“Berkeley Lecture Series” Presents:
“The Satirical Journal Mullah Nasroddin and the Iranian Constitutional Revolution”
Speaker:
Evan Siegel
Date: Sunday, July 15, 2012
Time: 4:00 P.M.
Place: 110 Barrows Hall
University of California Berkeley
http://www.berkeley.edu/map/maps/large_map.html
The Iranian Constitutional Revolution of 1906 marked the first uprising in the Muslim world for a parliamentary democracy. This presentation looks at the revolution through the eyes of the satirical journal Mullah Nasroddin (Tiflis) which, since its inception in April 1906, followed this from the Muslim Caucasus. Although deeply hostile to the Iranian monarchy, the journal was deeply skeptical of the revolution, seeing it chiefly as a revolution of the old social classes in Iran. Tabriz’s eleven-month resistance against the forces of absolutism temporarily led to a flurry of enthusiasm, but the restoration of the constitution led to a return of the journal’s previous sarcastic attitude.
Evan Siegel has published and presented articles on Iran for a quarter of a century. His interests focus chiefly on Iran during the Constitutional Revolution. He has translated Ahmad Kasravi’s monumental work “History of the Iranian Constitutional Revolution”. He has carefully annotated it with material from the Constitutional press as well as the memoir literature of the time and other relevant documents. He has also published and presented articles on the early Caucasian Muslim press, focusing on the satirical journal Mullah Nasroddin. For more information please see his website: http://www.qlineorientalist.com/Evan
Lecture in English