无可挽回地纠缠在一起，现在又受到撕裂该地区的冲突的威胁。数百万美元的国际援助正被投入到中东地区受到威胁和战争破坏的文化遗产的记录、数字化和保护工作中，却很少考虑到当地的利益和影响。相比之下，Nahrein网络将使当地人能够将这些遗产作为当地的历史，并将其用于当地社区和经济的建设性用途。它旨在利用跨学科的人文科学研究和教育，帮助中东的大学、博物馆、档案馆和文化遗产地建设能力，在未来几年为本国的经济、文化和社会发展做出贡献。伊拉克和叙利亚战争的致命影响远远超出了直接冲突地区。但是，急需的紧急救济不应以牺牲长期经济和社会再生的规划为代价。网络伙伴教科文组织伊拉克将教育和文化确定为两个关键的行动领域，其中性别平等和学术孤立尤其令人关切，而联伊援助团的目标是通过文化对话促进社会和解。Nahrein将首先以伊拉克南部和库尔德斯坦为中心，在库尔德斯坦休勒大学（埃尔比勒）管理一个由Saad Eskander博士领导的研究中心，并在巴格达大学和巴士拉博物馆管理两个合作中心。第三年，在安卡拉英国研究所、黎凡特英国研究委员会（Council for British Research In the Levant）和英国波斯研究所（British Institute of Persian Studies）的帮助下，它将扩展到土耳其、黎巴嫩，如果安全的话，还将扩展到叙利亚和伊朗。在英国伊拉克研究所的支持下，在Strand 1中，我们将通过为国际、跨学科合作、培训、指导和同行团体支持提供各种选择，特别是为妇女、少数民族和早期职业研究人员提供各种选择，欢迎人文教育工作者和研究人员重返国际社会。在Strand 2中，我们将发布为期六个月的跨学科合作项目资助呼吁，向学者、文化遗产专业人士、非政府组织和社区团体开放。每次电话会议将讨论与核心团队自己的研究相关的五个总体主题的不同选择，以解决网络的五个主要目标（见目标）。这种排序将使研究项目能够借鉴和发展先前的研究成果，并使网络参与者能够灵活地对该区域的新发展作出反应。我们的目标是在项目团队提供适当的支持和专业知识与允许网络参与者在他们自己的研究和开发中发挥主导作用之间取得平衡。我们将鼓励广泛的传统和创新方法和产出，包括理论和实践。然而，重点将放在开放获取、同行评议的在线出版物上，例如通过伦敦大学学院出版社和开放丰富注释楔形文字语料库（oracc.org）。通过这种方式，我们将最大限度地提高网络研究结果的可访问性，同时为作者和读者提供高学术质量的保证。在Strand 3中，我们将设立五个工作组，每个Aim一个，以评估、分享和嵌入良好实践，并在网络的整个地理范围内提出政策建议。与合作伙伴一起，我们将确保获得资金，在更广泛的中东地区开展可持续的新一代高质量人文科学研究，并使其受益。

Nahrein is the Arabic word for Mesopotamia - the ancient "land between two rivers", centred on modern-day Iraq and northern Syria. The literate, urban cultures of Sumer, Babylonia and Assyria together represent the vital first half of history, millennia before Greece and Rome. Yet they are also a new antiquity, rediscovered archaeologically in the 19th and 20th centuries, irrevocably entangled in the region's messy politics of colonialism and dictatorship, and now threatened by the conflicts tearing the region apart.Millions of dollars of international aid are being pumped into the documentation, digitisation and conservation of threatened and war-damaged cultural heritage sites across the Middle East, with little thought for local interests and impacts. The Nahrein Network by contrast will enable local people to reclaim this heritage as local history, and to put it to constructive use for local communities and economies. It aims to harness interdisciplinary humanities research and education to help Middle Eastern universities, museums, archives and cultural heritage sites build their capacity to contribute to their countries' economic, cultural and social development in the years ahead.The wars in Iraq and Syria spread their deadly effects far beyond the immediate conflict zones. But much-needed emergency relief should not be at the expense of planning for longer-term economic and social regrowth. Network partner UNESCO Iraq identifies education and culture as two key Areas of Action, with gender equality and academic isolation as of particular concern, while UNAMI aims to aid social reconciliation though cultural dialogue.Centred initially on southern Iraq and Kurdistan, Nahrein will run a Research Centre directed by Dr Saad Eskander at the University of Kurdistan Hewler (Erbil) and two collaborative hubs at the University of Baghdad and Basrah Museum. In year 3 it will expand into Turkey, Lebanon and--if safe--Syria and Iran with help from the British Institute at Ankara, the Council for British Research in the Levant and, we hope, the British Institute of Persian Studies.With support from the British Institute for the Study of Iraq, in Strand 1 we will welcome humanities educators and researchers back into the international fold by offering varied options for international, interdisciplinary collaboration, training, mentoring and peer-group support, especially for women, minorities, and early career researchers.In Strand 2 we will issue six-monthly funding calls for interdisciplinary, collaborative projects open to academics, cultural heritage professionals, NGOs and community groups. Each call will address a different selection of five overall themes, related to the core team's own research, chosen to address the Network's five primary Aims (see Objectives). This sequencing will allow research projects to learn from and build on prior findings, and enable Network participants to respond flexibly to new developments in the region. We aim to strike a balance between providing appropriate support and expertise from the project team and allowing Network participants to take the lead on their own research and development. We will encourage a wide range of traditional and innovative methodologies and outputs, both theoretical and practice-based. However, the emphasis will be on open-access, peer-reviewed online publication, for instance via UCL Press and the Open Richly Annotated Cuneiform Corpus (oracc.org). In this way we will maximise accessibility of the Network's findings while providing authors and readers with the reassurance of high academic quality. In Strand 3 we will set up five working groups, one for each Aim, to evaluate, share and embed good practice, and make policy recommendations across the network's full geographical range. With partners we will secure funding to develop a sustainable new generation of high quality humanities research in and for the benefit of the wider Middle East.